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Excellent digital sampling keyboard from 1986. This was Roland’s version of the “Fairlight”, with the ability to hook up video monitor, control tablet and various other functions to the machine.
A demo by reader Alex Stone from St. Petersburg, Russia
“I used when recording discs Vol1 (orchestr sounds), Vol2 (orchestr sounds), Vol8 (Vintage), and other disks from the library EIII, as well as discs for EIII (drums), the firm NorthStar. Once programmed EIII, separate each track recorded on a portable studio with a hard drive. And then, with the imposition of various internal and external effects on the tracks recorded on CD-ROM. The composition is called “Alex Stone – Lux Aeterna (Clint Mansell cover)”
Here is the Korg DSS-1, an 8-voice, 16-oscillator sampler/synthesizer from the mid-1980s. This is an extremely deep machine – the editing capabilities are endless!
This was a very respectable sampler for the time, and utilized 3.5″ double side/double density floppy disks – like many of its counterparts. The internal memory of the DSS-1 can contain up to 32 patches at once, but there are four “Systems” named A, B, C and D (blocks of 32 patches each) on a disk, so one can save up to 128 patches on one diskette.
The DSS-1 features the typical Korg joystick, perfect for controlling pitch-bend, vibrato, filter modulation and other effects. Keyboard controls include velocity, aftertouch, and key transpose – all programmable. These features add a great level of expressivity to this instrument.
Like for the majority of samplers, it’s possible to assign (and split, layer etc) several individual samples to the keyboard (multi-sampling). The DSS-1 allows a maximum of 16 individual samples (although you can stretch it to 30 splitting the oscillators), and it’s possible to use any sample, at any of the available frequencies, and/or mix and match with the created ones via additive/hand drawn. Korg refers to this as a “multisound”. The DSS-1 can sample at four frequencies: 16kHz, 24kHz, 36kHz, and 48kHz.
Additionally, the DSS-1 can create new waveforms (one full cycle only – turning on the loop on/off parameter is needed to hear anything), in two ways: Additive Synthesis, and “Hand Drawn” (moving slider A to shape the waveform). There are many parameters to shape the newly created waveforms. I am including a few audio examples from both the Additive and Hand-Drawn methods below in the review.
Once a sample/multisound is created, it’s possible to edit many parameters, including very good-sounding VCF and VCA. The effects include equalizer, and two DDLs (Digital Delay Lines). These can be used in a variety of ways, often contributing greatly to the general sound of the DSS-1.
Korg DSS-1 audio demos
Additive Synthesis audio demos:
Hand Drawn audio demos:
Check out the original Korg DSS-1 Sound Library page for more audio demos from this wonderful machine.
This box is the bomb! I am very fond of “lower grade” samplers, because of the characteristics they add to samples. One of my favorite samplers is still my Roland W-30, which samples at a maximum of 30kHz – very similar to this little Korg sampler.
The ES-1 is part of the first wave of Electribes, together with the ER-1 drum machine, and EA-1 synth. It is a rhythm sampler, very immediate and easy to use. The on-board effects are phenomenal, especially the most “extreme” ones like Ring Modulation, Distortion, and Decimator. The separate Delay is musical and lends itself very well to electronica styles.
The concept of Motion Sequence is superb, and it’s possible to record and play back your edits and “tweaks” in real time –
The sampling memory is a generous 90 seconds. I know that this doesn’t sound much in these days of gigabyte-streaming soft-samplers, but compared to old school samplers, is certainly more than adequate… plus, this is not meant to be a full fledged sampler, but a sampling drum machine, so the majority of sounds you will load in it will be extremely small drum, percussion and effect samples…
It’s now been superseded by the ES-1 MkII and the new ESX1, but it’s definitely a very useful piece of equipment.
The successor to the A3000. The A4000 (and its bigger brother, the A5000) is an exquisite-sounding sampler. It’s truly a powerhouse and comes with a very large library of sounds on CD-ROMs. This line of samplers came out in 1999, just before the soft synth and soft sampler craze started. The on-board effects in particular, make this machine very unique, and its “sonic character” is warm, imparting some sort of “analogness” to sounds sampled into it.
This sampler was embraced by the dance community – especially because features like loop divide, and the numerous great-sounding effects make it especially adept to House, Dance, Techno and Trance.
Yamaha A4000 audio demos
The Yamaha A4000 comes with four demo floppy disks, and several CD-ROMs full of sounds:
Demonstration floppy disk 1 ”A4000-A5000”Demonstration floppy disk 2 ”Rainkiss”Demonstration floppy disk 3 ”A-Dream”Demonstration floppy disk 4 ”CheckMe!”
Piano / Keyboards (from the included Factory CD-ROM PSLCD-101)
Guitar / Bass (from the included Factory CD-ROM PSLCD-102)
Brass / Wind Instruments (from the included Factory CD-ROM PSLCD-103)
Strings / Choir (from the included Factory CD-ROM PSLCD-104)
Real Drums (from the included Factory CD-ROM PSLCD-105)
World / Latin Instruments (from the included Factory CD-ROM PSLCD-106)
Syntraxx / Loops (from the included Factory CD-ROM PSLCD-201)
DJ / Producer Tool Kit (from the included Factory CD-ROM PSLCD-202)
Standards – Yamaha Professional Studio Library
The A4000 also comes with a CD containing software and the rest of the tracks are high-quality samples taken from popular sample CDs, from noted sample manufacturer AMG.
