MIDI and my keyboard

[guitar kid]

I'm brand spankin' new to MIDI, so I might sound like I don't know what I'm talking about at times because, well, I don't. Anyway, my parents gave me this keyboard we've had for a few years when I started my home studio. It's the Kawai PN80. It has a few piano modes (like organ, strings, and harpsichord) and MIDI in and out jacks. Now, my question is can I buy a machine that allows me to play drum sounds, guitar sounds, etc. on the keyboard I have. If so, what are these machines called, and how much do they cost. I appreciate any responses.

[mutt]

Yes you can! You might want to get a synthesizer sound module. They start at around $300 new, but you could pick up a used one for around $150 - $200. A basic module would be the Alesis Nanosynth. Of course, the more sounds and effects you want, the more the module will cost. You will also need to buy a couple of midi cables to connect it to you keyboard. When you connect the module to your keyboard you will hear a combination of the sound from your keyboard and whatever sound you have dialed up on the module. If you turn the volume down on you keyboard you will only hear the module sound. Have fun!

[monty]

Or you could get a software synth and use a computer as a sound module.

[c7sus]

Guitar Kid... I'm far from an expert on this topic but I can help a bit here.

The first thing I would do is obtain a manual for that keyboard, if you don't have one already. You'll want this to learn how to make keyboard splits and layers, and especially to find out how to configure MIDI transmit and receive messages so your synth module can talk to your keyboard and vice versa. By configuring your keyboard transmit to "omni" mode and assigning the sounds from the synth module to one of the 16 MIDI receive channels available you will hear ONLY the selected voices from the module. Likewise, if you choose to sequence into your computer you can assign a channel for each sound and play back as many sounds simultaneously as your module will support.

I'm having good experiences with the Roland JV-1010 synth module, which also offers you one slot of expansion to load another card of sounds. It ships with EMagic Sound-Diver software that allows you to tweak the patches in your computer and download them back into the synth.

Another suggestion if you find yourself hooking up multiple MIDI devices is to look into a MIDI interface. MIDIman makes a cool 2-in, 2-out interface that connects to your computer through USB. One thing I learned about the 1010 is that it doesn't like to be daisychained with keyboards and drum machines.

The MIDIsport 2x2 by MIDIMAN is about $70.00, the Roland about $460 or so at Guitar Center.

Hope this helps.