Step 3 - Pick a Style

One of the most important aspects of an "arranger" keyboard is that it includes various musical styles that you can use to accompany your playing.  The PSR-2000 includes 181 preset styles while the PSR-1000 has 169 preset styles.  The newer PSR-2100 has 203 preset styles and the PSR-1100 has 187. The Exploring section of the PSR Tutorial provides a complete list of all the styles in the PSR-2100 and the PSR-2000.  The styles are grouped into 8 categories, one of which is for styles that you save in the keyboard ("USER").  Press any of these style category buttons to bring up a list of 10 styles in that category on the main screen.

The MAIN Screen

You can also select a style from the MAIN screen.  We might as well look at this screen now, because it is one of the primary tools you use to see how the keyboard is setup and to instruct the PSR how you would like it to be setup. There are five buttons on the left, labeled [A] - [E], and five buttons on the right, labeled [F] - [J].  Next to each button is a small window describing one of the features of the keyboard setup.  The window next to button [D] is for the STYLE.  It shows the currently selected style, the beat (4/4) and the tempo.  Pressing button [D] brings up the STYLE selection screen. I'll discuss some of the other options on the MAIN screen as we get to them.

As an illustration, press the [DANCE] category button. The STYLE selection screen now appears and it looks like the one shown here if you have a PSR-2000. If you have a different model, the particular styles shown may differ slightly from those shown in this illustration. There are 10 "Dance" styles shown. To select a style, click the lettered button next to the style name [A] - [J]. The name of the style you have selected is now highlighted. If you press a different lettered button, the highlight moves to that style to show that it is now the "selected" style. To exit this STYLE selection screen and return to the MAIN screen, press the [EXIT] button located below and to the right of the center display screen. You could also return immediately to the MAIN screen by double-clicking (press the button twice quickly). This closes the STYLE screen and takes you to the MAIN screen without having to press [EXIT].

The EXIT Button

The MAIN screen is the primary, top-level screen on your keyboard. When you select various options from that MAIN screen, the display is replaced with a different display. In the case above, you saw the STYLE screen display. Some of these displays may lead to yet other displays. It is like stepping down through a hierarchy of options. To go back one step to where you came from, you would press the EXIT button. If you keep pressing the EXIT button, you will always wind up, eventually, back at the MAIN screen. So, if you are ever confused about where you are, just press EXIT one or more times to get back to the MAIN screen.

Screen Folders and Pages

Let's go back to that STYLE screen once more and look at it a little more closely. Below the 10 styles, you seen a folder icon and the word "Dance". This tells you that these styles are located in a folder called "Dance." Right below that, you see P1, P2, and P3. P1 is highlighted. These stand for "Pages" in the Dance folder. Each page shows 10 entries. In this case, 10 Dance styles. However, there are more Dance styles in the keyboard than just these 10 so it will take more than 10 "pages" to see all of the available Dance styles. 10 more styles are shown on P2. The remaining Dance styles are shown on P3. Before explaining how to select a different page, let's look at the other options shown on this page.

File Operations

Right below those "pages" is another row of options. You use these options to instruct the keyboard about how to handle any particular file. A "style" is actually a "file" in the keyboard. Files can be deleted, or saved, copied, or pasted, and, of course, named. On the example we are looking at now, you are viewing the internal "preset" styles in the keyboard. They can not be deleted so the DELETE options is grayed out. Nor can you rename or cut these files so these options are also grayed out. From this particular screen, all you could do was COPY the style selected or move up and out of the Dance folder. Both of these options are highlighted and available to you. All of the file "screens" you encounter when using your PSR will have these options and, depending on the context in which you see them, the relevant options will be available to you. Right now, you aren't going to do anything with the file options, but you might want to see what is on Page 2. How to you make selections?

Numbered Buttons

Notice the 8 buttons located directly below the main screen. They are numbered from [1] to [8]. Actually, there are 16 buttons since there is a button Above and another button Below each number.  Options in the two rows of information at the bottom of the main screen are selected by using these numbered buttons. The buttons Below the numbers select the options at the Bottom of the screen - the file operations mentioned above. The buttons Above the numbers select the options on the row right above the last row - the page options.

On the STYLE screen shown above, you saw that there are three pages of Dance styles available, labeled P1, P2, and P3.  P1 is currently visible.  To see what is on P2, you would press the button Above the number 2, i.e. [2A].  To see the remaining styles, press [3A].  To go back to the first page, press [1A].

For the moment, ignore most of the file options (NAME, CUT, COPY, PASTE, DELETE, SAVE, and NEW).  The last option, UP, however, is useful.  If you select this option, by pressing the [8B] button (the button below #8), you go UP and out of this Dance folder. The higher-level STYLE screen you see has a bunch of FOLDERS, one of which is labeled DANCE.  The folders correspond to the style categories that you see on the keyboard under the STYLE buttons.  To see the LATIN styles, for example, just press the button next to LATIN and the Latin styles on page 1 will be visible.  This is the same page you see when you press the LATIN button under the style categories. So, you can go to another category of styles by pressing that particular STYLE button or by moving up in the STYLE screen and selecting the appropriate style folder from there.

Go ahead and select any style you want and then return to the MAIN screen. The MAIN screen will show the style you selected in the little STYLE window next to button [D].