PSR Keyboards (11 Boards) > PSR-E Series
User songs
SciNote:
Yes, I haven't experimented too much with loading SMF files into my keyboard -- a similar vintage PSR-E433 -- but it makes sense that auto accompaniment would not work with playing back an SMF file. The auto accompaniment feature is meant to take your left-hand keyboard input and create background styles on the fly, changing chords with respect to the notes you play with your left hand. As has been already discussed, playback of an SMF file is "static" -- in that it does not allow changes to the chords once it is recorded, stored on the keyboard, and played back. At that point, it's much like playing a song on a CD -- you just listen to what's recorded. For auto accompaniment, it would just need to be recorded when the SMF is recorded -- all of the background drums and instruments -- but once again, the notes and chords of these SMF recordings would be "fixed" and unable to be changed while being played back on the keyboard.
With that said, as long as the keyboard allows you to play along with the SMF, you should still be able to use various SMF's as song-specific backgrounds, as long as the notes (including drums) being played with the SMF and the notes you are playing manually do not exceed the maximum polyphony of the keyboard. You would just record the SMFs with the desired backgrounds, instruments, and drums, using a desired chord progression. And then when you play it back, you should be able to play along with it as if it were a style. But like you said, you would not be able to improvise beyond the chord patterns and number of measures recorded, and if you made a mistake while playing, you'd have to remember that the SMF background will just keep on playing, and you'll have to figure out where in the song it is so that you can catch up with it.
It seems to me that you can record songs on the keyboard using the built in recorder and save them to USB as an SMF (I know this can be done on my E433 -- not sure about the E333). At that point, I would imagine you could transfer the SMF to just the general flash memory. And I would think that you could record SMFs on other keyboards and computers and utilize styles not built in to the E333, and that as long as it all can be saved as a standard SMF, you should be able to load those into the E333, as well.
johnluke:
--- Quote from: SciNote on April 27, 2021, 11:36:41 PM ---With that said, as long as the keyboard allows you to play along with the SMF, you should still be able to use various SMF's as song-specific backgrounds, as long as the notes (including drums) being played with the SMF and the notes you are playing manually do not exceed the maximum polyphony of the keyboard. You would just record the SMFs with the desired backgrounds, instruments, and drums, using a desired chord progression. And then when you play it back, you should be able to play along with it as if it were a style.
--- End quote ---
Thank you SciNote, this is actually exactly what I was thinking at as a backup solution: to include ACMP in the .smf recording and then playback the midi songs with keyboard in "split" mode, either using the left hand to add bass-lines, extra chords/harmony (as long as polyphony and my dummy tecnique allow...), effects or (most of all) program changes for the main voice (nothing new I know).
Not wanting to emulate performances achievable with much higher level full-customizable machines, I guess a pre-recorded rhythm, variations and harmonization layer may free up some more resources (one hand at least!) to give slight more personality to performances and covers, provided that this way we are not in full control of the performance itself anymore but have to follow up the fixed structure of the .smf song.
A good new I found during my research (not a secret for anyone minimally skilled!) which is still pushing me in favour of exploiting the E333 .smf capabilities is that I can use my Ipad to connect with the instrument in order to exchange files, and not necessarily a PC, with MusicSoft ios app (tried it, and works well).
I will continue in my trial and error journey and will keep you posted. :)
johnluke:
I have a good thing to report and a bad one.
The good one is that it works! So that I can record a song with rhythm, styles and chords, and then playback that with keyboard in split mode so that I can forget about chords and either gain: one more track (left hand) to give extra “personality” to the performance [or] some free fingers for more effective and comfortable program changes for the main voice.
The annoying one is that the E333 doesn’t transfer .smf songs to a PC (or ipad in my case) individually but in bulk together with the whole backup, so that in a big single file. And this backup file cannot be loaded into the instrument flash memory but only in the system folder, meaning I can say goodbye to my ideal 256 song pack and instead will have to live with 5 songs at the time (the maximum number included in the system memory as user songs). After that in order to load more songs I have to upload to the E333 another backup file to overwrite the previous one which gives me 5 more songs to play with. Which is annoying but affordable as long as I play for myself and doesn’t want to entertain a live public with any gig :)
Reasons why I am not spending maybe 300-400€ for a newer, full-capable and up-to-date instrument in order to overcome all of these machine limits are unknown, though. :)
SciNote:
So, yeah, I took a look at the manual online for your PSR-E333, and I looked at my manual for my PSR-E433, and there really is a magnitude of difference when going from the E333 to the E433. I was previously thinking that maybe you could do some of the things that can be done on the E433, but unfortunately, the ability to read and write data is quite a bit reduced on the E333.
The E433 does allow you to take, individually, the songs that you record on the multi-track sequencer, and then save them directly as an SMF on to a USB flash drive, whereas the E333 does not appear to have the "USB-to-device" port to allow this -- it can only do the back-up data dump you described to a computer.
Maybe there is a utility program that could extract the song data from the back-up file and then turn it into an SMF? While I don't see why that wouldn't be possible, I'm thinking that the existence of such a program might be a bit of a long shot.
Otherwise, we're back to just creating your desired SMF's "off-board", meaning creating them right on a computer, or on another instrument, and then loading those SMF's into the SMF memory slots on your E333. Beyond that, I don't know how much memory a whole-song SMF would take, so while the E333 may allow for 256 SMF slots, there may not be enough memory/storage to store that many SMF's if they are all full-length songs -- or even just the background tracks of full-length songs.
You may want to consider upgrading to an E400 series keyboard -- an E433 or later (as I'm pretty sure the E433 was the first to offer the USB-to-device port). It would still be considerably less than something like a PSR-S670 or PSR-SX600, and beyond the more advanced data input/output options, you really do get a significant upgrade in other features, as well, such as a six track recorder, live-control knobs, and synthesizer functions like filter and envelope generator. However, you would not get a significant (if any) boost in onboard memory/storage. My PSR-E433 has 1.54MB of storage onboard, which is about what is on your keyboard, based on what was posted earlier.
johnluke:
--- Quote from: SciNote on May 01, 2021, 04:01:49 PM ---So, yeah, I took a look at the manual online for your PSR-E333, and I looked at my manual for my PSR-E433, and there really is a magnitude of difference when going from the E333 to the E433. I was previously thinking that maybe you could do some of the things that can be done on the E433, but unfortunately, the ability to read and write data is quite a bit reduced on the E333.
The E433 does allow you to take, individually, the songs that you record on the multi-track sequencer, and then save them directly as an SMF on to a USB flash drive, whereas the E333 does not appear to have the "USB-to-device" port to allow this -- it can only do the back-up data dump you described to a computer.
Maybe there is a utility program that could extract the song data from the back-up file and then turn it into an SMF? While I don't see why that wouldn't be possible, I'm thinking that the existence of such a program might be a bit of a long shot.
Otherwise, we're back to just creating your desired SMF's "off-board", meaning creating them right on a computer, or on another instrument, and then loading those SMF's into the SMF memory slots on your E333. Beyond that, I don't know how much memory a whole-song SMF would take, so while the E333 may allow for 256 SMF slots, there may not be enough memory/storage to store that many SMF's if they are all full-length songs -- or even just the background tracks of full-length songs.
You may want to consider upgrading to an E400 series keyboard -- an E433 or later (as I'm pretty sure the E433 was the first to offer the USB-to-device port). It would still be considerably less than something like a PSR-S670 or PSR-SX600, and beyond the more advanced data input/output options, you really do get a significant upgrade in other features, as well, such as a six track recorder, live-control knobs, and synthesizer functions like filter and envelope generator. However, you would not get a significant (if any) boost in onboard memory/storage. My PSR-E433 has 1.54MB of storage onboard, which is about what is on your keyboard, based on what was posted earlier.
--- End quote ---
Thanks SciNote for the comments,
you're totally right and I'm seriously considering to upgrade.
Actually there were(are?) a couple of reasons preventing me from getting a new machine (let's count them as "cons"). First, I spent too much time in my life chasing around the newest technology and forgot about playing, that is the true enjoyiment. Too many nights programming and reading manuals and too little time hitting the keyboard :)
Second, I somehow appreciate the simplicity and minimalism of entry level machines, they tend to push your creativity and skills to the limit and it's always satisfactory to achieve anything decent from them (PS - I spent the last year having fun with an F51 before grabbing back my daughter's PSR-E333 as she's 16 now and music is not anymore on top of her thoughts - for now at least ;))
However I have to rationally consider that the newer models do have a few features which would definitely make my like easier and would not necessarily make me a compulsory shopper again (here they are the "pros"), such as the USB function (I can forget about wiring and cabling PC and iPad) or the Memory keys which - if I get it right - with just one touch would make changes in real time to voices, styles, functions setup, effects and all the rest, making it possible to introduce much more colour and variations to the performance (which is something I'm definitely looking for as I tend to play 70-80-90 synth-pop with all its bells and whistles and typical sounds). And then I saw that it's possible to mute tracks while playing styles which would probably allow me to somehow finetune the arrangement sound without necessarily having to bear organ riffs or brasses everywhere.
In any case I feel that a relatively little upgrade is actually required from my side according to my limited needs, so that maybe I'll be actually looking into a PSR-E4xx series model or similar, but not really much beyond.
Will let you know - thanks all!
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