SHPD: Roland GR55

[NickS]

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I've attached the GK3 pickup/controller to the old Hondo II LP copy for now as Roland provides a plate that fits on the tunomatic bridge and the control unit fits under the strap button, so no mods required. The eBay seller also sent me a link to a site where I can download other patches. So far, much fun.

[lorez]

wow thats looking great, how does the pickup work? is it converting to midi or is it an envelop follower (i use one with my eurorack)

[NickS]

There's an individual pickup for each string, so the GR55 takes the signal from each and processes it, effectively to MIDI. There are some interesting aspects.

- If the selected patch is piano, it will be corrected to standard pitch. This can be a bit weird if you have also have the guitar going through and it's not quite in tune, you get beat notes (this also happens if using pitch correction with a Boss VE-2 and the vocal mic picks up the guitar amp). If it's synth or sax or something like that, it tracks the input, so you can bend the note.

- Since there's a pickup for each string, there are patches where the voices are split across strings e.g. bottom 3 strings bass/baritone sax, top 3 strings brass ensemble. You can also use alternate tunings, rather like the Line 6 Variax guitars.

[Thomas]

Very cool. I was looking at a player grade 335 that’s got all the gubbins incorporated into the guitar so just needs the floor unit. Any chance of an demo?

[lorez]

if its midi whats the latency like? I love the idea of different voices for split strings. also can you route it to othe synths via midi or is it locked to roland apps? I can see this potentially being brilliant for some of my ambient stuff

[NickS]

if its midi whats the latency like? I love the idea of different voices for split strings. also can you route it to othe synths via midi or is it locked to roland apps? I can see this potentially being brilliant for some of my ambient stuff

I'll get back to you on that when I have a MIDI thing I can try it with. At the moment my only other MIDI thing (Yamaha PSS680) has been loaned to my son.

Very cool. I was looking at a player grade 335 that’s got all the gubbins incorporated into the guitar so just needs the floor unit. Any chance of an demo?

I am no Doog or Hurb but I may well have a go, probably after the weekend as we have a family visit.

[NickS]

One slightly disappointing thing; in their wisdom Roland have decided that this unit doesn't need MIDI sound module capability, unlike some earlier models (e.g. GR30).
[Edit]Nobody spotted it was a GR-55, not a GR-33, then...

[Doog]

if its midi whats the latency like? I love the idea of different voices for split strings. also can you route it to othe synths via midi or is it locked to roland apps? I can see this potentially being brilliant for some of my ambient stuff

I've got the GK-3 with the GK-20 floor unit and it's not terrible; as with most pitch-to-midi stuff, lower registers take slightly longer to track (I guess by virtue of the longer wavelength), so it's harder to get a lock-on.

This ridiculous example is using the built-in voices from the GR-20 straight to "desk", but it's about the same using the MIDI out on the GR20 into my Mac via MIDI-USB cable.

[lorez]

Thanks Doog, that sounds good. Nick, I look forward to hearing back from you.

[plopswagon]

That should definitely be a theme song for some hip sitcom.

[Doog]

That should definitely be a theme song for some hip sitcom.

*canned laughter*

[NickS]

So, still getting to grips with this but a brief run-down of what I've learned so far

The GR-55 provides two polyphonic PCM synth channels and a COSM guitar processing channel that's fed by two instrument inputs. One instrument input is the normal output from your guitar/bass and the other is the individual channels of the divided pickup ("V-guitar" input), also used to control the synths. Each of these can be selected on a per-patch basis and the synth output levels can be specified on a per-string basis. So in my user patches I can select the output level for PCM1 to be 60% for strings 1 and 2, 0% for strings 3 - 6 and vice versa for PCM2, giving me different instruments on those strings. You can route the guitar to be in the left/right outs or separately to a guitar out. A control on the GK-3 pickup allows you to select on the guitar whether to use V-guitar, both or guitar only. I still need to work out how I want to run that.

I still haven't been able to try the guitar-to-MIDI with a native MIDI device. Running it through MIDI-OX into MS General MIDI on my laptop is as bad for latency as using the RockBand MIDI guitar which is, in a way, encouraging as it suggests the issue is with my laptop setup. The MIDI can be standard 5-pin or USB. System setup for the hex pickup allows you to set the sensitivity for each string and they do give you a pretty thorough setup procedure.

USB sees it as an audio device as well so when you plug it into your PC/laptop it will tend to steal the audio in and out. In fact, although I can then select my internal speakers for sound out I can't select the laptop microphone for input. I have yet to work out why.

There are 99 x 3 user patch slots on the GR-55 plus the factory presets: 40 x 3 "Lead" patches, 40 x 3 "Rhythm" patches and 40 x 3 "Other" patches (which include sound effects and other weird stuff).
The GR-55 Librarian function allows you to upload and download user patches and preview them, so what I'm doing right now is working out what's been provided, working out why they do what they do, weeding out the duplicates and rearranging them so I can get e.g. clean, dirty and lead on foot switches 1, 2 and 3. Unfortunately, it seems you can't rearrange the seemingly random order of the factory presets. I haven't found out whether it's possible to copy a factory patch to a user patch yet. Most annoyingly the Librarian doesn't have a facility to print your user patch list.

[NickS]

I find that Maplin still exists online and has a case that would apparently suit the GR-55 at £21.61 delivered. I shall order one. Maplin doesn't appear to sell components and the website bears more than a passing resemblance to another defunct bricks-and-mortar operation, Office Outlet including identical pricing for the same RoC case. They're way cheaper than arch-tax-dodger Amazon.

Still working through patches to work out what's usable and what appears to have been put in as a demo. Some of the wind instruments PCM tones are really rather good - flute, oboe, saxophones - and respond to strength of plucking. Guitar modelling is also quite fun, with the ability to switch between modelled pickups on the modelled gutars. I just don't understand why the presets include random stuff ("hey, don't you think little bells would sound good with fuzz guitar?").

Another slight issue that may prevent you ditching all other pedals is that switching between patches takes a moment. You can, though, assign the "CTRL" footswitch switch or the expression pedal switch to enable/disable tones and effects - but also see the bit about switching using a MIDI controller below.

An excellent site for this stuff, not just the GR-55, is VGuitar forums. Andy, if you haven't come across it yet I can recommend it.
Setup and configs that affect tracking
Using a MIDI controller (Behringer FCB1010) to switch tones with no between-patch break

[NickS]

Well, here's that cheap case:

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It's big enough to take the GR-55 and PSU. The metalwork is a little thinner than a proper flight case, and the lid is not removable like a Stagg or Kinsman pedalboard/case, but it will protect the GR-55 from scratches in general use and storage. For £21.61 delivered I'm very happy.

[Bacchus]

the lid is not removable like a Stagg or Kinsman pedalboard/case,

Wonder how hard that would be to bodge...

[dots]

that unit is clean, nick. nice pick.

[Mike]

that unit is clean, nick.

MATRON!

[dots]

hey, take care of your gear, and it takes care of you!

[NickS]

I transferred the GK3 pickup to Matt's old Squier Strat and took it and the GR55 to band practice last night.

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The scratchplate already had extraneous holes so I didn't feel bad about drilling fixing holes through it for the pickup.

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I had to raise the neck the thickness of a credit card to fit the pickup under the strings and raise the bridge saddles, which is handy as it means there's less of the bridge saddle screws sticking up to irritate my hand.

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Very little adjustment was needed; there was already a Strat profile set up by the previous owner so that was handy.

The sitar sound was complimented ("Signed, Sealed, Delivered"). Using the guitar's own pickups through GR55 effects straight into the PA sounded dire, to be honest, very honky, so I need to see what's going on with that; it could be the PA we were using or maybe the tone pot wiring is wrong. I might disconnect the volume control as I keep knocking it while playing and I have a volume control on the GK3.

I need to get the presets in a convenient order for the big gig on Friday next week.