I need some Phat runs!

[Holyroller4eva]

I attend a pentecostal church here in San Antonio, a small hispanic church to be exact, nither my church or I can afford a organ, I would settle for a c2, but of course I pray and fast for a B3. lol Well anyways, I have been playing piano for about 2-3 years, but this last year I have been desiring an organ. Well since i can't afford one I settled for a roland VK-8M organ sound module! And well Im positive it wont compare to a mouth watering hammond, at least its something ( Thank God!). It has nine drawbars and leslie, sounds great. well any ways, I have a question. Looking at some of the material here, is that you all write
 
pedal/LH/RH  

and well i was just wondering with is a young kid like me to do in a situatuion like that where i am to be with out pedals? please help!


also I need some phat runs to throw in with my preaching chords, PLEASE!!!!   my favortie keys are Eb Ab Db and anything else after that! Thankl You all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[B3Wannabe]

If you bought that vk8m brand new, I'm sure you could've bought a spinet from ebay or www.theaterorgans.com. The thing then would be getting it to the church. I have a Korg CX3 myself. It has 18 drawbars, no pedal bars and no leslie output. However, it IS one of the top-ranked organ clones out there, costing almost $2,000. I paid 1,800+ for mine. I love it though!

I recommend, if you bought your vk8m brand new to sell it and get a Hammond xk2, Roland vk-7 or vk-8, or Korg CX3 (vintage, it's cheaper but heavier).

The Hammond and Roland clones can connect straight to an 11-pin leslie. The Korg needs an adapter which runs about $300, but you can connect it to a regular amp.

They all allow you to connect a second keyboard, through midi, so you can have 2 manuals. The Korg, however, is the only one that doesn't allow you to connect pedals too. (I don't know where their mind was on this one.)

If you search on ebay, you can find either one of these for the price of a new vk-8m, so I think that's your best option....If you paid for it brand new. Otherwise, you can go with a cheapo spinet, which you can keep stationary and just use your keyboard.


Here are some pics of my Korg and the midi pedals that I made:
http://www.geocities.com/omniscientdeveloper/


Hope this helps....

[Suleyman]

How DID you make that pedalboard?!?!?  

[B3Wannabe]

I bought some organ parts, manuals, pedals, and drawbars from a guy on ebay ($200), and a midi circuit board from www.speakeasyvintagemusic.com (about $400)--If you look at the same midi pedals on their site, you'll see how expensive they are, so I saved a bundle! I could've saved more by ordering the midi board from the manufacturer. The instructions came with the circuit board, it was pretty straight forward. I just had to go in and cut some wires here and add some wires there. It took me a few hours to do the whole thing. I still have to rig something more secure for the midi board though. It sits in the space where all the wires were sitting, but I have it surrounded with cardbard, so it can't get shorted by the metal casing.

I'm altering my CX3's circuit board, so I can have an output port for a motion sound leslie speaker. I just bought one, also from ebay, and it should be here in a few days. Once it gets here, I can start testing the circuit paths. Like I told the Clonewheel group on yahoo, I'll let you all know if I fry my organ. (though that would really suck!!! but I think I can fix that too, just a few capacitors I'll have to replace. I'll just be organ-less for a few days.)


I'm going to use the manuals and drawbars to make a midi organ, using the B4 program for the chapel here.


Oh...I just sold that electro, on ebay, for $1100. Like I said before, I'm getting a yamaha p120 and a motif next month.  

[ee_guy]

Why doesn't the CX3 plug into the MS?  (1/4" to 1/4")

[B3Wannabe]

For sound output, you can do that, but to switch the rotor, you can't.
On a regular organ, you have the tremelo/chorale switch. This sends switching information to the leslie, so the upper and lower rotor can change speeds. On most clones, this function is built into the organ itself, and isn't a separate switch like on regular organs, so you can plug the leslie cable straight into the clone and do switching from the clone's panel. The CX3 can't do this, so you have to use an external switch, like normal or, in my case, try to modify the organ.

If that confused you, then simply it's this:

The MS speaker has two 1/4" main inputs, one for sound and one to switch the rotor.

[ee_guy]

Just curious what you were up to....

I run my B3 thru a MS KBR-M.  I built a box that lets either the fooswitch or the half-moon Leslie switch control the MS.  (It also has 3 status LEDS for speed).  I don't play pedals at church (i'm not happy about it...)

The KBR-M is a cool speaker.  I run my synths thru a 1402 Mackie board and into the "normal" channel on the KBR-M.  The "mixed" output of the KBR-M is them run to a Behringer mixer/splitter (in splitter mode).  From there, one output runs to the house mains, then I run an output back into the Mackie (on chs 3-4) where I mix it with the house signal, then thru a power amp and into a Carvin (some number... 15" + horn) monitor.  This lets me get that "right" mix.

I'd say that normally, the KBR-M would be loud enuf for the whole monitor job.  But I sit next to the drums, and even though they are behind plexi-glass, I need extra keys in my mix as I do run the KBR-M at low levels.  Also, the church (which we built 2 years ago) is a gym (basketball) used as a sanctuary, so you can imagine how bad the acoustics are!

[cakinbro]

Learn your blues, harmonic minor and melodic minors....for starters...practice them inside and out, up and down 2 octaves...