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Roland Corporation




Roland Corporation is a .

Roland uses a number of additional Brand names for their products:

Roland company Slogan s:
  • Inspire the enjoyment of creativity

  • Be the ''best'' rather than the ''biggest''

  • We Design the Future



STRUCTURED/ADAPTIVE SYNTHESIS

Before 1986 attempts to reproduce the sound of the piano in digital instruments were based on sample based synthesis. This was done by Kurzweil in 1984 with its K250. It was expensive and not as sophisticated as today's digital piano sounds. Just two years after Roland introduced its Structured/Adaptive Synthesis.

SAS divided the keyboard into more than 30 zones where pitch, brightness, individual formant structures and string enharmonicities vary. It was unlike the pre-existing sample-replay systems. Roland engineers sampled and analyzed instruments' timbre with various pitches and velocities. They designed an algorithm that reproduced the necessary harmonics. It made possible to reproduce the sound of a grand piano better than with the other techniques available then.

The polyphony was 16, which was considered acceptable at the time.

Roland discontinued the original SAS in 1990 when Advanced SA was introduced. In 1996 a 64-voice stereo implementation was developed.


ROLAND'S NAME


It may seem strange for a Japanese company to have a Western name, but Roland was founded with export in mind. Ikutaro Kakehashi heard that the name of his previous company, Ace Electronic Industries Inc. , was often mangled in pronunciation, sometimes unpleasantly; so he looked for a good-sounding name which would be pronounced roughly the same in all of his major export markets. He found the name Roland in a telephone directory.

Ironically, the name is difficult to pronounce correctly in Kakehashi's native Japanese , which Does Not Distinguish The 'L' And 'R' Sounds As In English .

Roland was ''not'', as is often claimed, named after the French epic poem '' La Chanson De Roland ''.


TIMELINE OF NOTEWORTHY PRODUCTS

  • 's first commercial keyboard synthesizer.

  • -based echo machines ever produced.

  • 1973 - Roland SH-3A: Monophonic synthesizer.

  • 1975 - Roland System-100 : Roland's first attempt at a modular synthesizer.

  • 1976 - Roland System-700 : Roland's first professional-quality modular synthesizer.

  • . The first product in the musical instrument industry to utilize a Microprocessor .

  • 1977 - Roland GR-500 : The world's first commercial guitar synthesiser.

  • .

  • 1978 - Roland Jupiter-4 : Roland's first self-contained polyphonic synthesizer.

  • 1981 - Roland Jupiter-8 : This synthesizer put Roland in the forefront of professional synthesizers. A hugely successful 8-voice programmable analog synthesizer.

  • s; its distinctive analog sounds, such as its cowbell sound, have become pop music cliches, heard on countless recordings.

  • 1982 - Roland Juno-60 : Roland's first synthesizer with digitally-controlled analog oscillators.

  • " sound for House Music .

  • to support MIDI .

  • to support MIDI .

  • synthesizer designed to be worn hung around the neck with a strap, with an optional modulation attachment that protruded like the neck of a Guitar .

  • ) are still essential components of modern Electronic Dance Music . The first Roland drum machine to use analog sound synthesis combined with digital sample playback.

  • with digitally-controlled oscillators. Same synth engine as the Roland Juno-60 but with the addition of MIDI and the ability to transmit button and slider information through SysEx.

  • 1986 - Roland JX-10 : This was one of Roland's last true analog synths.

  • 1986 - Roland RD-1000 : Roland's first digital piano to feature Roland SA Synthesis technology {Link without Title} .

  • " synthesis (a form of Sample-based Synthesis combined with Subtractive Synthesis ). The D-50's descendants include the D-10 and D-20 synthesizers.

  • Games in the late 1980s and early 1990s as a high-quality music option, until support shifted to General MIDI Sound Card s.

  • and Casio . The E-20's descendants include the E-70, E-86, G-800, G-1000 and the current G-70.

  • 1989 - Roland Octapad : A set of visually distinctive electronic drum triggers.

  • 1990 - Roland HP-3700 : Roland digital piano {Link without Title} .

  • synthesizer.

  • 1991 - Roland JD-800 : Digital synthesizer with analog style knobs and switches.

  • 1996 - Roland MC-303 The first non-keyboard drum machine, sample based synthesizer and sequencer combination bearing the now generic term " Groovebox ".

  • 1996 - Roland XP-80 : 64 voice music workstation.

  • " synthesizer.

  • 1997 - Roland V-Drums : Digital drums incorporating 'silent' mesh drum heads that realistically reproduce both the natural feel and sound of an acoustic drum.

  • 1998 - Roland MC-505 : Successor to the MC-303 with a more powerful synthesizer and sequencer.

  • 2002 - Roland MC-909 : Successor to the MC Groovebox series featuring a full 16 track sequencer and built-in sampling.



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