REFACE CP Professional Keyboard

Having tried my hand at recording music through Ableton Live, I discovered and have enjoyed DAWless jamming. My current setup is this synth, along with it's brother Yamaha Reface DX, both controlled by a Novation Circuit Tracks. I enjoy the Circuit Tracks not only because of it's tones and workflow, but also because of it's portability. It has it's own battery which makes it nice for carrying to the various synths I own. As time passed, I began to use the Reface DX more and more since it can take batteries as well. I wished for one like it, then remembered seeing this Reface CS. I got lucky and found this here on Amazon. I am no expert at electronic synthesis, but I've been at it for over 10 years so I have some experience. I find this synth to be the most approachable one I've used to date. While this means this synth isn't the powerhouse that others are in this price range, this synth is still capable of a wide variety of tones and sounds great! One nuance that plays strongly to this is it is easy to dial in some historic tones. For example, choose a sawtooth for this synth's oscillator, max out the Texture and Mod slides, open up the filter and dial in some Resonance, and presto! You've got the classic "Supersaw" tone from rock songs in the 80's! Now, since this is a Reface synth, it has the same features as the others: Tiny onboard speakers that are better than nothing, but fail abysmally to showcase these devices' awesome tones, mini 37 keys that I'm sure some would gripe about the feel (I'm fine with them...When I use them), and the odd mini SV port that splits into DIN MIDI in and out via an included dongle. While I run both Reface synths on battery power, I very much appreciate the fact that Yamaha also includes a DC power supply as well. Between this and my other pieces of gear, I have oodles of tonal flexibility. Since this synth can be hard set to be monophonic or polyphonic, even playing it unsequenced is easy. I also gratefully note that just like the Reface DX, this CS behaves perfectly fine being sequenced by the Circuit Tracks. I've been having a blast playing this with the Reface DX and Circuit Tracks and I can't help but wonder how my synthesis journey would have turned out had I started with this CS instead of a MicroKorg and Novation MiniNova. Those are excellent synths but have a steep learning curve if you're new to electronic synthesis. I take pride in the fact that I stuck with them until I figured out how to use them, but I wonder how different it would have been had I started with this CS, given how much more approachable it is. I have one major gripe with this synth though: Programming it is a pain!! I needed it to send and receive MIDI commands on channel 4. Since the Reface DX has a screen, programming that to channel 3 was easy. A quick internet search found detailed instructions for programming this CS via SysEdit commands by connecting it to a PC. I didn't want to bother with that, and kept looking. Thankfully, a gentleman on YouTube has a short, concise video on how to program the CS with regard to MIDI channels. It took me a couple of tries but I finally got this synth dialed in to send/receive MIDI on channel 4, and it's worked fine ever since. But, this is the most un-user friendly side of this synth. Finally, I haven't had this synth for very long, but I've had my Reface DX for a few years and even despite some rough handling and drops, it works perfectly fine, so I expect the same from this one!

I was pleasantly surprised by the build quality and weight of this tiny keyboard. It's more weighty than you think so doesn't slide around everywhere while playing it. The sound is great on all organ types, although the vibrato is horrendous unless you just stick to the vox types. So if you're expecting vb3 or genuine Hammond scanner vibrato this won't cut it. Overdrive and percussion are great and the Leslie SIM is very useable. Polyphony is amazing not that you'd be using two hands on such a tiny keyboard but it is possible. Even drops the 1' drawbar when using percussion as it should do, leaving fast registration changes at the touch on a button. Has a lovely reverb too. What's more it can be midi'd up to a full size keyboard very easily if you struggle with the mini keys. They do take some getting used to but perfectly playable. The octave shift is another great feature. Give one a try, if you don't like it send it back. Nothing to lose really. I've been playing Hammond organs since is was 11 yrs old, I'm now 63 so you could say I speak from experience.

Top Produkt in Yamaha Qualität. Toller Sound und tolles Interface. Dank hochwertigem Display und Touchscreen sehr intuitiv zu bedienen. Ja es ist ein DX-7 und er hat Style. Habe auch einen Volca FM-2, ebenfalls super aber der Yamaha ist edler auch wenn manche Presets albern sind.

Der CS hat die gleichen Vorteile wie die anderen Instrumente der Reface Serie (kleine aber gute Keys und Speaker, Batteriebetrieb, wertige Verarbeitung, ordentliche Effekte), dazu schreibe ich nichts mehr. Zwei zusätzliche Nachteile des CS haben mich zum Abzug von 2 Sternen und zur Rückgabe bewegt. 1) der Klang. Ich habe einige analoge Vintage Synthesizer und der CS klingt einfach nicht gut, viele Software Plugins klingen besser. 2) die (je nach Oszillator unterschiedlich belegten) Type und Texture Parameter (z.B. Sync, PWM, etc.) machen die Oszillator Sektion viel komplexer als bei den analogen CS Synthesizern der 70er Jahre, aber sorgen gleichzeitig dafür, dass man einen eingestellten Sound nie wieder reproduzieren kann, jedenfalls nicht ohne MIDI Sysex Dump, da der CS ja leider keine Speicherplätze hat.

Ce petit clavier est immédiatement plaisant. Look vintage, pas d'écran / menu / etc.... un truc qui ne demande qu'à être branché ou mis sur piles et hop. Les sonorités d'orgues sont top, on se fait plaisir immédiatement. Idéal pour faire une jam avec un gratteux sans ramener un clavier, son stand, son ampli et j'en passe. Super intuitif. Le clavier est très jouable. Seuls inconvénients, les haut parleurs intégrés souffrent un peu sur certain sons d'orgues dans les notes basses. Par ailleurs, l'option mini-din pour le midi avec son adaptateur fourni ne me semble pas génial à la longue, je ne l'utiliserai pas parce qu'à mon avis c'est supra fragile. Bon, j'ai commandé son frère le Reface CS et je pense me prendre aussi le CP, je trouve le concept de ces claviers tout à fait génial, se concentrer sur la portabilité et la jouabilité pour des claviers spécialisés sur quelques sons, c'est précisément ce qu'un ordi ne fera pas. Merci Yamaha.