Nord User Forum

[lovemahnord]

Just throwing this out there...I've never had any problem with the transpose feature. I find it extremely easy to do between songs, even on stage. Hell, I've transposed one-handed without looking...it's all about being familiar with your gear. While I agree a button for it would be nice, my last keyboard was a KORG Triton, and transposing on that involved something like 4 sub menus and touch screen BS.

[simonbeck]

I'm guessing that because the target customer-base for the Electro is largely people who want an authentic vintage keyboard experience, a key transpose feature would have been pretty low on the list of priority. After all, no real vintage keyboards had a transpose feature. I don't want to sound like a snob (for the first 25 years of my 33 as a keyboardist I had trouble playing in keys other than C, G, F, D, E and Bb,) but my first keyboard back in 1980 was a Hohner Pianet T electric piano. It had a 60-note keyboard, an output jack and NOTHING ELSE. No controls, no power supply, no sustain pedal and DEFINITELY no transposer! Imagine coming from 21st-century digital keyboards with full-colour LCD screens, auto-rhythms and multi-effects and being faced with that.

Actually, I did use a transpose feature. Just once. A few years ago I was depping with a Blues Brothers tribute band, using a Casio WK-3000. At the gig I was suddenly told that I had to play "Green Onions" in F, when all my life I've always played it in E. Never mind; hit a couple of buttons and my sound is a semitone up. I play the song, it works fine and everyone's happy. The next song is "Shake a Tail Feather", which starts with an unaccompanied Rhodes solo. I play it note-perfect, and the rest of the band slams in... a semitone flat. I forgot to reset the transposer. Never again.

Moral? Learn to play in the right key. You'll pick it up surprisingly quickly, and you'll be a better musician for it.

[reneshelle]

Why didn't they make it as a "shift-function" for the octave transpose. I'm sure that panic function could be placed elsewhere!

[Ritchie333]

The next song is "Shake a Tail Feather", which starts with an unaccompanied Rhodes solo. I play it note-perfect, and the rest of the band slams in... a semitone flat. I forgot to reset the transposer. Never again.

Been there, done that! Also started "Superstition" in E flat (which is the key it's supposed to be in) only for the band to come in in E (usually) or D (less often), or even F (WTF?) More recently I got up to do a few songs in a drums / keys / vocal trio, started "Valerie" in E flat only for the singer to come in in E (fortunately she and the audience took it in good humour).

When I first started playing keyboards in the late 80s, I made occasional use of the transpose feature, usually for things like C# to C, but when I got hold of a Hammond L100 in the early nineties, which of course didn't have a transpose, that stopped and I learned how to play in every key instead.

[theGman]

Wanting transpose buttons have little to do with one's ability...in my case, I can play fairly well "on the black keys", but when you start a song in an expected key, the key you have always practiced in, and right then, live, someone plays it a half step off, I would much rather quickly hit a button than play in a half step key in which I had never practiced even once.
You don't have to use it, but it is nice to have there for that kind of emergency.

[Cute James]

Great post about forgetting to reset the transpose!
That's caught me out on a couple of occasions too...

Adding a transpose 'shortcut' as SHIFT+OCTAVE UP/DOWN would be a great idea - I can't recall ever using the PANIC function.
Even implementing it as SHIFT+UP/DOWN (without selecting a menu setting) would probably work.

Cheers,
James
x

[doctorgeorge]

the rest of the band slams in... a semitone flat. I forgot to reset the transposer. Never again.

Ouch... had this happen to me about a year ago, only the other way around... the band plays an intro and I come in very dramatically with a big organ solo. It starts with a huge glissando upwards, so there's mostly just rumble and noise, and it ends at a minor sixth which I hold really long. Usually sounds really good, very dramatic. Didn't sound so good when I forgot that my transposer was a semitone off. It was dramatic though

I've since taught myself to be able to quickly adapt to any key. The transpose function can make you very lazy...

[hand solo]

i had a Nord Piano 88 which DID save the transpose within a single patch....Nice. my Electro 3 not so much. as mentioned in a previous post, the Electro 2 was easier to access Transpose with one step.

surprised my Stage EX doesn't save Transpose non-globally, does the Stage 2?

[Jvelez]

Hi Hanon,

Nord itself actualy reacted to my post so that was great!! They have helped me to fix the issue, so everything is back to normal now.

Thank a lot to Nord Technical Support of being so Pro-Active!

Greetings,


Bob

I,m having the same problem where c=EBay. How did you fix it?

[Rusty]

Some great comments, I am on the side that transpose is a major feature that should be easily accessible,
I've played for over 30 years but like to learn most songs in the original key, whether on black or white keys, so if the singer wants to throw two quick encores in but with the guitarist not being able to do a guitar swap between the two songs that he usually uses different guitars for then I'd have to play it a step lower to compensate, as I'm not going to relearn every song in different keys I'm happy to use the transpose key, on my korg and Roland keyboards the songs are already stored in the massive memory locations in both the original key and in the transposed keys making it a doddle to select and play with one button and even when the song is finished and I select the next one with one button, the keyboard reverts back to original key, no worrying about still being in a dropped key,
The nord would definitely appeal to a bigger audience if this were to be added to future models I'm sure,