Korg Unveils New Kaoss Pad Quad, Kronos & Limited-Edition Wavedrum Oriental
Among new products introduced at Winter NAMM last week was Korg’s new Kaoss Pad Quad, which employs new effects, functions and features that let users create their own combination of Kaoss effects with simultaneous control of up to four effects in real-time.
Korg's new Kaoss Pad Quad ($350)
Each of the four effect modules – Looper, Modulation, Filter and Delay/Reverb – contains five options (plus a module kill), for a total of 1,295 combinations.
Users tap, slide or move their finger across the Kaoss Pad Quad’s X-Y touchpad interface, the effects parameters will change, producing real-time transformations in the sound. Any audio source can be processed, including an MP3 player, a mixing board, an instrument or vocals (for example) via the unit’s mic input.
In addition to more traditional effects (flanger, low/high-pass filter, delay and reverb), the Kaoss Pad Quad offers many new types of effects, including Multi-Mode Looper for looping a part of a song; the number of beats is controlled by the location touched, Vinyl Break turntable effects, which allow users to create all the standard turntable rotation effects, Ducking Comp, creating effects of a “ducking compressor,” and more.
The Korg Kaoss Pad Quad Dynamic Effects Processor will be available in February 2011 at an MSRP of $350. For more information, visit http://www.korg.com.
Korg also announced its new Wavedrum Oriental Dynamic Percussion Synthesizer, a limited edition version of Korg’s Wavedrum designed specifically for Middle Eastern music.
Featuring more programs than the original Wavedrum, the Wavedrum Oriental (and in this instance “Oriental” denotes Middle Eastern rather than Far Eastern) offers new, specialized algorithms and samples designed for the percussionist seeking the very highest quality Middle Eastern percussion sounds.
Find out more about the Wavedrum Oriental (available now, at an MSRP of $980) at http://www.korg.com.
And Korg also introduced its new flagship keyboard, the Kronos Music Workstation, which unites nine distinct sound engines plus new supporting technologies to provide a “versatile, yet fully integrated instrument.
The Nine Sound Engines include:
• SGX-1 Premium Piano: VMT (Virtual Memory Technology) Piano sound engine
• EP-1 MDS Electric Piano: Multi-Dimensional Synthesis Electric piano sound engine
• CX-3 Tonewheel Organ: Tonewheel organ modeling sound engine
• HD-1 High Definition Synthesizer: Flagship PCM, sampling and Wave Sequencing sound engine
• AL-1 Analog Synthesizer: High-fidelity analog modeling sound engine
• MS-20EX Legacy Analog Collection: Analog modeling sound engine
• PolysixEX Legacy Analog Collection: Analog modeling sound engine
• MOD-7 Waveshaping VPM Synthesizer: VPM, Waveshaping, and PCM processing sound engine
• STR-1 Plucked String Synthesizer: Physical modeling sound engine
New technologies added to support these engines include Korg’s VMT (Virtual Memory Technology), allowing Kronos to take advantage of huge piano, drum, and tape-based keyboard libraries. These long, un-looped samples play back directly from the internal SSD (Solid State Drive), without needing to be loaded into RAM.
For more information on the Kronos, which will be available in March, please visit http://www.korg.com/kronos.