# Anyone here getting the new Yamaha Montage ?



## muziksculp (May 3, 2016)

Hi,

Just curious to know if anyone on this forum is planning to get the new
*
Yamaha Montage* ? 

https://www.yamaha.com/us/namm/2016/montage.aspx

I'm looking forward to get the _Montage 7_ once they begin shipping. (I already Pre-Ordered one from Sweetwater). 

Cheers,
Muziksculp


----------



## dpasdernick (May 26, 2016)

The Montage looks really cool. Billed as a combination of sampled sound sets married with FM. I love FM so I was intrigued and then I had an epiphany. The Yamaha SY77, TG77 and SY99, all very old synths, marry sampled sounds with FM. Now arguably the Montage has more horsepower and the entire Motif sound library but the concept is very similar. Of course if you give the thing a "Super Knob" it could make it seem more appealing...


----------



## chimuelo (May 26, 2016)

It's an impressive achievement.
But I hope such an investment will be supported if sales aren't as hoped for.

Motion sequencing is what I do on my synths but having this built into to a ROMpler is rather unique and far more exciting than Pad Scratchers and their Roli controllers....


----------



## muziksculp (May 26, 2016)

Hi,

The Yamaha Montage sounds amazing !

I got my Montage 7 just a few days ago, and so far loving it. It is quite a deep instrument. Lots of possibilities for sound design, and a great performance keyboard.

I'm just beginning my journey of discovering this new marvel from Yamaha. Given that most of the emphasis here is Sample Libraries, (mostly Kontakt based), a Rompler like the Montage is not the most popular tool around this forum. But, I'm still old-fashioned, and love using, and programming HW Romplers. With the FMX engine the possibilities are quite endless. Lots of power under the hood. The Super Knob is pretty cool, although I have not gotten to program it yet, but I think that alone can keep me busy for years.

I am hoping that Steinberg/Yamaha will bring the Montage Integration closer to Cubase, (Most likely when Cubase Pro 9) is released. I feel they didn't focus much on the Integration with Cubase Pro 8. i.e. (It doesn't provide control surface functionality for Cubase Pro 8, which you would think would be something they would have done, given that the Montage doesn't have a sophisticated onboard Pattern-Sequencer like the Motif Line).

Anyways..so far no one on this forum has indicated that they are getting. or have a Yamaha Montage. So, I might be the only forum member with a Super-Knob Synth for now  , also changed my forum Avatar to the cool Super-Knob. 

Cheers,
Muziksculp


----------



## whinecellar (Aug 30, 2016)

muziksculp said:


> ...Anyways..so far no one on this forum has indicated that they are getting. or have a Yamaha Montage...



You know, I haven't even glanced at a hardware synth for the better part of a decade, other than my Access Virus. I feel like software (heck, Omnisphere alone) has far surpassed anything in the hardware realm, and that hardware is a waste of money.

HOWEVER. As a Yamaha-endorsed artist who works for a high-profile Yamaha artist, I found out they sent him a Montage to check out. So I started listening to demos, and I gotta say - WOW - that thing may be the first hardware synth I buy in a LONG time. Not for anything sample-based, but for the synth textures. It sounds like Omnisphere in hardware. Not as deep of course, but as a performance instrument, it looks like they knocked it out of the park. Every review I've read is calling it the biggest synth advance in a long time, and it looks like they might be right. Very cool piece of gear! So, I may join you @muziksculp and be the second person here to have one


----------



## re-peat (Aug 30, 2016)

whinecellar said:


> So, I may join you @muziksculp and be the second person here to have one


The third, Jim. (Not counting those who prefer to keep it a secret.) Mine arrived a few weeks ago.

_


----------



## muziksculp (Aug 30, 2016)

Cool ! 

So we got a few more Montage users on this forum now 

Oh.. The *FM-X* Engine of the Montage sounds Awesome !


----------



## whinecellar (Aug 30, 2016)

re-peat said:


> The third, Jim. (Not counting those who prefer to keep it a secret.) Mine arrived a few weeks ago.
> 
> _



Ha - well, I stand corrected then


----------



## whinecellar (Aug 30, 2016)

Forgot to ask @re-peat - your thoughts? Assuming you don't want to keep them a secret of course


----------



## FrankIV (Sep 6, 2016)

i owned one about a month and 1/2 ago. it was a great board, but i primarily work with vst instruments for film composing, so it didnt really apply to my work, since you cant run the sounds and effects directly into a DAW as a VSTi (at least not until they release some kind of interface like the Motif xf8 supposedly has). though, im sure you can still record it using a usual audio out method. so ultimatly i would have just paid $4000 for the keys and mod/ pitch wheel.

Now, excluding that personal dilema, it was a fantastic board.

i owned a Kurzweil PC3K8 not long before it and the keybed felt much better than the Kurzweil. much more light to the touch, yet equally balanced across the board in a way that allows you to play both piano and multiple other instruments with out feeling like youre having to give up quality feel on one instrument vs the another. the sounds were great honestly, a very nice fullness to them. and there were loooads of them. my favorite part of the board was how customizable the sounds were using the on baord controls. once again, compared to the kurzweil which had just as many controls (minus the yamaha super knob), the yamaha was able to distort the sounds much farther, with the ability to do multiple selections of distortions on one knob or fadar within one instrument. then, if you wanted to really up the anti, crank the super knob. touch ribbon mod strip was actually pretty cool, surprisingly responsive and accurate. honestly i only owned it for a week so i didnt master it by any means. but i will say this, i spent alot of time just sitting there enjoying messing with sounds and music. being able to physically touch controls always inspires me that way. and since ive taken it upon myself to add many physical and touch midi control for my vst instruments. is it worth 4grand? man i really dont know, that is alooot of cash. though i cant say much because im still on the hunt for a great controller and id pay it if it was perfect for my needs. lemme know if you have any more specific questions, ill try to describe what i can.


----------



## chillbot (Sep 6, 2016)

Any mention or talk of a rackmount?


----------



## whinecellar (Sep 6, 2016)

Good stuff @FrankIV - thanks! I ordered a Montage 7 last week. It's funny, reading the few "real" reviews out there would have you believe it's just about on par with the sample libraries we all know and love when it comes to "natural" sounds like strings, winds, etc. - but hearing demos, I'm not holding my breath for that, and I couldn't care less honestly.

What I *AM* excited about are all those crazy synth sounds, arpeggiated stuff, and realtime manipulation. It's been a while since a piece of hardware was FUN to mess with like that, and I've heard enough to know it will be a blast for that kind of thing. The envelope follower and sidechain stuff looks fun too. And yeah, Yamaha makes real hardware, so it will be nice to have that as well. Looking forward to it!


----------



## whinecellar (Sep 6, 2016)

chillbot said:


> Any mention or talk of a rackmount?



Anyone's guess at this point, but since their aim with this piece is clearly to be a performance synth (not a "workstation"), I kinda doubt it. We'll see!


----------



## chimuelo (Sep 6, 2016)

I think folks have forgotten how live performance, even if privately at home is inspiring and its immediate and reproducable.

Software exceeds hardware in sound quality sometimes, and sometimes hardware cannot be emulated.
But ideas and real time paramter modulation is an entire creative process.

Like I said earlier Ive done this for years but it requires audio or midi recorded then manipulated.
Rolands MV30 used live phrase sequencing back in the 90s and was amazing but discontinued.

This synth does it all once you get use to it, from what Ive gathered.


----------



## FrankIV (Sep 6, 2016)

chillbot said:


> Any mention or talk of a rackmount?



I haven't seen anything since the purchase, and I didn't see any hardware on the back for mounting anything directly off the keyboard itself. But as big as the montage8 was i think it would still juuust fit onto a standard stand and rack system from a guitar center-type online store. The measurments are on this page though http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/Montage8/specs


----------



## FrankIV (Sep 6, 2016)

whinecellar said:


> Good stuff @FrankIV - thanks! I ordered a Montage 7 last week. It's funny, reading the few "real" reviews out there would have you believe it's just about on par with the sample libraries we all know and love when it comes to "natural" sounds like strings, winds, etc. - but hearing demos, I'm not holding my breath for that, and I couldn't care less honestly.
> 
> What I *AM* excited about are all those crazy synth sounds, arpeggiated stuff, and realtime manipulation. It's been a while since a piece of hardware was FUN to mess with like that, and I've heard enough to know it will be a blast for that kind of thing. The envelope follower and sidechain stuff looks fun too. And yeah, Yamaha makes real hardware, so it will be nice to have that as well. Looking forward to it!



Exactly how I feel. The sounds were great but as far as using them for a finished product I would still choose the sample libraries I already have. So I just felt it would be an under used tool for the cost i spent. BUT if my budget was bigger right now I definitely would have kept it for that excellent live sound manipulation.


----------



## re-peat (Sep 7, 2016)

I don’t think there is a single orchestral or acoustic instrument in the Montage that compares favourably with what dedicated sample libraries have to offer. Most of them are fairly decent, sure, and will come in quite handy on stage I guess, but they’re definitely not to be called upon in situations where a 2016-degree of mock-realism and believability really matters.
(I quite like the Bosendorfer though which you get as a free bonus gift. In fact, despite it weighing only 400 or so megabytes, I like its sound better than the 32 gigabytes of Vienna Bösendorfer. And the included CFX is going to see quite a bit of use here as well.)

But surely, no one would ever buy the Montage for its banks of orchestral/acoustic instruments? (As I assume no one would buy Omnisphere mainly for its strings or guitars?)

I had a few head-scratching days when first trying to hook up the Montage to my DAW (Logic). It’s definitely not a plug-and-play situation.
To get the Montage’s audio into Logic, the creation of a ‘aggregate audio device’ (combining the Montage and my UA Apollo into a single audio device) was required, and while that was pretty easy (and worked instantly), the MIDI-side of things proved a whole lot more difficult to configure. I’m not going to go into all the details — the problems that need to be solved have to do with echoing both MIDI #CC’s and SysEx data, which required some not-for-the-faint-of-heart Environment-work in Logic, and needed me going over parameters & settings which I hadn’t looked at in years — and it certainly wasn’t smooth sailing. Things were not helped either by a few confusing decisions (on the part of the designers) regarding the MIDI-setup of the Montage itself.
Got there in the end though, and now everything works.

I still miss a couple of things however, the main one being: a controller on the Montage which can be assigned a #CC-value independent of the selected Performance. Would have been so nice to be able to assign, say, #CC11 to a fader, and have it stay that way, no matter which Performance you select. But apparently, according to the Yamaha-rep on the Yamaha-forum, that’s not going to happen. Pity.

But other than a few practical and workflow-related misgivings, I have no complaints. On the contrary: incredibly powerful synth, incredibly powerful controls, high-quality sonic output and … the irreplaceable joy of hands-on physical interaction with the sound. Lovin’ it.

_


----------



## whinecellar (Sep 7, 2016)

@re-peat - I've been doing some research into a workaround for Logic users wanting to use the Montage faders for MIDI CC's. I can't test it until mine shows up, but if you're interested, I'll let you know if it works. It will involve some Transformer objects in Logic's environment, but I'd be happy to send you a file once I get it working. Should be pretty easy to do.


----------



## re-peat (Sep 7, 2016)

Jim,

Thanks very much for the kind offer, but I know enough about the Environment and its objects to be able to do that myself. It's no problem to assign CC's to Montage's faders — piece of cake — and it's no problem either to make Logic recognize them — piece of chocolate crumble — and transforming incoming MIDI-data presents no difficulty either — piece of apple pie — but the problem is that you have to sacrifice all-important realtime controllers if you want to use one of Montage's faders to control, say, CC11 in Logic.
(I suppose I could miss one of the eight faders in each of the Performances, but ... it's not always the same fader that can be missed. Which means that you'd have to decide for each and everyone of the Performances which fader is the least essential, and then assign that to generate CC11. As you can imagine: undoable and certainly unmemorizeable.)

There is one fader that is doing absolutely nothing on the Montage as soon as you connect it to a DAW, and that is the Master Volume fader. Haven't touched that one since installing the keyboard. The perfect solution would be if it were possible to make that fader send out CC11 data_, irrespective of the chosen Performance_, but it's precisely that which the Yamaha-rep said is, for various technical reasons, impossible to implement.

But thanks again!

_


----------



## whinecellar (Sep 7, 2016)

re-peat said:


> ...the problem is that you have to sacrifice all-important realtime controllers if you want to use one of Montage's faders to control, say, CC11 in Logic...



Ah, didn't think about that - probably because I don't yet have mine to play with! Yeah, that makes sense, and kinda stinks. I suppose for me that will mean having one "dummy" performance that will allow me to use it as a controller with my assigned CC's unless/until Yamaha hopefully comes up with a smarter control mode. We'll see! Thanks for the insight


----------



## FrankIV (Sep 7, 2016)

re-peat said:


> But surely, no one would ever buy the Montage for its banks of orchestral/acoustic instruments? (As I assume no one would buy Omnisphere mainly for its strings or guitars?)
> 
> _




i agree. i probably wasnt very clear on why i bought it in the first place. ive basically been hunting for a new master keyboard for my studio, and the MONTAGE8 was just one of many i bought and tested. Didnt buy it at all for the sounds. purely wanted it for the feeling on the keys, and the hope that i could program the onboard controls for my own cc controls, and maybe find a way to use the onboard distortions on my vsti's. once i bought it i just kind of realized for the money i could easily buy a lower model with the same keybed for less money and way less buttons and controls that ultimately just got in my way. i still havent found the right master controller and its driving me nuts haha.


----------



## muziksculp (Sep 7, 2016)

By the way, you can assign the knobs of the Montage to any CC# you want to send, but the Faders of the Montage are not assignable, they simply are restricted to Volume (CC#7). Kind of a strange thing, but that's what Yamaha decided to do.


----------



## whinecellar (Sep 8, 2016)

Well, my Montage 7 showed up today. Don't have time to mess with it too much right now, but man... it is definitely not organized like any other synth I've ever owned! Doesn't even have patch numbers - it's all done with category search and live sets?! It's not often I need to crack a manual, but I can see I'll need to do some reading.

Quick question - anyone tried importing any Motif XF user data that includes custom WAVs? I ported some Roland/Akai stuff to my Motif XF years ago and saved it in flash RAM. I backed all that up before I sold that keyboard a few years ago, and now I'd love to import that stuff into the Montage. I hope that can be done? I would try it but I'm gonna have to go digging through my archives to find it - wondering if it's worth the effort.

Thanks!


----------



## Morodiene (Sep 17, 2016)

From what I'm hearing here, it sounds like typical Yamaha stuff with the difficulty of using it as a controller. I own an MOX6 (which is an entry-level synth - nowhere near the price tag of the montage) and I like it, but it's tricky to work it as a controller. Seems like other manufacturers find a way to make theirs much more plug-and-play.

And what's with the 128 polyphony? You can get by with that on a new digital piano since most people will just want it for piano sounds, but for a synth at this price? I'd imagine that gets eaten up rather quickly.


----------



## whinecellar (Sep 17, 2016)

Haven't had much time with mine yet, but I am truly impressed with it as a highly playable synth. Tons of realtime controllers, wicked sounds, a blast to play with. Couldn't care less about the "real" sounds - they don't compete with the libraries we're all used to. The free Boesendorfer promo is actually really good though!

But yes, it is typical Yamaha: not at all intuitive. Definitely requires some significant manual reading. The controller options are severely limited although there are some workarounds.

Overall though, as a pure synth - it has massive potential and sounds stunningly good. Oh @Morodiene - the polyphony is 128 per engine: 128 for the ROMpler and 128 FMX.


----------



## dpasdernick (Sep 17, 2016)

I just bought a used Yamaha SY99. It has two types of synthesis. Sample playback and FM. 25 years later Yamaha introduces the Montage which has two types of synthesis. Sample playback and FM. Now the Montage is much more powerful than my SY99 but it's interesting to see the parallels. The more things change...


----------



## Morodiene (Sep 17, 2016)

dpasdernick said:


> I just bought a used Yamaha SY99. It has two types of synthesis. Sample playback and FM. 25 years later Yamaha introduces the Montage which has two types of synthesis. Sample playback and FM. Now the Montage is much more powerful than my SY99 but it's interesting to see the parallels. The more things change...


That's Yamaha for you...reliable and you know it's a great product, but it's not going to be cutting edge. They stick with what they know works, which is good in some ways.


----------



## SEA (Oct 18, 2017)

re-peat said:


> But surely, no one would ever buy the Montage for its banks of orchestral/acoustic instruments? (As I assume no one would buy Omnisphere mainly for its strings or guitars?)



Actually, I like the strings in the Montage and I have about every VSTi orchestra library as well. Not as deap as my libs, but they do sound good and could do in my studio productions in a pinch!


----------



## SEA (Oct 18, 2017)

I needed a new controller and decided to try the Montage 8. I purchased my Montage 8 from Sweetwater for only $2,879! It was used a shows but came with their full 2 year warranty and looked brand new! It also came loaded with sounds including the $99 AG Grand. 

I wouldn’t of bought it full priced and was looking at the Kurzweil Forte, but my Sweetwater rep explained the pros of the Montage over the Forte and I figured if I didn’t like it I could flip it and make a few bucks. 

Before I bought it I tried every action I could get my hands on like the Kronos 88, RD-2000, Kawai, SL88 Studio and Grand (they were horrible). The best was a used S90 ES that was WAY better than the XS! As a classical/jazz pianist the action is #1! I recently tried a used RD-700 and it plays a bit lighter and very good next to the Montage and S90ES.

So far the Montage sounds are good! I have AB the CFX to my sample pianos and it sounds pretty good next to them but I still prefer my samples like the PV Grand 2 and White Grand.

I look forward to program the synth and using it as a module to midi in for some cool sounds. If I didn’t go with the Montage perhaps the RD-2000 as a second choice although it’s action is a bit heavier but better than the Kronos.

Since I have tons of VSTi synths and samples I think I wouldn’t get another synth unless something like the Dave Smith REV2 or the DeepMIND 12.

I do like the FA series like an FA 7. Maybe the Integra-7 to save space but once again with my VSTi’s I don’t think I would really need another samples base keyboard.


----------

