![]() ![]() Whichever organ mode you choose, the voicing is unconventional, although this is most apparent for the Hammond emulation. However, I noticed that their LEDs are barely visible in bright sunlight, so beware festivals if you’re not topping the bill. I found the resolution to be a little coarse but, despite a bit of latency when doing the equivalent of grabbing a fistful of drawbars, it’s not a bad system and, unlike physical controllers on a digital instrument, the sensors always show the current settings. You make changes by sliding your finger up and down the display itself, or by tapping the position to which you want it to jump. ![]() The most prominent feature of the Konti’s control panel is its bank of nine touch sensors that control the organ voicing, the synth settings, and the global graphic equaliser. However, you can layer two of the sound generators by pressing their selectors simultaneously. You can split the keyboard into upper and lower parts either side of a single user‑defined split point, but this facility is only available for two of the organs (for some reason, the Farfisa is precluded) and there’s no way to play piano or lead synth with your right hand while ’comping on organ or strings (or whatever) with your left. This emulates the response of many organs, although all of the active footages are triggered simultaneously there’s none of the slight spread that you can obtain when you depress a key slowly on a multi‑contact keybed. There’s also an option that allows you to reduce the amount of key travel needed to activate notes. Nine velocity curves provide the usual range of responses, and there’s a Dynamics function that compresses the range to make it easier to generate forté at the expense of piano. This is a shame because the instrument is devoid of performance controls apart from a recessed lever within the left‑hand cheek and the provision of sockets for damper and expression pedals as well as a rotary speaker fast/slow footswitch. Their waterfall keybeds are velocity‑sensitive, but they don’t generate aftertouch, nor does the sound engine receive it. It’s available in both 61‑ and 73‑key versions. The outputs from these are then passed (or not, as you choose) through five effects sections before reaching the outside world. ![]() Korg’s Vox Continental (which, henceforth, I’ll call the Konti) contains four sound generators: organs (a Hammond courtesy of the CX‑3 engine, plus Vox and Farfisa models), acoustic and electric pianos courtesy of the EP‑1 and SGX‑2 sound engines from the Kronos, and a simple synth derived from the AL‑1 and HD‑1 engines introduced on the OASYS. But is there a place for another red (or, to be more accurate, deep orange) keyboard in a market that has been dominated by a single Swedish manufacturer for nearly two decades? The Technology It’s into this arena that Korg, who have owned the Vox brand since the 1990s, have chosen to resurrect the Vox Continental name, attaching it to a digital multi‑keyboard that also produces the sounds of pianos, organs and a range of other instruments. Today, you can barely go to a gig (well, a gig during which the keyboard player actually plays the keyboards) without espying a red slab of Scandinavian technology that produces pianos, organs, and orchestral imitations of such realism that few would notice that the band is no longer touring with half a ton of vintage keyboards, nor a minibus full of stroppy MU members. We’ve come a long way since analogue multi‑keyboards such as the Siel Orchestra offered piano sections that sounded nothing like pianos, organ sections that sounded almost nothing like organs, and strings and brass sections that, even if you were out of your tree, sounded only vaguely like strings and brass. Korg have resurrected a ’60s classic - and completely reinvented it in the process. The 73‑note version of the Continental measures 110 x 35cm and weighs 8.4kg. ![]()
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