Is This The Best Synth Guitar EVER?! | Roland GR-300
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- Опубліковано 19 чер 2023
- Turn the volume up to hear how these bad boys sound! While we’ve had a handful of these Roland GR-300 guitars and GR-303 basses come through CME’s vintage and used inventory, this is the first time we’ve ever had them side-by-side! Built by one of the pioneering brands of the synth takeover of the 70's and 80's and featuring craftsmanship that rivals even the best boutique guitar brands of the era, this synth guitar and synth bass incorporated the latest synthesizer technologies of the day into the most popular instrument styles of the ‘50s and ‘60s to offer players in the ‘80s a totally expansive tonal palette!
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More About the GR-300!
The GR-300 was considered the first "playable" guitar synthesizer. (Its predecessor, the GR-500, was plagued with tracking problems that rendered it virtually unplayable.) The GR-300 had no MIDI and could only be played through a GR-300 series guitar controller.
The actual synthesizer module sat on the floor and had the rugged appearance of a large guitar-type foot pedal (complete with carrying handles). It featured 6-voice polyphony, one voice per string and 2 oscillators per voice. Each pair of VCOs were harmonically locked to each string but could be tuned separately to play different pitches. The GR-300 also featured a VCF with variable lengthsweep up and down, and an LFO. Each string had an enable-disable switch as well as a string sensitivity switch (basically audio compression). Built-in footswitches controlled the VCO mode (single/dual), the VCO harmonize pitch (detuning of the VCO's), and the VCF mode (on, bypass, or inverted). There was also a pedal control input for the VCF. The GR-300 could output
either the guitar, the synth, or a mix of the two.
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Notable players of this guitar!
Pat Metheny
Chuck Hammer
Robert Fripp
Andy Summers
Adrian Belew
Charly García
Shawn Lane
Kazumi Watanabe
David Byrne
Jimmy Page
Pete Townshend
Trevor Rabin
Jeff Beck
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Songs Played:
"Thus Spake Zarathustra" From 2001: Space Odyssey
"Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)" Eurythmics
"Axel F" - Harold Faltermeyer
"Last Train Home" Pat Metheny
"Separate Worlds" Journey
"Africa" Toto
"Jump" Van Halen
Additional Gear Used:
Roland KC-600
Fender '65 Reissue Princeton Reverb
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Last Train Home!!!!! Such an EXCELLENT rendition!!! Now I want the whole song like this lol!
I was just clickin around UA-cam and landed here, skipping through the video to see if anything interesting happened and holy moly, that was the last and best thing I could have imagined.
Another vote for a full rendition of last train home in this style. Bravo
Very nice playing that Pat Metheny's song. Superb!
Oh, surprise, you played another Metheny's.. Ultra! I have couple of guitars with the GK3 triggering sounds from the GR55. My first MIDI guitar was the Casio PG380, when it came out in 1987 I think it was. Great instrument, the sounds it came with were crappy and the MIDI imlementation had lots of latency. Someone came with a fix for that but by that time I already sold the guitar.
Pats Parents came into a patio furniture company I worked for in Manassas VA years ago. They were such proud parents both wearing Pat Metheny hats.
The guitar+synth that obsessed me 40 years ago... And when I saw John McLaughlin doing All blues with this guitar plus a Synclavier, it blew my mind!!!
I remember Phil Lynott used one in his later years but added the mirror scratchplate and de midi'd it.
Pat Metheny was definitely the instrument's best player. I've seen him play it concert twice, and it was amazing. His setup is pretty simple. He doesn't tweak the filters or envelopes much, and also pitches the guitar up an octave often, claiming it allows him to play in the register typical to an alto saxophone or trumpet. It has a lot of dynamic range. For instance, on the Pat Metheny Group's 1982 album "Offramp," he uses really shreds it on the track "Are You Going With Me?", but plays very delicately and quietly on the final track "The Bat Pt. II." The difference is remarkable. Both songs are extremely beautiful in completely different ways, largely thanks to the GR-300 (excellent composition as well-- "The Bat" was originally written for alto saxophonist Dewey Redman in 1980).
Pats sound is brilliant, no matter that he's playing !!
The smiles say it all. Sounds great and very fun.
Thanks for watching!! 🤘🤘
¿This thats song "INTRO"????
Aha ! So it was Pat Metheny that most likey influenced Joni Mitchell to use a Parker Fly with GK2 pick up driving a GR1 pedal board.
I have big brother G808 and gr300 synth box from 1982. Superb guitar.
There's a patch in the GR-20 which mimics the typical GR-300 sound very convincingly.
As someone who started playing synths at the same time I started playing guitar over 40 years ago, I never really had a need for a guitar that could do synth sounds, but I have to say I always really liked the sound of those Roland 303 guitars just played as straight guitars. They are really beautiful in my opinion as well.
Awesome!
Beautiful job
I purchased and used a Roland GR-300 in my rock band in the 1980's touring in Northern Ontario and theCanadian Maritimes provinces with an up and coming new vocalist, Eileen (Shania) Twain. Who knew the amazing artist that she would become. Anyways, I enjoyed playing the syth guitar which was my main electric guitar while in the band. A great guitar in itself. I gave up touring and playing in the early 1990's and packed up the guitar synth unit and all of my gear storing these in my attic for over 25 years. I unpacked the unit in 2020 when I retired and got back into relearning the guitar and re-recording o;d and new tunes. I plan on selling or exchanging the Roland GR 300 Synth unit for an acoustic or dobro guitar. Will let you know when I decide to sell or exchange if anyone may be interested in purchasing the synth guitar. Keep up the great work Chicago Music Exchange team
Hi Steve, please let me know if you decide to sell.
Thanks for this trip down memory lane! I bought a G505 and GR300 in 1985 and used it live and in recordings with Touch The Flame, a Northern Ireland band long forgotten no doubt! Although not programmable, with the GR-300 floor unit you could set up 2 duet harmonies and recall them (eg 5ths and octaves) and also "invert" the sound envelope so if you danced about with your feet you could make it look like it had a variety of sounds - I mean it did have a variety of sounds but "making" the sounds required the player to plan how the controls would be changed manually during a performance (also by varying the cut-off resonance on the guitar controller ie the G-505 or G-303 as in this video). This was no different to other early analogue keyboard synths except the guitarists hands are busy so it has to be done with the feet! It also helped the sound by taking the synth output and adding compression, chorus, reverb and delay after it which I did and then put it through a JC-120 with its on-board chorus often engaged. We're talking 1986/7 here, it was ground-breaking stuff back then. I've owned the GR-700, GR-30, GR-1 and GR-50 since. They were inspirational instruments for sure.
These examples stay in tune well.
wow, great playing
With some of the new eurorack envelope/frequency following pitch tracker, gate extractor modules you can make a killer guitar synth that tracks almost perfectly.
Awesome. I have this setup and loved this video. Great Metheny rendition of Last Train Home. He should have done it on the GR-300. Love it when you grab the tremelo.
I played a GR-300 with the G-808 (unfortunately not mine) quite a bit in the 1980's. I was always amazed at what a great playing guitar the G-808 was all by itself.
This is the best GR-300 video ever! More please?!
Thank you! If we get one of these in again we’ll definitely do some more!
@@chicagomusicexchange I could send you mine to borrow! LOL
Big fun! I demoed these for Roland NZ when they were launched and still have the blue Strat Guitar & the Synth (in good working order!). Actually a very versatile and touch responsive piece of work, the way you can just touch the small metal button on the guitar to activate filter fx are quite amazing, very intuitive! Pat Metheny was certainly 'the guy' with the Offramp album but I also really enjoyed what Robert Fripp & Adrian Belew got up to on the Discipline album.
I Love the look of the Guitar
Great video! AXEL F made my day!
Glad to hear it! 🤘🤘
Great choice of music and I always enjoy your guitar playing. 👏
I’ve used my old GR-30 with RMC piezo pickups for years, mostly playing organs, electric piano, strings, banjo and steel guitar.
As good as the Boss SY200 is ( our guitarist uses one) The GR300 has still yet to be rivaled. Great sounds- we think these are about due for revitalizing guitar sounds these days!
I have one of those... Kind of... I bought a Washburn A20-BBR from ebay. The previous owner added (I don't even know if he did the mods or if he bought the guitar in that condition from someone else) all the control cards, the output port, synth pickup, the knobs from a Roland GR-300 into the Washburn. So I have a synth guitar in an "Explorer" body. I always wanted the Washburn A20, and I was pissed because it was heavily modified, but after a while I felt that I had something with a unique story of its own
Very cool
Shawn Lane used one of these
Yes!
Expensive!
also sprach zarathustra
Very appropriate intro ⭕️
This may be the best vid you've ever done, simply for the setlist choices.
I had a GR-303 in the early 80s. Being more of a Fender guitarist, I swapped it for the GR-505. which was probably a mistake as the guitar was a bit weedier. I'm sure there are 80s analogue enthusiasts who go mad for it, but as a long time guitar synth experimenter (obviously), the Roland GR-55 is much more versatile. This one basically did two sounds. They were two good sounds, but I wouldn't swap it for a newer one.
What metheny song is that around 6:40? Love this rendition
“Last Train Home”
Thanks for watching!!
James!!
How much did the guitar set sell for?
In a thousand years when aliens ask what is the best that humans achieved, play them this guitar synth solo. You tube... Pat Metheny & A.M.Jopek "Are you going with me" (audio and video restored)
Off topic - but what's that snare drum? Thanks!
Ludwig Pewter Over Copper Snare
1988 Casio PG-380 is the best, built in synth and controller.... IMO.
I thought a chimp was gonna jump out and smack you with a bone after you finished the intro.
Now do Kraftwerk!
Pat Metheny!!!!! Vivia Pat!!!
Color temp and lighting changed dramatically just after 4:47 LOL. They go from red faced to not real quick
Since the Arp Avatar I've owned a lot of various guitar synths, hex pickups and midi-to-cv convertors and while they are fun I'm of the belief that if you want Synth sounds you might be better of using a keyboard (especially with the recent advancements in expressive keyboards)
Even with today's advances in technology the guitar to synth signal still kinda gets lost in translation.
There are certainly areas where a guitar synth could be used tastefully.
Just my opinion folks : \
2:13 - 2:56 anyone know the song??
Pat Metheny “James”
@@Zeppelinbarnatra THANK YOU! I knew it sounded familiar, offramp is a fantastic album
Drummers like "Wheres my VDrums"?
Thought u weren't gonna talk so much,? Very nice instruments though 👍
Sounds horrible
Absolutely dreadful sounding jam. No thanks, have the GR20. Seems to sound fine with the regular guitar. It's hard to use guitar synthesizers in a way that's truly musical. I think it's really dependent on the creativity of the musician playing them . hint hint
Yup the bass player ruined everything
You said almost nothing about the structure of the system. Instead, I had to watch your mediocre play by the brilliant Pat.