Roland GR-20

[6stringbassist]

Anyone tried one with bass ?.

I've been looking at the V-bass, but I don't want all the modelling sounds.

What I do fancy though is the synth pad sounds and piano and such like, they'd be great with my new looper, and would be useable in my one more experimental jazz trio.

How well do they work with bass ?

 

[Ba55Man1ac]

Hey 6.

The GR-20 works well with bass for sounds that swell, e.g. synth pads. You'd get some nice big chords with a 6. The tracking lags too much, especially down low, to make it useable for any "tight" sounds. You can improve this by playing higher up and transposing the output down, but it's still noticeable (and annoying!).

 

[elros]

I used the GR-20 for a few years. Good unit, I didn't find the tracking lacking, except in the lowest registers (below low A).

 

[6stringbassist]

I used the GR-20 for a few years. Good unit, I didn't find the tracking lacking, except in the lowest registers (below low A).

Thanks, I've been reading some of your postings and I really like your recordings.

 

[Gimongous]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YScsxiZIFgg&feature=related


Think this might be what you're interested in. She uses the GR-20 w/ a GK 3B pickup to get a cool tenor sound. On some of her other Youtube posts she gets a pretty nice muted trumpet tone as well.

 

[Ramsy]

When I was trying bass to MIDI out the GR-20 wasn't compatible with the GK3B pickups. This may have changed now, not sure. The only bass capable Roland gear was the GI-20 (No sounds only MIDI output) or the new GT-10B.
There's a few tricks when setting up the pickup that can drop the lag time down a little but it's still difficult to get around.
I ended up with a GI-20 and it does the job fine. No fast playing though, the poor dear can't take it.

 

[elros]

The first version of th GR-20 wasn't good with bass. But the current one has a bass mode, it'll work quite well with a standard tuned bass guitar and the GK-3B (or the older GK-2B) pickup.

 

[DTKempII]

You can download an update for the GR-20 that allows you to switch it between use with the Guitar or Bass...so, yes, it is more compatible.