Clavia Nord C1 on the road

I’ve had the C1 in nearly 4 years now, and here are my views on how it’s been working for me. The C1 isn’t being sold anymore, but the not so different C2 is still being sold, as well as the soon to be released C2D (with drawbars).

Travelling with the nord C1

I bought the C1 in 2008, and today I simply cannot understand how I could live without it before. At almost every concert up to then I used a big B3 organ. I still prefer to bring the B3 when possible, but it is so convenient to use the Nord for a rehearsal, or for a gig when Continue reading

Hammond Suzuki XPK-200L midi foot pedals

I read about these somewhere on the internet and got quite excited as they seem like a good compromise between the small one octave midi pedals I currently use, and the huge 27 note “Nord Keys 27“, which does look very nice, but too big for me to carry around. They have the longer pedals which should make it feel close to real hammond pedals, and would be great for playing with the heel.

I first read that the xpk-200L pedals should be available in the autumn of 2011, but now I see Q1 2012. They are already available in Japan, but the dealer I contacted said they couldn’t send out of the country. If anybody has any more info on this, please drop a line.

EDIT: they are available now from a few sources. I have not got the weight comfirmed exactly, but it seems to be around 18 kgs, which is much heavier than I hoped for. With a flight case this is going to be 25kgs at least, maybe closer to 30. I might still try them out. For now I’m still using my 1 octave set which is completely falling apart.

The B2 organ

I bought a B2 organ from ebay (seller adickson) some years ago and got it shipped to China. It came with a Hammond PR-40 tone cabinet. The B2 organs are much cheaper than B3’s, especially in the US where you can find them for a bargain. The PR-40 sounds pretty nice, I used it for gigging for a few years before I bought a leslie. The bass is deep Continue reading

Changing caps of tone generator

I did change the capacitors on the tone generator of my B2 some years ago. Many people recommend this, as the old caps will drift in value over the years, and you can get a brighter sound after you change it. You have to unsolder all the old ones and put in new ones.

I am not sure if I would do it again, because there are some drawbacks. First, the sound Continue reading

The Hammond Organ

Background

What makes someone an organ player? I consider the Hammond organ my main instrument. Although I play piano and synthesizers also, there something about the approach that I makes some people organists and others pianists. Chords sounds different on organ vs piano for example. The organ is to thick sounding, I normally play 3 note chords, or maximum 4. On the piano I will put down from 4 to 8-10 notes in a chord. This is just one thing about the organ.

I have two organs, one 1959 B3 organ with a 122 leslie speaker, and a 1951 B2 organ with a 21H speaker. The B2’s can be a bargain, much cheaper than B3. And they sound really good, especially for jazz, as they can be quite smooth sounding, with less bite than a newer B3. You could also change some old parts if you’d like to get it to be more biting. I have installed the trek2 percussion kit, and I do think that percussions sounds really good, even thought I don’t use the 5th option, and I would prefer to have swithces instead of sliders, as the sliders take more time to adjust from off to on.

The leslie 122 is my favorite, I prefer it’s sounds to the 147. The 21H (and 22H and others) are essentially the same amp as a 122 but with less power. My 21H was lacking in power, and I changed the tank cap and then exchanged the two rectifier 5u4 tubes with solid state rectifiers. And what a difference! Much more power, and the bass was much more tighter. I was adviced against doing this, as the voltage on the tubes and the caps will be higher when using SS rectifiers compared to tube rectifiers. So you should at least replace the tank cap before doing this.

Well, this was just supposed to be the introduction. Read more post on organ here.