High-Tech Notes Make Music at Anaheim Show

With names like V-80 FD and PM 2800 M, they sound like the latest in advanced weaponry. Instead, they represent the state of the art in loudspeakers, synthesizers and mixing consoles, and they are music to the ears of the instrument industry.

High-tech electronics is definitely the hottest attraction at the winter show of the National Assn. of Music Merchants, which is expected to draw more than 550 exhibitors and 35,000 retailers, distributors and music educators to the Anaheim Convention Center this weekend.

While anticipation was high, few who attended the exhibition’s opening Friday expected to see another revolutionary breakthrough like the debut several years ago of computer-assisted technology called “sampling,” which enables a keyboard to store and reproduce on command the sounds of a variety of instruments.

Instead, they found “new and improved” versions of existing technology, in some cases concentrated in smaller and more convenient packages that eliminate the need to connect a chain of separate machines.

The excitement generated by the merger of computers and music is credited in large part for the strong growth in sales of musical instruments, which swelled from $2.2 billion in 1982 to $3.6 billion in 1987, according to figures compiled by the American Music Conference.

“Most of the sound you are hearing in the movies and on TV is made by one person in a studio with electrical musical instruments and computers,” said Don Griffin, president of the National Assn. of Music Merchants and owner of West L.A. Music, a music store catering mostly to professional musicians and composers.

Industry observers said the emphasis in electronic music this year is on consolidating many high-technology functions in a single “black box.”

At a single work station, for example, a professional or amateur musician can compose and record complex orchestral arrangements--even if he can barely play a note on the piano.

“We are addressing a much wider audience,” said Thomas Beckman, president and chief executive officer of Roland Corp., who noted that the non-professional is trying his hand at music making with computers.

To further broaden the market, Beckman said his company has begun to build digital keyboards--which were originally developed in black molded plastic and aluminum frames for professional musicians--with wood finishes and built-in speakers that look at home in living rooms.

And he said he is pushing to have schools teach electronic music. “It would open up a whole new market for us,” he said.

Similarly, Greg Hartel, director of marketing for Coda Music Software, a Bloomington, Minn., firm, said “long term, we see education as our biggest market.”

Coda Music’s newest product is a software package retailing for $1,000 that can enable someone to write music on an Apple Macintosh computer terminal, which in turn can be connected to an electronic keyboard that will automatically play the composition.

Like many music industry manufacturers, Hartel said Coda is concentrating its efforts on making its product less expensive and simpler to operate.

For those who like the feel of the traditional but want the flexibility of electronics, Yamaha has developed a kind of hybrid piano. At the show Friday, performer Chick Corea played piano jazz accompanied by a musician playing a string bass. A second string accompaniment was produced electronically by Corea’s piano, which was controlling a separate music synthesizer.

“If you closed your eyes, you couldn’t tell which was the real bass,” said Yamaha spokesman Carter Schuld.

Adding yet another new twist to an old concept, several pianos exhibited by Yamaha were playing without any human assistance Friday.

No, they were not traditional player pianos, according to the Yamaha sales representatives. Using fiber-optic technology, human piano performances had been recorded and were being played back with an exact duplication of feeling and style that the old player piano could not accomplish. By slipping a cassette into one of the pianos, an owner can hear the sounds of Stanislav Bunin, Floyd Cramer, Steve Allen or Liberace.

Such pianos, which sell for about $10,000, are expected to find a market among serious musicians as well as doting parents who want to record little Jane’s first recital and listen to it again in later years just like they would look through a photo album.

Despite the industry’s continuing fascination with synthetic and recorded music, there are indications that the high-tech segment of the industry is cooling off somewhat.

While overall sales of musical instruments continued to expand by about 5% in 1988, “the introduction of new electrical products has slowed down,” said Larry Linkin, executive vice president of the music merchants association. “It is harder to come up with something really new.”

And there were plenty of familiar-looking violins, clarinets, drums, cymbals and other traditional instruments on display at the show.

Surging guitar sales may even represent something of a backlash against the electronic movement of recent years, said Derek Davis, vice president and general manager of Santa Ana-based Rickenbacker International Corp.

Davis said Rickenbacker recently has seen “a strong resurgence” of interest in its electric guitars, which first gained wide popularity in the 1960s with the Beatles. In the early ‘80s, he said, many guitar players turned to electronic synthesizers that simulated guitar music. Now, he said, “people are getting back to natural tones.” In the last 18 months, he said, Rickenbacker’s sales have increased 65%.

Although traditional instruments look the same as always, the quality has been dramatically improved, said John Gronemeyer, a representative of United Musical Instruments, a manufacturer of band and orchestra instruments based in Elkhart, Ind. “The student-priced instrument that we sell today is better than the professional instrument we sold 25 years ago,” he said.

The band-instrument business is booming, Gronemeyer said, largely because of the support of the educational system. “Our business is better today than ever,” he said. “We just completed a record sales year and we are increasing our manufacturing. We can’t keep up with demand.”

Gronemeyer said he has no fears that band instruments will ever be outmoded by electronic technology. “A keyboard just stands alone, he noted. “You can’t have kids out there marching with it. A band is a social experience.”