I was just gifted a D-20. My first Synthesizer, my first keyboard...Just playing around it already feels like its going to be a lot to learn, but I'm excited!
Nice demo! The D-20 is really capable although a "little brother" to the D-50. I got my D-50 in 1987 from Unisound in Vaasa. A nice surprise at the end to see this video was from Vaasa, my town of birth and childhood.
Nice to hear! I was there in Unisound about 1987 too and looking that mighty D-50 then. It was too expensive for me thou. Today i can do all roland legacy sounds with my FA-06. ;) My artistname and bio is simply Synat! (short about finnish word "syntetisaattorit") synatmusic.com
Nice video! An underrated synthesizer. Requires some programming but you can some really nice sounds out of it. I got my D-20 in 1995 and will always keep it 😀I got the PG-10 programmer as well and a D-110 in the rack.
Functionally what an upgrade the D10 was from my Juno 60 back in the day but it sounded so cheesy.... replaced with M1 once the 2nd hand prices were ok and wowser what an upgrade sonically. Still had fun with the little D10 :)
Please be so kind and somebody explain me please, why my the same Roland D-20 doesn't have a lot of demonstrated timbres like Deep Note, Super Saw, S&H bell sound, Virtual Bass, Hit Me, Christmastime, Reso sweep, Analog Brass, Hammond2 and many others...??? How could I get them on my Roland D-20? Thank you so much in advance!!
Hi, Saul. You need SYX. (or sysex) files generated for D-20. You need a DAW or other MIDI program and MIDI interface for Your computer. Then you can send the new patches to user memory area in D-20. I have used Cakewalk Sonar and sysex send there and also MIDI-OX, which is powerful MIDI tool.
Looking back at those years without DAW, the only multitimbrality we can achieve was using a sequencer and connect it to separate keyboards/ soundmodules. While we may have had access to full sound capacity of each, it was a little bit work to make it blend as one ensamble. D-20’s sounds while a little bit thin in itself, turned to be quite coherent when combined in it’s onboard sequencer, with good gain balancing and pan positiong, of course.
D-20 synth action keyboard is not aftertouch. but very good to play (those are well done then at 80´s and 90´s) And then about Roland FA-06 keybed is not the best to play (short key lenght) but yes it is dynamic response keyboard, but not equipped with aftertouch. The model FA-07 has synth action keybed which is slightly better. I always play in my studio with ext master keyboard (wooden piano keys from my Technics SP or via Nektar LX88+)
D-10 and D-20 are from 1988. XP-30 is from 10 y later era, XP maybe more clean sounding device. But I think D-10/20´s 12-bit LA sounds are more "nostalgic" and "soulful"?
