Hey everyone, figured I’d post these pictures here of a recent meeting with the Yamaha FGDP team (in the lobby of the hotel they were staying). It was fun, I gave them feedback and that was that (for now). No scoops about future FGDP’s, but the fact they wanted to meet and get my opinion does bode well!
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That’s awesome!!! Congrats to you! 
Was this a research team, a musical team, a production team, a sales team?
Not that anyone asked, but in the spirit of friendly conversation (
), my wishes would be (in order):
- (by far #1): Better, more sensitive pads. People are gonna get repetitive strain injuries if they don’t watch out on that device. Plus, dynamic control isn’t anywhere near the MK3, at least for my n00b fingers.
- More pads on the left and right. The pad bank on the top of the 50 is nice, but a broader pad could be hugely useful.
- There are some important performance features (not that I’m performing finger drumming or anything) that shouldn’t be so menu-divey. Talking to a pro about prioritization of a few extra performance features to expose with additional buttons would be dope.
- The ability to completely turn off the lights on the top pads. It gets in the way of my playing it on airplanes . This just seems like an easily fixable miss in the software, honestly.
Again, congrats! I’m sure it was an honor for you (and a huge acknowledgement of your influence!)
-David
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I think it was a pretty complete team. So there was the designer of the unit (First picture most right) and a marketing guy, and a “profitability” guy. So yeah, basically everything you need in business haha.
And let me respond to your comments with regards to the conversation I had.
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(by far #1): Better, more sensitive pads. People are gonna get repetitive strain injuries if they don’t watch out on that device. Plus, dynamic control isn’t anywhere near the MK3, at least for my n00b fingers. << Yes, talked about this extensively
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More pads on the left and right. The pad bank on the top of the 50 is nice, but a broader pad could be hugely useful. << I did not talk about this, I basically told them they were on the right track and they shouldn’t mess with the layout too much (and preferably keep it as is)
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There are some important performance features (not that I’m performing finger drumming or anything) that shouldn’t be so menu-divey. Talking to a pro about prioritization of a few extra performance features to expose with additional buttons would be dope. << We did talk about this. Especially easy preset switching and being able to create presets with a computer tool instead of having to do it on device.
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The ability to completely turn off the lights on the top pads. It gets in the way of my playing it on airplanes
. This just seems like an easily fixable miss in the software, honestly. << Yeah that should be easy. Did not comment on it because it wasn’t a problem I had. -
I also mentioned the usb-c vs micro usb and they laughed since it was their number one complaint haha.
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I have their contact info and I offered Yamaha to help out with more feedback down the line. So when the time comes I can maybe run a survey here as well with my students.
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Awesome stuff Robert!
I was at the Sample Music Festival in Berlin this summer, and Yamaha had a special FGDP room with some Melodics laptops and several controllers. I was able to try playing both the 30 and the 50 (30 I didn’t like, 50 I liked a lot even if the sensitivity wasn’t amazing).
There were a few fingerdrumming contests there, and I saw them talking to and collecting feedback from a few of the contestants, so that’s a positive sign for further development as well, I think.
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So happy to hear and see this. You’re one of the most influential persons on finger drumming and I’m glad they’re tapping into your huge bucket of experience.
It would be nice if the FGDP-50 had a small sequencer (drum programming machine) built in. May not be very advanced … but rudimentary at least. This would help in sequencing a pattern of 16th notes of high hats or shakers … essentially leaving us free to concentrate more on the other percussive elements. If this feature is already present, please correct me so I can check it out. Basically it should have a looping feature (creating and playing).
While on this topic … I heard that Yamaha had tied up with Melodics and that Melodics have a separate section of lessons especially dedicated to the FGDP series. Is this true? Any links would be appreciated.
Much love and more power to you Robert
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So my guess is if the melodics patterns goes from left to right it is just like my Left to Right diagrams or classic rum notation, but one that does automatic “scrolling”. It would not be hard to make some lessons for melodics that way.
Also, from what I understand about Melodics is that they try to have some sort of coupon in every pad controller box. So instead of Yamaha asking them to make lessons they might very well have offered to make those lessons and then get the coupon in there. It’s a great growth strategy tbh.