Roland Corporation

Roland Corporation TYO: 7944 is a Japanese manufacturer of electronic musical instruments, electronic equipment and software. It was founded by Ikutaro Kakehashi in Osaka on April 18, 1972 with 33 million yen in capital. Today Roland has factories in Japan, the United States, Italy, and Taiwan. As of March 31, 2005, it employed 2233 employees [1]. That is over 200% rise from 729 employees in 2003.

Roland uses a number of additional brand names for their products:

BOSS (guitar effects pedals, effects units, rhythm machines, recording equipment)
Edirol (Desktop Media Production or 'DTMP')
Rodgers Instruments (electronic, combination electronic/pipe and pipe organs)
Roland Digital Group (Roland DG).

Roland company slogans:

Inspire the enjoyment of creativity
Be the best rather than the biggest
We Design the Future

Structured/Adaptive Synthesis

Before 1986 attempts to reproduce the sound of the piano in digital instruments were based on sample based synthesis. This was done by Ray Kurzweil in 1984 with its K250. It was expensive and not as sophisticated as today's digital piano sounds. Just two years later, Roland introduced its Structured/Adaptive Synthesis.

SAS divided the keyboard into more than 30 zones where pitch, brightness, individual formant structures and string enharmonicities vary. It was unlike the pre-existing sample-replay systems. Roland engineers sampled and analyzed instruments' timbre with various pitches and velocities. They designed an algorithm that reproduced the necessary harmonics. It made possible to reproduce the sound of a grand piano better than with the other techniques available then.

The polyphony was 16, which was considered acceptable at the time.

Roland discontinued the original SAS in 1990 when Advanced SA was introduced. In 1996 a 64-voice stereo implementation was developed.

Roland's name

It may seem strange for a Japanese company to have a Western name, but Roland was founded with export in mind. Ikutaro Kakehashi heard that the name of his previous company, Ace Electronic Industries Inc., was often mangled in pronunciation, sometimes unpleasantly; so he looked for a good-sounding name which would be pronounced roughly the same in all of his major export markets. He found the name Roland in a telephone directory.

Ironically, the name is difficult to pronounce correctly in Kakehashi's native Japanese, which does not distinguish the 'L' and 'R' sounds as in English.

Roland was not, as is often claimed, named after the French epic poem La Chanson de Roland.

Timeline of noteworthy products

1973 - Roland SH-1000: Claimed by Roland to be Japan's first commercial keyboard synthesizer.
1973 - Roland RE-201: The renowned 'Space Echo' machine, one of the most popular tape delay-based echo machines ever produced.
1973 - Roland SH-3A: Monophonic synthesizer.
1975 - Roland System-100: Roland's first attempt at a modular synthesizer.
1976 - Roland System-700: Roland's first professional-quality modular synthesizer.
1977 - Roland MC-8 Microcomposer: A ground breaking digital sequencer. The first product in the musical instrument industry to utilize a microprocessor.
1977 - Roland GR-500: The world's first commercial guitar synthesiser.
1978 - Roland CR-78: One of the world's first user programmable drum machine.
1978 - Roland Jupiter-4: Roland's first self-contained polyphonic synthesizer.
1980 - Roland CR-8000
1981 - Roland Jupiter-8: This synthesizer put Roland in the forefront of professional synthesizers. A hugely successful 8-voice programmable analog synthesizer.
1981 - Roland TR-808: Among the first and most popular programmable drum machines; its distinctive analog sounds, such as its cowbell sound, have become pop music cliches, heard on countless recordings.
1982 - Roland Juno-60: Roland's first synthesizer with digitally-controlled oscillators.
1982 - Roland TB-303: Defined the "acid" sound for house music.
1983 - Roland JX-3P: First Roland synthesizer to support MIDI.
1983 - Roland Jupiter-6: Second Roland synthesizer to support MIDI.
1983 - Roland SH-101: Monophonic synthesizer designed to be worn hung around the neck with a strap, with an optional modulation attachment that protruded like the neck of a guitar.
1984 - Roland TR-909: An extremely popular drum machine during the early 1990s, the sounds of which (particularly the kick drum) are still essential components of modern electronic dance music. The first Roland drum machine to use analog sound synthesis combined with digital sample playback.
1984 - Roland Juno-106: A widely used synthesizer with digitally-controlled oscillators. Same synth engine as the Roland Juno-60 but with the addition of MIDI and the ability to transmit button and slider information through SysEx. Still, no MIDI control of volume in real time.
1986 - Roland JX-10: One of Roland's last true analog synths.
1986 - Roland RD-1000: Roland's first digital piano to feature Roland SA Synthesis technology [2].
1987 - Roland D-50: One of the most popular digital synthesizers; Roland's first all-digital synthesizer implementing their "Linear Arithmetic" synthesis (a form of sample-based synthesis combined with subtractive synthesis). The D-50's descendants include the D-5, D-110 rack unit and D-20 synthesizers.
1987 - Roland MT-32: Also using "Linear Arithmetic" synthesis, it was supported by many PC games in the late 1980s and early 1990s as a high-quality music option, until support shifted to General MIDI sound cards.
1988 - Roland E-20: Roland's first entry into the auto-accompaniment keyboard market, going head to head with Yamaha and Casio. The E-20's descendants include the E-70, E-86, G-800, G-1000 and the current G-70.
1989 - Roland Octapad: A set of visually distinctive electronic drum triggers.
1989 - Roland W-30: A sampling Workstation Keyboard (DAW).
1990 - Roland HP-3700: Roland digital piano [3].
1991 - Roland SC-55 Sound Canvas: The world's first General MIDI synthesizer.
1991 - Roland JD-800: Digital synthesizer with analog style knobs and switches.
1994 - Roland S-760: 16 bits Digital sampler with resonant filters.
1996 - Roland MC-303 The first non-keyboard drum machine, sample based synthesizer and sequencer combination bearing the now generic term "Groovebox".
1996 - Roland XP-80: 64 voice music workstation.
1997 - Roland JP-8000: Roland's first "virtual analog" synthesizer.
1997 - Roland V-Drums: Digital drums incorporating 'silent' mesh drum heads that realistically reproduce both the natural feel and sound of an acoustic drum.
1997 - Roland JV-2080: 64 voice, 3 effects processor, 8 expansion slot, synthesizer module.
1998 - Roland MC-505: Successor to the MC-303 with a more powerful synthesizer and sequencer.
2001 - Roland AX-7: Successor to the AX-1. A keytar noted for it's aesthetics and design.
2002 - Roland MC-909: Successor to the MC Groovebox series featuring a full 16 track sequencer and built-in sampling.
2004 - Roland Fantom-X: Music Workstation/Professional Synthesizer expandable to 1 gig of sounds.
2004 - Roland Juno-D: Popular entry-level synthesizer
2005 - Roland MV-8000 : Production Station with 24-bit sampling capabilities. Designed to rival Akai's legendery MPC series, specifically, the MPC-4000.
2005 - Roland Micro Cube: First portable amplifier made by Roland. Allowed for A/C adaptor or battery use. 7 input effects, delay, and reverb options.
2006 - Roland SH-201 : The first affordable analog modeling synthesizer that can be bought for under £450.
2006 - Roland Juno-G: Entry-level workstation based on the Fantom-X

References

Sound On Sound Magazine - The History of Roland (five parts) - [4]
Roland Piano Sound Sources [5]

External links