The Roland XP-80 is a

music workstation A music workstation is an electronic musical instrument providing the facilities of: *a sound module, *a music sequencer and *(usually) a musical keyboard. It enables a musician to compose electronic music using just one piece of equipment. Origin ...

that uses digital PCM subtractive synthesis and combines an updated version of the JV-1080

synthesizer A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and ...

engine with the sequencer capabilities of the

Roland Roland (; frk, *Hrōþiland; lat-med, Hruodlandus or ''Rotholandus''; it, Orlando or ''Rolando''; died 15 August 778) was a Frankish military leader under Charlemagne who became one of the principal figures in the literary cycle known as the ...

MRC-Pro

sequencer Sequencer may refer to: Technology * Drum sequencer (controller), an electromechanical system for controlling a sequence of events automatically * DNA sequencer, a machine used to automatically produce a sequence readout from a biological DNA sam ...

. The XP-80 was introduced in 1996 and is now discontinued.

Specifications

The XP-80 has a 76-key semi-weighted keyboard. A smaller 61-key variant, the XP-60 was introduced shortly afterward. The synthesis engine is capable of 64-voice

polyphony Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice, monophony, or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords, h ...

and 16-part

multi-timbral Monotimbral (from the root prefix ''mono'' meaning one, and ''timbre'' meaning a specific tone of a sound independent of its pitch) is usually used in reference to electronic synthesizers which can produce a single timbre at a given pitch when pr ...

ity. The XP-80 includes the 128

General MIDI General MIDI (also known as GM or GM 1) is a standardized specification for electronic musical instruments that respond to MIDI messages. GM was developed by the American MIDI Manufacturers Association (MMA) and the Japan MIDI Standards Committ ...

instrument set, as well as 384 additional preset instruments ("patches" in Roland parlance), for a total of 512 preset patches. Additional user memory is provided for making copies of up to 128 patches, allowing the user to edit patch parameters and save them in memory. There are 8 preset percussion instrument combinations (called "rhythm sets") and 2 user configurable rhythm sets. The XP-80 includes 64 preset combinations of up to 15 existing patches and 1 rhythm set. These patch and rhythm set combinations are referred to as "performances" in Roland parlance. There are an additional 32 user memory locations to store user configurable performances. There is a built-in backlit

LCD A liquid-crystal display (LCD) is a flat-panel display or other electronically modulated optical device that uses the light-modulating properties of liquid crystals combined with polarizers. Liquid crystals do not emit light directly but in ...

display of 320 by 80 pixels. The onboard sequencer is capable of storing up to 60,000 notes of recorded musical performance and has a clock resolution of 96 parts per quarter note. It's capable of storing up to 100 patterns and 1 song at a time in memory, but can also load and play music sequences directly from

floppy disk A floppy disk or floppy diskette (casually referred to as a floppy, or a diskette) is an obsolescent type of disk storage composed of a thin and flexible disk of a magnetic storage medium in a square or nearly square plastic enclosure lined w ...

using the built-in floppy disk drive. The XP-80 includes 4 user accessible expansion slots (located under a removable cover on the bottom of the unit). Each slot can accommodate one SR-JV80 expansion board. A total of 21 SR-JV80 expansion boards were released by Roland. Nineteen were sold (SR-JV80-01 through SR-JV80-19), while 2 were given away as demonstration expansion boards for various promotions (SR-JV80-98 and SR-JV80-99). A built-in 3.5" floppy disk drive provides removable data storage for up to 1.44 MB of music sequences, sequence chain-play playlists, groove quantize settings, additional patch, rhythm set, performance and system settings storage. External connections include 2 unbalanced 1/4-inch "MIX" (left and right channel) and 2 unbalanced "DIRECT" (left and right channel)

TS connector A phone connector, also known as phone jack, audio jack, headphone jack or jack plug, is a family of electrical connectors typically used for analog audio signals. A plug, the male connector, is inserted into the jack, the female connect ...

jacks. Sounds are normally routed to the MIX outputs but can instead be routed to the DIRECT outputs when required. There is a 1/4-inch stereo headphone jack, a 1/4-inch jack for the sustain (hold) pedal and a 1/4-inch jack for sequencer click output, useful as a metronome when playing along with the sequencer. Four 1/4-inch control pedal jacks have configurable functions, including the ability to adjust patch volume, patch cutoff frequency, effects levels, organ speaker rotation simulation, stepping through patches, and so forth. There are three 5-pin

MIDI MIDI (; Musical Instrument Digital Interface) is a technical standard that describes a communications protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, computers, and re ...

ports (IN, OUT, and THRU). The waveforms and presets of the XP-80 are made by sound designer

Eric Persing Eric Persing is an american sound designer, professional synthesist and producer based in Los Angeles, California. He is best known as the Founder and Creative Director of the music software and virtual instrument company Spectrasonics. He has ...

. This product is no longer in production. Similar capabilities can be found in newer Roland Fantom series music workstations.

Trivia

The Roland XP-80 has been used by

Jean Michel Jarre Jean-Michel André Jarre (; born 24 August 1948) is a French composer, performer and record producer. He is a pioneer in the electronic, ambient and new-age genres, and is known for organising outdoor spectacles featuring his music, accompanie ...

to record his

Sessions 2000 ''Sessions 2000'' is the fourteenth studio album by French electronic musician and composer Jean-Michel Jarre, released on Disques Dreyfus and distributed by Sony Music in 2002. On January 7, 2003 was released in US. ''Sessions 2000'' featured Fra ...

and by the

Beatmasters The Beatmasters are an English electronic music group who gained success in the UK in the late 1980s with four top 20 hit singles. They then went on to produce and remix records for many other artists. The group's string of chart hit singles ...

team. Also utilised by Flaming Lips on their album 'Yoshimi battles the Pink Robots' '

XP series

Its family of XP synthesizers consists of the first released XP-10 in 1994 and XP-50 in 1995. Later joined by the XP-80 in 1996 and the XP-60 in 1998 and lastly the XP-30 in 1999.

External links

XP-80 at Vintage Synth Explorer

XP-80 at Roland US

References

{{Roland Music workstations XP-80 Polyphonic synthesizers Digital synthesizers

Specifications

Trivia

XP series

See also

External links

References