Roland, V-Combo Live Performance Keyboard, 73-Key (VR-730)

This keyboard is overall a great keyboard for performing to live audiences. While the piano and organ sounds are not quite as good as my Yamaha XF keyboard, it is much lighter, as well as much quicker and easier to find and save good sounding piano, organ and synth sounds, as well as to change keys and octaves. It is also much lighter.

Light weight keyboard with lots of “on the fly” adjustments. I bought it thinking it would be perfect for live gigs where I need to switch sounds quickly and enhance sounds during a performance. But the sounds in this keyboard are weak (especially piano sounds) and there are not as many as most keyboards available. After trying it for a couple of weeks I returned it because I just couldn’t get the sounds i wanted. I’ll also admit I have a couple other keyboards and this wasn’t good enough to upgrade from what I have.

This instrument has glitches: pitch bend does not bend the pitch the first time you use it, that is whenever you change the patch you are playing, And you cannot change the register using MIDI, so forget about live performances using Set List Maker and such. Also, the organ drawbars move in steps, not smoothly, so fine adjustments to your tone cannot be made.Expect issues. And Roland support has not been forthcoming, they do respond but have no answers. Big disappointment. Yes it is cheaper than Nord electro-6 or Hammond SK1, but I returned it and paid the difference to get something reliable.