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Keytar
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A keytar is a relatively lightweight keyboard or synthesizer that is supported by a strap around the neck and shoulders, similar to the way a guitar is supported by a guitar strap. Keytars allow players a greater range of movement compared to conventional keyboards, which are placed on stands. The instrument has a musical keyboard for triggering musical notes and sounds. Controls for pitch bends, vibrato, portamento, and sustain are placed on the instrument’s “neck".
keytar was developed by Anthony Masakowski and commercially introduced in 1980 as the Moog Liberation.
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A keytar is a relatively lightweight keyboard or synthesizer that is supported by a strap around the neck and shoulders, similar to the way a guitar is supported by a guitar strap. Keytars allow players a greater range of movement compared to conventional keyboards, which are placed on stands. The instrument has a musical keyboard for triggering musical notes and sounds. Controls for pitch bends, vibrato, portamento, and sustain are placed on the instrument’s “neck".
History
The keytar was developed by Anthony Masakowski and commercially introduced in 1980 as the Moog Liberation. Early users included Spyro Gyra keyboardist Tom Schuman and the band Devo. The word “keytar” is a portmanteau of “keyboard” and “guitar”. An early printed use of the term “keytar” was in 1980 in an interview with Jeffrey Abbott by Tom Lounges of Illianabeat magazine (now Midwest BEAT Magazine).The keytar was made popular in the 1980s by glam metal bands, as well as synthpop and New Wave groups. Changing trends in music diminished the keytar’s popularity shortly thereafter.
The keytar has enjoyed new visibility due in part to software innovations from companies like Musiclab (RealGuitar), UltimateSoundBank (PlugSound).
While Edgar Winter often performed with a keyboard slung around his neck in the early 1970s, it was not a keytar—it was an ARP 2600 keyboard with a shoulder strap added. Wayne Famous of the 1980s band The Producers also strapped on a regular Oberheim synthesizer, which caused him to develop back problems.
Roland ceased production of its AX-7 model in early 2007. In January 2009 the company announced the forthcoming release of Roland AX-Synth shoulder synthesizer with an axe-shape design and an internal sound module as an improvement to AX-7, which had no built-in sounds. AX-Synth also has further improvements, such as USB connectivity.
Types
1980s
The Moog Liberation was released in 1980 by Moog Music. It included two monophonic VCOs and a polyphonic section that could play organ sounds. The neck had spring-loaded wheels for filter cutoff, modulation, and volume as well as a ribbon-controlled pitch bend. The Liberation had a single VCF and two ADS envelope generators.
The Roland SH-101 is a small, 32 key, monophonic analog synthesizer from the early 1980s. It has one oscillator with two waveforms, an 'octave-divided' sub-oscillator, and a low-pass filter/VCF capable of self oscillation. When a shoulder strap is connected to it, and the small handgrip with a pitch bend wheel and a pitch modulation trigger is used, the SH-101 becomes a keytar.
The Yamaha SHS-10 from the late 1980s has a small keyboard with 32 minikeys and a pitch-bend wheel, an internal Frequency modulation (usually referred to as FM) synthesizer offering 25 different voices with 6-note polyphony. Onboard voices include a range of keyboard instruments (pipe organ, piano, electric piano, etc.); strings (violin, guitar, double bass, etc.); and wind and brass (clarinet, flute, trumpet, etc.).
1990s-2000s
The Roland AX-7, which was manufactured from 2001 to 2007, contains many more advanced features than early keytars. It has 45 velocity sensitive keys (without aftertouch), and a 3-character LED display. Several features aimed towards stage performance are present, such as a pitch bend ribbon, touchpad-like expression bar, sustain switch, and volume control knob, all on the upper neck of the instrument. There is also a proprietary "D-Beam" interface, made up of infrared sensors that detect nearby motion. This interface can be used to trigger and control effects.
Related instruments
While some inexpensive children’s toys are manufactured in the same shape as a keytar, and marketed with the keytar name, these toys have very limited capabilities. They can typically only perform one note at a time (monophonic) or in some cases, two-note polyphony. Professional models allow the performer to play many notes at once (except for older instruments such as the aforementioned Moog or the Roland SH-101). As well, the sound quality for the samples or synthesis is usually very rudimentary.
Instrument builder Vinson Williams developed two instruments which he calls Keytars, the Keytar V-1 (with 12 strings and a 12-note keyboard) and the Keytar V-2 (with 24 strings and a 24-note keyboard). Unlike the synthesizer-based Moog Liberation and the Yamaha and Roland keytars which descended from it, William's keytar combines a guitar body with strummable metal strings and a piano keyboard, instead of a fretboard, for allowing the strings to sound the strings. While William's instrument shares the keytar name, its use of strings and its Clavinet-style fretting mechanisms puts it in a different category. Like the Clavinet, William's instrument uses rubber pads which, when depressed, fret the otherwise damped strings. Unlike the Clavinet which relies solely on the impact of fretting to sound a note, however, the Williams instrument allows the strings to be plucked or strummed by hand.
Popularity
Keytars reached their height of popularity in the 1980s, and were strongly associated with the New Wave music of the time.
In the 1990s and early 2000s, they were extremely unfashionable, however with the Synthpop revival of the late 2000s, they are once again hip, with Synthpop revivalists like Cobra Starship and Lights using them.
See also
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