Roland Workstations
Roland Workstations
Browse our Range
One For All - Performance, Production and Song Creation In One Box
What is a workstation? If you are new to the world of keyboards you might have come across this term being applied to certain products and wondered what exactly it meant. Well, here we thought we’d try to explain the concept and look at some of the features you’d expect to find in the current Roland Workstation line-up. Scroll down to learn more about Workstations.
Each Roland Workstation comes with a 2 year warranty when registering your product with Roland Backstage.
The Fantom is Roland’s flagship range of synthesizer workstations featuring their latest and greatest sound engine; Zen-Core, making its sounds second to none. The Fantom features a completely modelled piano section called V-Piano as well as high-resolution SuperNatural acoustic instruments for ultimate realism. The synth engine is incredibly powerful and detailed, and editing is a dream thanks to the front panel controls which feature 1024 steps of resolution. Fantom allows you to sample and multi-sample instruments to create custom sounds too. Like the JunoDS and FA you can split/layer 16 sounds at once, but Fantom takes this a step further allowing you to combine internal sounds with external sounds triggered via MIDI or over USB using Apple’s Mainstage programme, making it perfect for professional live and studio musicians. Best of all though is expandability. Roland have made additional technologies and sounds available as expansions for the Fantom through Roland Cloud, meaning you can customise the instruments to your heart’s desire to fit your needs. This truly makes the Fantom in a class of its own.
The FA series is Roland’s midrange level workstation that builds upon the performance of the JunoDS. Featuring an upgraded SuperNatural Acoustic and Synth engine, the sounds of the FA are truly stunning and ideal for semi-pro studio and live situations. The FA also allows you to split/layer 16 sounds across the keyboard and features a full 16-track linear MIDI sequencer for creating songs. The FA also has 16 performance pads which can be used to trigger samples or a host of other functions.
The JunoDS range is Roland’s entry-level workstation offering and is the perfect choice for musicians on a budget. The JunoDS offers great quality sounds across all styles from acoustic instruments to synths and allows you to split/layer up to 16 of them at once. It features the ability to load in samples to create your own custom multi-sampled keyboard tones and also a fun 8 track pattern sequencer for creating loops. The JunoDS can even be powered by batteries to provide a truly portable solution.
All Your Sounds In One Place
To put it simply, in modern terms a workstation keyboard could be described as something that does a little bit of everything; an all-rounder that can be useful in many different studio and stage situations. A modern workstation keyboard will usually cater to the keyboard player who would normally require several different keyboards/synthesizers and studio items but they are looking for one keyboard to fulfil several (or perhaps all) of these requirements in one unit for convenience.
For example, a modern workstation will usually contain a huge variety of sounds that would cover everything from acoustic instruments like pianos and orchestral sounds, to drums, advanced synthesizer tones, special FX and everything in between. This would be ideal for a session musician or a function band player who would perform a setlist that covers multiple genres and styles or composers that write for film/TV, as they would always have appropriate sounds available in one keyboard.
Maximum Creativity, Ultimate Control
A workstation usually allows for more complex layering and splits of sounds than found in standard keyboards. Many players might require the use of several tones at once within the same song, and many workstations can allow you to layer up to 16 sounds at once.
A keyboard play may also need to use samples to recreate a particular performance in a live situation, and a workstation will also usually offer this functionality in some capacity.
In the same way, a guitar player may rely on a multi-fx unit instead of a vast array of individual pedals/pedalboard to enhance their tone, for a keyboard player, a workstation usually offers a plethora of onboard effects. Whether individual instruments within a layer need independent effects or you would like to run numerous instruments in global reverbs/modulation effect, a Workstation offers flexible routing solutions, negating the need for an external mixer or DAW once more.
Key Actions For Every Need
A workstation may also be available in different key configurations to accommodate different styles of players. For instance, a player who predominately uses synthesizer or organ tones may choose a 61-key range with fast action, whereas a more piano-focused player may prefer an 88-key option with weighted piano keys. Typically, a Workstation does not come with built-in speakers, which can be hugely advantageous in terms of space, transport, ease of use, and crucially, cost.
Partner your Roland Workstation with a Roland KC Keyboard Amp for playing live and performing with other musicians or use Roland Headphones for silent practice.
Compose Your Own Arrangements - Without A Computer
Typically, workstations offer some onboard sequencing capabilities. Traditionally, home computer recording was far less accessible to most people (as well as being very expensive), so the addition of a sequencer on a workstation meant a musician could create compositions in the same machine. Nowadays computer recording has become vastly more powerful and affordable, with most musicians having access to some kind of DAW.
Many keyboard players find using a computer frustrating and slow them down, as they have to power on their machine, interface, monitors and other studio gear, whereas the sequencer in a workstation is a way of quickly getting ideas down the moment inspiration strikes. Due to the seamless integration of modern Workstations, users can take their ideas to the computer to embellish them and finish their songs.
Modern workstations can support this process, as they usually contain an inbuilt USB audio interface, enabling users to easily record their sounds onto a computer, as well as act as a MIDI/DAW controller.
Workstations can also be referred to as “mother” or “master” keyboards, as the MIDI sequencer is able to send note information to external instruments, whether that is hardware or software. Live keyboard players love using workstations to power their entire live show and backing tracks. You can also perform the sounds of your favourite hardware/software without having to have 4 arms.
The perfect Workstation will allow users to seamlessly flip between rehearsal, live performance, studio and composition environments without the need for any other products.
For users that want a wide variety of sounds, editability and performance features, but do not need the sequencer/compositional benefits of a workstation, check out the range of Roland Stage Pianos.