Latest News

30 Years of MIDI

cliff@embeddedinc.com (Cliff Elion) — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 21:01:13 GMT

30 Years of MIDI

The MMA (MIDI Manufacturers association) celebrated the 30 year anniversary of MIDI at the 2013 NAMM show. Besides several historical events, including showing a 30 year old Commodore 64 used as a MIDI sequencer to control an iPad base audio synthesizer. Talk about 'back to the future'/

Check out the MIDI Creators and Innovators Panel discussion, this included luminaries: Dave Smith, George Duke, Tom Oberheim, Alan Parsons, Jordan Rudess, Craig Anderton.

Note the mention of the YRG at: 33:40 secs

For the full article go here: http://www.midi.org/aboutus/news/2013namm.php

YRG-review collage

cliff@embeddedinc.com (Cliff Elion) — Sun, 16 Dec 2012 18:35:11 GMT

YRG Reviews

A collection of recent articles published about the YRG.

"If you're in the market for a guitar to MIDI controller, I can't think of a single reason why you wouldn't go for the YRG Gen2. It's much cheaper than any of the other offerings from other companies and does the job better.	"1) It is dead easy to get started with 2) The easy in it does not limit what you can do. It is VERY deep 3) The tracking is fantastic. If you have ever done the MIDI thing with guitar then you know about tracking errors. ... The YouRock had not latency that we can detect so far. 4) It's a freakin' blast."	"This is the simple, effective controller I wanted when I first started working with MIDI in 1985, but I’m very happy to have it now, and it won’t be going back, and wouldn’t even at twice the price""
"I not only appreciate its accuracy and tracking speed, but also, that I need to do very little MIDI data cleanup after recording. Although the YRG-1000 turned a lot of heads—even for people who thought they wouldn’t like it—the YRG improves the concept and execution even further."	"Final thoughts: this little guitar rocks. If you are more comfortable with the guitar neck than the piano keyboard, then it will help you get up and rocking in no time. When used with Garage Band, Logic, or any other VST MIDI interface, there will be no limits to the creativity that you can inject into your music."	"If you’re into MIDI guitar—or want to be—don’t ignore the You Rock Guitar. It does indeed rock."
"...an incredibly fun device that really does give you that extra feeling of authenticity as you strum real strings with a real plectrum using real frets."	"Overall a very impressive little unit. The tracking is fast so for recording with midi alone this is a great tool for the recording guitarist. The pre-set sounds are decent and have a vast array of tones and effects, making this a great axe for practicing or jamming anywhere. The removable neck makes it easy to toss in a backpack and take anywhere (even on a plane)um using real frets."	"The YRG opens the world of production to those who discovered their passion for music through the guitar, but don’t have the time/money to learn boolean logik (computer programs). Simply plug it into your computer, open Garage Band, and record those insane potential remixes that have been humming in your head."

Gi Magazine Review

cliff@embeddedinc.com (Cliff Elion) — Thu, 13 Dec 2012 19:05:45 GMT

Guitar Interactive Reviews the YRG

"Once tweaked to match the playing style the YRG is easily the fastedt tracking guitar controller I've ever come across."

"If you're in the market for a guitar to MIDI controller, I can't think of a single reason why you wouldn't go for the YRG Gen2. It's much cheaper than any of the other offerings from other companies and does the job better.

Check out the Video

Read the Full Review here

Teachers: You and the You Rock Guitar

cliff@embeddedinc.com (Cliff Elion) — Wed, 19 Sep 2012 22:35:34 GMT

Teachers: You And The You Rock Guitar

If you make your living playing and teaching the You Rock Guitar is sure to take things to a whole new level. As a significant development in the evolution of the instrument the You Rock Guitar not only makes your job as a teacher easier, it will also fuel your creativity. There are 10 good reasons to buy a You Rock Guitar.

    1.    The You Rock Guitar is always in tune!

Since the You Rock Guitar has virtual strings and a high-tech, touch sensitive fretboard there is no need to ever tune the guitar. This is a tremendous advantage for the beginner as learning to tune the guitar is probably one of the biggest stumbling blocks they encounter. Playing a guitar that is always in tune greatly accelerates the learning process and, as any teacher will tell you, aids in the development of a musical ear in a very real way. If you teach a guitar class with multiple students, the You Rock Guitar is an answer to a prayer because half of your valuable instruction time will not be wasted with the dreaded ritual of tuning up the class.

    2.    The You Rock Guitar does not ever hurt your fingers!

Because the You Rock Guitar has a high-tech touch sensitive fingerboard your students can concentrate on learning chord shapes and visualizing scale patterns without any of the physical discomfort and pain associated with learning to play the guitar. The You Rock Guitar is ready to go right out of the box and is always ready to go whenever you or your students need it.

    3.    The You Rock Guitar is a lesson plan machine!

The You Rock Guitar is the best guitar-based MIDI controller ever made. There are no issues with tracking, latency or add-on pickup systems that are overcomplicated and never quite work properly. You will find that the You Rock Guitar is a dream machine when it comes to interfacing with music notation software. Personally, I prefer Finale to create exercises and lesson plans. In my 20+ years of teaching experience I have never found a device that has improved my workflow like the You Rock Guitar, which integrates seamlessly with any of the music notation or guitar transcription software programs available today.

    4.    The You Rock Guitar is a rhythm trainer!

The Achilles heel of guitar students, and a good many guitarists as well, is rhythm. Most students have a tendency to rush and many fairly accomplished guitarists simply don't understand how to get in the groove. Don't take my word for it, just listen to some of the music being made nowadays and you will probably agree with me. The You Rock Guitar has a boatload of hot sounding, preprogrammed rhythm grooves right on board the instrument itself in its internal software. Just press a button and you are playing along with professionally prepared rhythm tracks that will give you the experience needed to play in a rock band.

    5.    The You Rock Guitar is a harmonic ear-training machine!

Included in the internal software of the You Rock Guitar is an assortment of common knowledge chord progressions and cadences that are a required component of professional level instruction. These tracks are of course recorded with the full sound of a rock band and are supported by our instructional manual Cool Chords, that is available on our website. The best part about it is, studying chord progressions with the You Rock Guitar seems like fun to the student. The benefits of this are wide ranging but the chief benefit in my estimation is having students play and hear common knowledge chord progressions and cadences in perfect time every time they practice.

    6.    The You Rock Guitar is an introduction to the world of digital music!

With loads of excellent sounding guitar models and synthesizer patches included in its internal programming, the You Rock Guitar opens the students mind up to the world of synthesis and digital music. Playing the guitar and being able to access great sounding guitar and keyboard sounds is not only informative, it's entertaining. This feature keeps the guitar in your students’ hands and gives them one more reason to practice. Also, sound modeling and digital instrument sounds are simply a part of today's musical landscape, and the You Rock Guitar is the best way to get your students started in this exciting world without breaking the bank.

    7.    The You Rock Guitar is affordable and portable!

I am not suggesting that the You Rock Guitar replaces a traditional guitar but it sure enhances the experience of playing and studying the guitar in a cost-effective way. The You Rock Guitar has a removable neck and its small and comfortable size makes it the perfect guitar to take along in a backpack, suitcase, RV, vacation home, or stored in a school locker. The You Rock Guitar is a real problem solver for all of your students from the junior high school student to the adult learner who may frequently be out of town.

    8.    The You Rock Guitar gets your creative juices flowing!

If you own any other MIDI equipment such as a keyboard or synthesizer the You Rock Guitar integrates seamlessly with any and everything that has MIDI capabilities. Many of our end-users have created You Tube videos that are absolute knockouts simply by plugging the You Rock Guitar into an amplifier and a digital synthesizer to create a wide variety of incredible sounding layered guitar tracks. The You Rock Guitar is in use by scores of original bands and working musicians who are creating sounds that would normally cost thousands of dollars and require stacks of complicated equipment.

    9.    The You Rock Guitar makes your home recording studio guitar friendly!

If you use any of the popular Digital Audio Workstations (DAW’s) such as Garage Band, Logic, Sonar, Ableton or even Pro-Tools the You Rock Guitar will enable you to input digital information as quickly as you can with your MIDI keyboard. The big difference is you are a guitar player, not a keyboard player so you will not be limited by your ability, or inability to think of and play music on a keyboard. The You Rock Guitar will enable you to create music intuitively and with the feel of a real guitar just like you want to. Owning a You Rock Guitar is a great way to concentrate on your music, instead of your equipment, when you are in your home studio.

     10.) The You Rock Guitar automatically does alternate tunings!

As your students become more advanced and beginning to concentrate on copying songs, they will undoubtedly encounter songs in alternate guitar tunings. To me, this is always a nightmare. It means I have to stop the lessons and re-tune two guitars: theirs and mine. In your typical half-hour lesson your time is all but shot. With a You Rock Guitar a wide variety of the most common alternate tunings are just a button away.

In closing let me say that I found the biggest and most important reason to own a You Rock Guitar is simply because it is way too cool! It's new, it's hot, it's what's happening now and is a sure way to take your playing and teaching to a whole new level.

About Karl:

Karl Aranjo is a graduate of the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston Massachuttes and was a protégé of the great William G. Leavitt, often called the best guitar teacher of all time and creator of the Berklee method.

Karl has also studied with many of the world's great players and has built a solid career as a performer, arranger, session player, sought after instructor and best selling author of six guitar books including the highly acclaimed Guitar Buddy, Guitar Chord Guru and Guitar Scale Guru.

Mr. Aranjo is currently artist in residence at one of the nations landmark restaurants, L’hirondelle located in historic San Juan Capistrasno California.

Karl Aranjo is also the creative director of www.getgoodfast.com, an interactive, educational guitar site designed to teach pro level guitar skills and support his best selling guitar poster.

Buttons Vs Strings

cliff@embeddedinc.com (Cliff Elion) — Wed, 05 Sep 2012 16:24:50 GMT

"Why are buttons inferior to simulated strings in a midi guitar?"

As we watch sporting events and marvel at the agility of athletes we are in awe of their fluid and precise movements

Nobody was born with that. But nobody was born without it either.

In training for any activity, you have a silent helper----part of the central nervous system few people talk about called the cerebellum. Think of this as a feedback looper for your sense of touch and position.

The cerebellum isn't "thinking".....its a router. It sits above the spinal cord in the back part of the skull, and receives and sends information to your arms and legs (and yes, to your fingers). Repeated exercises and movements "program" pathways to allow for certain movements, and make them precise and quick. And eventually without too much "thought"----remember typing class????

Your years of guitar playing pay off by you "knowing" music and your cerebellum facilitating the movements. Santana, Clapton, Van Halen
..and you

The YOUROCKGUITAR encourages this learning by keeping strings in the mix. While other midi controllers have the spacing similar to guitars, the buttons (Fender Mustang Midi, Kitara, Yamaha EZ-AG) are quite different, so your brain is having to deal with a different batch of data.


Typical guitar neck with buttons	YRG patented fingerboard with simulated strings and frets

I still want to be able to play guitar---so while I see the potential of other midi controllers, I also "feel" the superiority of the YRG. Add the pop-off neck (not on the Misa Kitara or the Yamaha) for transport ease, and I can keep one with me when I travel, and have a three hour lay-over.

I will never be good on a balance beam, and I look funny on ice-skates...........but I hope to be a better guitar player.

Bruce Cross, M.D.

Note From Inspired Instruments:
Inspired Instruments, Inc was recently awarded US and international patent protection for the You Rock Guitar neck and fingerboard design. We agree with Dr Cross. There are many differences when playing digital musical instruments using a guitar, our goal is to remove the boundaries and give guitar players access to all the technology afforded to keyboard players. The touch and feel of the User Interface is critical for this.

YRG1000 Gen1 Loyalty

cliff@embeddedinc.com (Cliff Elion) — Tue, 03 Jul 2012 19:55:52 GMT

YRG-1000 Loyalty Program for Gen1 Customers

July 3, 2012

The YRG-1000 Gen2 will replace the Gen1 and will be the only product in its family (YRG-1000) produced by Inspired instruments Inc. It will be launched early August 2012.

So what does this mean for the Gen1 and existing customers?

Well, production of the YRG-1000 Gen1 is complete. The YRG-1000 Gen2 will replace it as our primary product. Customer, technical, and bug support will continue for all models. Furthermore, we will continue working to implement DLC functionality for both platforms and plan on offering some upgrade paths for Gen1 users.

We recognize that some of our existing Gen1 customers may want to upgrade and we value that support. So in the spirit of support we will be offering a YRG customer loyalty program. Our existing Gen1 customers will be able to upgrade or trade in their units to receive a discount on a Gen2. We have not figured out the specifics of the program, but will be sure to announce it before our DLC goes online.

So what makes the Gen2 different from the Gen1?

Since we launched the YRG-1000 in mid 2010 we’ve learned a huge amount about our own product. Through a series of firmware upgrades we were able to build the Gen1 into a stable, affordable, and powerful MIDI guitar. However, the production and testing process for our product is extremely complicated. Having the product produced overseas has helped us keep the price down, but it has also been a cause of some technical and performance issues. To mitigate these issues we have moved final assembly, test, and QC from China to our California facility. In addition to the procedural change we made several design improvements to our pickup system which will increase consistency and reliability. The new design allows for more dynamic control over the feel (loosening and tightening), trigger, and gain parameters.

More over, the Gen2 platform has new onboard sound drivers, substantially increasing the value of the onboard synth. We have also included features that increase the amount of control the user has of the onboard synth, external MIDI devices ie: DAWS, composition, and notation software.

See the features list here: http://www.yourockguitar.com/component/content/article/194.

Fox8 news

cliff@embeddedinc.com (Cliff Elion) — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 05:17:04 GMT

Reprinted from Fox 8 WVUE in New Orleans

You Rock Guitar: a battery-powered MIDI marvel

Updated: Apr 18, 2012 7:02 AM PDT

The You Rock Guitar is a digital guitar designed for musicians, performers, music teachers, beginners and video gamers. The device has strings and a finger board, just like a real guitar, but it never needs tuning.

Furthermore, it provides 99 built-in presets and 25 digitally-sampled guitars, allowing it to sound like a six-string acoustic or the electric "ax" of your choice -- at the press of a button.

Also included are 50 synthesizer sounds, such as pianos, organs, strings, brass, etc., and 75 built-in song and drum loops for musical accompaniment.

The unit supports playing styles, ranging from tapping to sliding, and employs one of the best MIDI controllers available, which ensures compatibility with all the popular software on both Mac and PC.

In "You Rock Mode," the device will not let you play a wrong note and keeps you in the right chord progression, which is ideal for beginners and a great teaching tool.

A built-in whammy bar is provided for pitch bend (both up and down), and you can even record your own creations with the on-board MIDI recorder.

In "Game Mode," the unit is compatible with both Rock Band and Guitar Hero and can connect wirelessly to most major consoles, including the Nintendo Wii and Sony PlayStation3, using an optional GameFlex cartridge.

The device is powered by 4 AA batteries (not included) or USB power, and a removable neck makes it easy to transport.

A built-in panel with lighted buttons and a numeric display controls everything, except for the volume knob and pitch bending controls on the face. Connecting to a computer is only necessary if you want to use the guitar with GarageBand or some other software.

A variety of inputs and outputs are provided, including a stereo headphone jack, stereo audio input, standard 1/4-in. guitar cable jack, high-speed USB to MIDI, and a legacy MIDI five-pin connector.

The You Rock Guitar weighs approximately 7.5 lbs., measures around 30" x 14" x 3" , and has an MSRP of $219.99. For more information, visit YouRockGuitar.com.

SEE the original article at

http://www.fox8live.com/story/17274568/you-rock-guitar-a-battery-powered-midi-marvel

Freddie Gately YRG1000 review

cliff@embeddedinc.com (Cliff Elion) — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 05:03:35 GMT

Freddie Gately Reviews the YRG-1000

reprinted from www.freddieguitar.com

As soon as I discovered that I could use my keyboard to play all of the midi instruments in Garage Band, I was pumped! The door had been opened to a whole new musical world. MIDI had come so far in the last 10 years and I hadn't even noticed. The MIDI songs that I remember listening to, were mechanical, 8 bit, Mario Bros style music. But now, instruments are digitally sampled (actual instruments recorded) and with the addition of touch sensitivity, I could get pretty close to a real sounding track. There was just one major setback – I'm a much better guitar player than piano player.

I started to look at MIDI guitar options. I had heard rumors of people using guitars as MIDI controllers, but I just couldn't figure out how it would really work in the real world. There were MIDI converting pickups that you could install in your guitar, but they were several hundred dollars, required a lot of modifications, and still didn't sound like they worked well for folks. I'm sure that a more dedicated person could get it working somewhat well, but time and money were things that I just didn't have. I decided to let the thought go, but did an occasional Google search every year-or-so just to see if there were any advancements.

This last month, I was getting ready to TAB some songs and thought of how convenient a MIDI guitar would be. I finally just faced that fact that I would have to tear into one of my older guitars and try to turn it into a MIDI controller. While searching through the various forums and products, I noticed that some new MIDI guitars were hitting the market. The price tag – at least $1000. They were cool, but not that cool... Then, I came across this little gem.

The YouRock Guitar had all the features that I was looking for and at a price tag that wouldn't break the bank... shockingly cheap actually.

For the complete article check out Freddie's site ....

http://freddieguitar.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=125:yourock-guitar&catid=55:gear-reviews&Itemid=188

Radio Promos

cliff@embeddedinc.com (Cliff Elion) — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 19:19:24 GMT

We're on the Airwaves again
Check out our promo on RadioScreamer

	2013
listen to the promo






	NOVEMBER 2011

Lorri Voornas playing Hits WJBQ- 97.9	Ethan Briner plays Hits on WILD 95.5	Ronn Ricks and Tim Howard playin gcountry music on KCKL 95.9


Frank FM 106.3, Classic Hits	Classic Rock with Kim Terbrack on 104.9 The Hawk	MIX107.7


Country on Star 95.9, 96.9	Classic Rock on Kbus 101.9	K-Lake 97.7 FM


Country 93.9 KOYN	Country with Mikey T. on KFAV 99.9

	DECEMBER 2011

Andrew Carl is Classic Rock on Big 105.9	The Morning After with Crissy and Nikki for hits on SHE 106.3	KRST 92.3 for Country


Hunter and Michaels playing Classic Rock on Wind-FM	Pop Music 93.3 KOB FM

Music China 2011

cliff@embeddedinc.com (Cliff Elion) — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 06:44:53 GMT

Music China 2011

Check Out Dan Mumms You Rock Guitar demo in Shanghai

October 12~15 was Music China in Shanghai. EETI, our new distributor in China is featuring the You Rock Guitar in their booth to present our technology to the Asian Music Market - this is our first big International show. We sent Josh Elion and Dan Mumm to represent us at the EETI booth. Dan will be showing his extraordinary prowess on guitar (in this case we are lucky that it's the You Rock Guitar).

The show is being held at the New Shanghai Expo Center from Oct 12~15, 2011

And we are in great company at the show ...

Dan is scheduled to demo 3 times a day + a performance on the main stage of the exhibition.