Roland Fantom G6 Specification sheet

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© 2010 Roland Corporation U.S.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form without the
written permission of Roland Corporation U.S.
FGWS13
Playing Clips from the Fantom-G Pads
®ÂØÒňήWorkshop
Fantom-G Workstation Keyboard

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About the Workshop Booklets
Roland’s Fantom G6, G7, and G8—the Fantom-G family—set a new standard
for excellence in workstation keyboards, with spectacular sounds and
incredible built-in effect-processing muscle. A beautiful full-color LCD
display and innovative performance features make getting around a pleasure
and make the G6, G7, and G8 a dream to play. For recording, the Fantom-G
contains a powerful 152 MIDI/audio track sequencer. Each Fantom-G can
also host two Roland ARX SuperNATURAL™ cards whose breakthrough
modeling technology provides sounds with amazing sonic detail, expressive
possibilities, and sound-design opportunities.
Each Fantom-G Workshop Series booklet focuses on one Fantom-G topic,
and is intended as a companion to the Fantom G6/G7/G8 Owner’s Manual.
This booklet requires Fantom-G Operating System v1.30 or higher. You can
download the latest Fantom-G O.S. for free from www.RolandUS.com.
About This Booklet
While the Fantom-G is obviously a powerful synth/sampler performance
keyboard, it also makes an excellent onstage launchpad for firing off clips,
DJ-style. Build songs and sets on the fly to match the music to the moment
using the Fantom-G’s pads and its RPS feature. This booklet explains how.
Understanding the Symbols in This Booklet
Throughout this booklet, you’ll come across information that deserves
special attention—that’s the reason it’s labeled with one of the following
symbols.
A note is something that adds information about the topic at hand.
A tip offers suggestions for using the feature being discussed.
Warnings contain important information that can help you avoid
possible damage to your equipment, your data, or yourself.
Clicking or Pressing
As explained in the Power User Control Fantom-G Workshop booklet, you
can perform most operations on the Fantom-G using either a connected
mouse—sold separately—or the Fantom-G’s own front-panel controls.
If you’re using a mouse: If you’re using the Fantom-G’s controls:
You select parameters and objects with
a left click. You change the selected
parameter’s value by turning the scroll
wheel. You can often display a menu by
right-clicking an object.
You select parameters and objects with the
3, 4, 5, and 6buttons. Change a
selected parameter’s setting by turning the
Value dial or by pressing DEC and INC.
Left click Right click
Scroll
wheel
Value dial
In any situation, the best method to use is always simply the one that feels
most natural to you.
Going forward, when we want you to click an onscreen button or its
physical counterpart—your choice, of course—we’ll simply tell you to “click”
the button. The same mouse-centric logic will apply to any other virtual
versus physical control issues we encounter. If there’s only one way to do
something, we’ll tell you so. Beyond that, remember that whether you use a
mouse or the Fantom-G’s built-in controls is entirely up to you.

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What Is RPS?
A Traditional Roland Feature, Re-Imagined
RPS, or “Realtime Phrase Sequencing,” first
appeared in Roland’s XP-50 back in 1996. At
the time, it was envisioned simply as a way to
let musicians easily play back hard-to-perform
musical passages by striking a single key. It
added an arranger-type capability to the
XP-50.
While RPS can still serve that purpose,
in today’s more fluid, improvisational
performing environment, RPS has
taken on a more exciting, modern
role: With RPS, phrases can be used as
“clips”triggered live from the Fantom-G
pads to create custom-made, in-the-
moment dance-floor and club grooves.
A phrase can also be an entire song,
allowing you to change a show’s setlist
in response to the audience’s mood.
How RPS Works
RPS is simple, really: It allows you to trigger phrases from the
Fantom-G pads or keys. These phrases can be complete song
sections, sections that leave out one sound you’ll play live on
the Fantom-G keyboard, or beats, for example.
To use RPS, you switch the pads to RPS pad mode and then assign each
phrase to a pad. A RPS setup for all 16 pads is called an “RPS set.”Each project
can hold up to 2000 phrases and up to 64 RPS sets. We’ll explain how create
an RPS set in “Setting Up Your RPS Pads” on Page 4.
In this booklet, we’re discussing using MIDI phrases as clips. You can
also, of course, fire off beat and loop samples from the pads in Sample
Pad mode—see the Power User Control 2: The Pads Workshop booklet.
In the Fantom-G, there’s no real difference between phrases you
use for RPS and phrases you use as rhythm patterns. RPS pad mode,
though, offers options you don’t have in Rhythm Pattern pad mode.
A lot of what we’re covering in this booklet is discussed from a
somewhat different angle in the Workshop booklet Power User Control
2: The Pads, and in the Sequencing and Recording and Perfecting
Songs, MIDI Tracks, and Audio Tracks Workshop booklets. We’re mostly
just pulling these threads together for you.
Clips
You can fire off any Fantom-G phrase from the pads, whether it’s a single-
instrument phrase, a full-blown arrangement, or something in-between. You
can even import an SMF-based beat—or an entire song, for that matter—as
a new phrase. We explain how to do this on Page 22 of the Sequencing and
Recording Workshop booklet.
While you can assign any song phrase to a pad for use as a clip, the best
way to develop your clip phrases is to sequence them directly without using
a song track. We describe how to do this in the section called “Trackless
Sequencing”on Page 16 in the Sequencing and Recording Workshop booklet.
You’ll also want clips you’ll use together to share the same studio set.

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Switching to RPS Pad Mode
If you’re not familiar with pad modes, see the Workshop booklet Power
User Control 2: The Pads.
So that your phrases play correctly, select the studio set you used when
you created them. This’ll automatically get you the sounds you need
and set the tempo the way you want it.
You can always get immediately into RPS pad mode this way:
1 Press the PAD MODE button to display the Pad Mode
window.
Strike Pad 5 to select RPS pad mode.2
Even Better—Automatic RPS Setup
As each studio set and live set is selected, it can automatically switch to its
own Pad Mode setting and load the RPS set and tempo with which it was
saved. We recommend you dedicate a single studio set to each RPS set so
you can instantly configure the Fantom-G for your clips by simply selecting
their studio set (or live set if that’s what you sequenced your clips with).
There are a couple of settings to make for turning on this behavior:
Press the MENU button.
1
Click F2 (System).2
Click F2 (Group/Down) to select the Dynamic Pad parameter group,3
as shown in the next column.
Select the Pad Assign Source parameter if it’s not selected, and then4
set it to TEMP so that the pads use each studio set’s pad mode.
The RPS Set Assign Source parameter sets whether or not each studio
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set automatically loads the RPS set with which it was saved. Set the
parameter to TEMP so each studio set load its own RPS set.
If you don’t want each studio set to control the current pad mode, set
Pad Assign Source to SYS, and set Pad Mode as desired. To disable the
automatic loading of RPS sets, set RPS Set Assign Source to SYS.
Click F7 (Sys Write) to store your settings in the current project.6
Setting Up Your RPS Pads
Once you’ve selected the studio set your clips use, press the PAD SETTINGS
button to display the Pad Setting screen.
It’s on this screen that you set up your pads with the clips you want, and set
their behavior as desired. Some of the RPS set parameters apply to the entire
set, and each pad also has its own group of settings.

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Once you’ve set up your RPS set, press WRITE and re-save the current studio
set so it contains—and remembers—your new RPS set. You can also store
the RPS set separately in the current project by clicking F7 (Save) if you like.
RPS-Set Parameters
You can click F1 (System) on the Pad Setting screen as a shortcut to
the Dynamic Pad System parameters we discussed in “Locking the Pads
Into RPS Pad Mode” above.
RPS Set Number/Name
This parameter selects the RPS set you want to use. Select the parameter’s
current value, and use your mouse scroll wheel, Value dial, or the INC/DEC
buttons to scroll through all of the current project’s available RPS sets, or
press ENTER to see them in a list. Each project can hold up to 64 RPS sets.
(Of course, if you’ve dedicated a studio set to each RPS set as we mentioned
on Page 4, you won’t have to manually dial one in.)
Keyboard Mode
Keyboard Mode sets the behavior of the keyboard keys that play the same
note numbers the 16 pads play. These note numbers—and keys—are E1 to
G2 by default, shown here shaded in blue. (Middle C is shown as gray.)
Fantom G7
Fantom G6
Fantom G8
Using the default note numbers, the 61-note Fantom G6 has eight keys
that play the same note numbers as the pads. You can change these
note numbers, as we’ll discuss later on.
When you’re playing clips in RPS pad mode, these keys can be set to operate
in one of three ways, according to the setting of the Keyboard Mode
parameter. When you set it to:
NORMAL—
• the special keys operate as normal keyboard keys, playing
notes using the currently selected sound, live set, or studio set part.
RPS—
• you gain a duplicate set of RPS triggers with which you can fire
off your RPS set’s clips just as you can from the pads. This can be handy
when you’re playing the keyboard and don’t want to have to move your
hands to the pads to trigger a clip. If you’re using a Fantom:
G6—
• the keys mimic the behavior of Pads 9-16 by default.
G7 or G8—
• the keys mimic the behavior of Pads 1-16 by default.
Since the special keys mimic the behavior of the pads, they use the
same pad settings we’ll be getting to in a little bit.
RHYTHM-PTN—• you gain a set of rhythm-pattern triggers with which
you can trigger rhythm patterns that play along with any clip you play
on the pads. It’s a bit like getting a 17th pad that can play a rhythm.
You can trigger a single rhythm pattern at a time from the keys in
RPS pad mode—if a rhythm pattern’s already playing when you strike
another pattern’s key, the new pattern replaces the older one.

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Trigger Quantize
Trigger Quantize determines how a pad’s phrase begins playing when you
strike the pad. When it’s set to:
REAL—
• the phrase begins playing as soon as you hit its pad.
BEAT—
• the phrase starts playing at the next beat after you press its
pad.
MEASURE—
• the phrase starts playing at the next measure after you
press its pad.
Whether or not each phrase you trigger replaces a phrase that’s
already playing is something you can control using the pads’ Mute
Group parameter, as we’ll see.
Velocity Sens
Velocity Sens (for “Velocity Sensitivity”) sets the degree to which the volume
of your clips is affected by the force with which you strike the pads. With
Velocity Sen turned on, how hard you whack a pad affects its clip’s playback
velocity, making the clip’s sounds behave as if you’d played the Fantom-G
keys harder or softer during sequencing. You can use this velocity-sensitivity
as a way to add a bit of additional feeling to your clips.
You can set Velocity Sens to:
OFF—
• so that clips play with their original playback velocity regardless
of how hard you hit the pads. Set Velocity Sens to OFF when you want
each clip to sound the way it did when you sequenced it, and so that
transitions between clips are as even as possible.
LOW—
• gets you a slight change in the clips’ playback velocity as you
strike the pads with more or less force.
MID—
• results in a medium amount of change in the clips’ playback
velocity as you strike the pads with more or less force.
HIGH—
• so that the pads become very sensitive to the force with which
you play them, producing the largest possible changes to the clips’
playback velocities as you strike their pads with more or less force.
RPS-Pad Parameters
Each of the 16 pads has its own row of parameters with which you select the
pad’s phrase and set its behavior. Here’s an explanation of these settings.
Phrase Number
This parameter selects a pad’s phrase. You can select any project phrase in
the usual ways or, to see a list of available phrases, highlight the parameter
and press ENTER to display the RPS Pad Phrase Number window.
Play Mode
Each pad’s phrase can play in one of three ways, determined by the setting
of the Play Mode parameter. You can set it to:
LOOP1—
• With the LOOP1 value, the pad’s phrase plays only while you’re
holding down the pad. It loops around and around until you let go. Use
LOOP1 for machine-gunning the start of a clip.
LOOP2—
• With LOOP2, the pad acts as a toggle switch that turns the
phrase on or off with each strike. Once playing, the phrase loops around
and around until you stop it. This is the most typically used setting.
ONCE—
• With the ONCE value, the phrase plays through to its end once
each time you strike its pad.
When you strike a pad, it uses the current Play Mode value—if you
change this setting as a phrase plays, the next pad strike uses the new
setting.
Mute Group
Mute groups is an interesting feature that can keep clips from stepping on
each other, and can also allow you to stack clips when you want to.
One phrase from a mute group can play at a time—if a clip from a mute
group is playing, and you strike the pad of another clip from the same mute
group, the first clip stops playing and the second one takes over. This is the
most common way to use clips, which is why all RPS phrases use Mute Group
1 by default.

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Phrases that are in the same mute group stay out of each others’ way, since
only one can play at a time.
Verse A1
Mute Group 1
Verse B1
Mute Group 1
Verse B1
Mute Group 1
+=
Suppose, however, you want clips to play together. Here’s an example. Say
one clip is a beat, and another is a bass line. If you set the bass-part clip to a
different mute group, it can play on top of the beat clip.
Beat
Mute Group 1
Bass Part
Mute Group 2
Beat
Mute Group 1
Bass Part
Mute Group 2
+=
Going a step further, you can set bass-part clips for different song sections
to the same mute group so they don’t step on each other. You can go on and
on like this, assigning each group of clips that shouldn’t play together to the
same unique, shared mute group.
Note Number
Each pad’s Note Number parameter sets the note number the pad uses
when you strike it. If you’re just playing clips from the pads, you can ignore
this parameter, as the pads play their clips regardless of this setting.
When you’ve set the Keyboard Mode parameter—described on Page 5—to
RPS, however, each pad’s Note Number parameter determines the note, and
therefore the keyboard key, that plays each phrase. Unless you prefer to play
your clips from some other set of keys, you can leave this parameter set to
its default values so the keys from E1 to G2 play your clips. If you’d like to use
some other keys, select them using this parameter.
A Fantom G6 provides a good reason to change Note Number settings:
If you want to trigger clips from 16 of its keys, not just the top eight
default keys as noted on Page 5, you can use this parameter to set the
pads so they work with 16 note numbers the G6 has.
Changing Note Numbers as a Group
To quickly change all of the pads’ Note Numbers
at once using a pre-programmed template, click
F3 (Quick Setup) to display the Quick Setup
window. In this window you select the lowest
note in the series of notes you want to use—
called the “base note”—and then select the type
of notes you want. Set:
Template—
• to the keyboard layout you’d like to use. You can choose:
All—
• to assign the pads to a consecutive series of white- and
black-key notes starting at the selected base note.
White Keys—
• to assign the pads to a consecutive series of white-
key notes starting at the selected base note.
Black Keys—
• to assign the pads to a consecutive series of black-
key notes starting at the selected base note.
Base Note—
• to the lowest note you want to use for triggering clips.
Exchanging Pad Assignment and Settings
You can quickly swap pad settings by clicking F2
(Pad Exchg) to open the Pad Exchange window.
Dial in the pair of pads whose settings you want
to swap, and then click F8 (Execute) to make the
exchange.
About Clip Tempos
Whatever you’re doing, the Fantom-G always has an
internal clock running at the tempo you see displayed
in the TEMPO/VALUE readout. Phrases you play as
clips from the pads use this tempo setting. There are a
couple of ways the Tempo value gets set. It’s set when:
you press the TEMPO button—
• and manually change
the current tempo value.
you load a song—
• since each song has a tempo setting, and may even
have a tempo-track’s worth of tempo changes.

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When you load a project—or create a new one—the project’s default
song is automatically loaded along with the song’s starting tempo.
Clip Tempo Tips
You may want to set your clips’ tempo manually, especially if
you’re not dealing with a lot of tempo changes between clip
sets. However, if you’re playing clip sets that require different
tempos, it can be time-consuming to have to manually dial in
the desired tempo for each one.
Did We Mention Studio Sets?
Of course the simplest way around manually having to set your tempo
onstage is to store each RPS set in its own studio set—as we mentioned
earlier—since each studio set also contains its own tempo setting. Select the
studio set and get the RPS set and tempo you want for free, as long as your
Fantom-G is set up as we described on Page 4.
Five on the Floor
Another way to hook up hands-free tempo changes is
to connect a foot switch or damper such as the Roland
DP-10 or DP-2 (sold separately). This’ll let you tap in
the desired tempo at any time with your five toes
or, seriously, your foot. When you’re using clips with
live musicians, this can be a great way to go. For the
Fantom-G to understand the tempo you want, you’ll
need to tap the pedal just a few times to match the
clips to their tempos.
To set up your foot switch:
Press the MENU button.
1
Click F2 (System)—if the Pedal/DBeam tab isn’t already selected, click2
F1 (Group/Up) until it is.
You can learn about the other foot-pedal and -switch possibilities in
the Manipulating Sounds in Realtime Workshop booklet.
The FOOT PEDAL CTRL 1 and 2 jacks are called “Control Pedal 1” and
“Control Pedal 2” onscreen and have their own settings.
Set the Control Pedal Assign parameter for the FOOT PEDAL CTRL
3
jack you’re using to TAP TEMPO.
Click F7 (Sys Write) to store your new setting in the current project.
4

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Playing Your Clips in Performance
You can use clips in situations where they provide the backbone of the music
you’re performing, or play them along with a song.
When you play clips “wild”—
• that is, not along with to a Fantom-G song,
all you need to do to is make sure the pads are in RPS mode, get your
tempo the way you want it, and start striking the pads. Play along on
the keyboard if you like as the clips play.
Chorus
Bridge
Verse
Intro
To play clips along with a Fantom-G song—• load the song, make sure the
pads are in RPS mode, press PLAY, and then play the pads.
VerseIntro
Using Clips in a Song
You can use clip phrases to quickly build out the structure of a song.
The quickest way is probably to insert each phrase you want on a track,
one-after-another, as we described on Page 4 of the Perfecting Songs,
MIDI Tracks, and Audio Tracks Workshop booklet.
Sequencing Clips Into a Song
If you prefer to play your song’s structure, though, you can trigger your clips
from the pads, and sequence this performance. If each clip is a song section,
when you hit STOP, you’ll have the foundation of your whole song in place.
To sequence clips into a Fantom-G song, you’ll use essentially the same
realtime sequencing procedure we introduced on Page 14 of the Workshop
The Fantom-G Possibilities, and dug into more deeply in the Sequencing and
Recording Workshop booklet. There are just a few differences involved when
you’re sequencing clips.
We’re going to assume you’re already in Studio mode and that you’ve
selected the studio set your clips require.
Switch the pads to RPS pad mode if they’re not already set that way.
1
Press SONG so the Song Play or Edit screen is visible.2
Press the LIST/EDIT PATCH button to display the Part Select window.3
Select the current studio set’s rhythm part—this is Part 10 by4
default—so your pad playing is captured by the sequencer.
Press REC—you can set the Realtime Rec Standby window parameters
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any way you like.
If you like the way your clips sound, there’s usually no reason to turn
on Input Qtz on the Realtime Rec Standby screen.
If you want to, though, you can use Input Qtz to alter clips’ original
quantizing. For example, you could add swing to grid-quantized clips
by turning on Input Qtz and setting it to SHUFFLE.
Press PLAY or click F8 (Start) and then sequence your clips by playing6
the pads.
When you hit STOP or reach the Rec End Point location, click F7 (OK)
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to assign your new phrase to a track.
Advanced Clip Tip: Realtime Control Clips
Generally, your clips play musical notes, and this is they way we’ve discussed
using them so far. However, if you’re a musician who likes to use certain
realtime control gestures on a regular basis for manipulating your sounds,
there’s another way to use clips that we haven’t yet discussed. You can use
them as what we’ll call “realtime control clips.”

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Clips—or phrases, really—can hold more than just notes, of course. They can
also hold Control Change data you generate using the Fantom-G’s control
knobs and sliders, D Beam, Pitch Bend/Modulation lever, foot controls, and
so on. In fact, a phrase doesn’t need to contain notes at all—it can contain
realtime controller data all by itself.
A realtime control clip, then, is a phrase containing nothing but data
generated by the Fantom-G’s realtime controllers. Why not construct an
RPS set of controller clips each of whose sole purpose is to apply realtime
controller changes with the single strike of a pad?
Here’s an example. Let’s say you like to spin Control Knob 1 as you play
live sets and/or patches—in many of the factory live sets and patches, this
sweeps the sound’s filter by rolling through the possible filter cutoff values.
Rather than having to remove your hand from the keys for the time it takes
to grab Control Knob 1 and turn it, you could create a series of sweep clips.
Put together one that sweeps the filter slowly, one that sweeps it quickly,
and another one in-between. That way, when you want a filter sweep
onstage, just strike the corresponding pad and keep playing—the Fantom-G
sweeps the filter for you.
This idea doesn’t end with filter sweeps, though. Stereo panning, volume
swells, D Beam swipes, and any other type of realtime controller gesture can
be automatically performed firing off a clip.
Creating a Realtime Control Clip Phrase
Unlike phrases that contain notes, you have to sequence realtime control
clip phrases on MIDI tracks, and not directly from the phrase list.
Press the LIST/EDIT SONG button to display the Song Play screen.
1
Click F1 (Song List) and select an unused INIT SONG in which to2
capture your controller-only phrases.
Click F8 (Load) and then F7 (OK) to load the empty song.
3
Press the STUDIO MODE button, and then F6 until you see the4
realtime controls onscreen, as shown in the following illustration.
We’re assuming the Sequencer Auto Track parameter is turned on in
these instructions. If it’s not, manually select the MIDI track you want
to use instead of using the Part Select window as described in the
following step.
Press the LIST/EDIT PATCH button to display the Part Select window5
and select Part 1—the clip you create will affect the keyboard in
Single mode, or Part 1 any live set or studio set you select.
Press REC and hit PLAY or F8 (Start)—after the countoff, and without
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playing any notes on the keyboard, perform the realtime controller
move you want to capture.
For sweeps and other temporary changes you want to capture, be sure
to return the control you’re using to its 0 position before hitting STOP
so the sound is restored to its original state at the end of clip playback.
If you want the change to remain in place after the clip plays, leave
the control wherever it happens to land.
Hit STOP when you’re done performing the realtime control gesture.7
Press SONG again, and click F7 (OK) to assign the phrase to a track.8
Press the WRITE button, click F5 (Phrase), give the phrase a name that9
helps you easily identify, click F8 (OK), and then F7 (OK) to save the
new phrase into your project.
Repeat Steps 5-9 for all of the realtime control clips you want to
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create.

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Setting Up Your Realtime Control Clip RPS Set
Create your realtime control clip RPS set—gathering all of your realtime
control clips into one easily accessible place—using the method we
described starting on Page 4 of this booklet. Be sure to set:
Velocity Sens—
• to OFF.
each pad’s Play Mode parameter—
• to ONCE.
Make sure you press F7 (Write) to store your RPS set when you’re done.
Getting To Your Realtime Control Clips Onstage
Once you’ve built a realtime control clip RPS set, there are two ways to
ensure you’ve got them when you need them:
For live sets, you can re-save each live set—
• in RPS pad mode and with
the realtime control clip RPS set selected. This approach does what you
need, and leaves the pads available for other live sets’ needs, but it’s a
bit of work to do this with all of the live sets you may possibly want to
grab onstage.
Lock the pads in RPS pad mode and lock in your realtime control clip RPS
•
set at the system level—This is the easier way to go. Here’s how to do it.
Press the SYSTEM button.
1
Click F2 (Group/Down) to select the Dynamic Pad parameters.2
Set Pad Assign Source, Pad Mode, and RPS Pad Assign Source to3
Sys.
Click F7 (Sys Write).4
Press the PAD SETTING button, select your realtime control clip5
RPS set.
A Note About Tempo and Realtime Control Clips
Your realtime control clips, like any phrases, will play back at the current
Fantom-G tempo. Since you’ll be using them with live keyboard playing, the
tempo setting doesn’t matter too much to anything other than the clips. You
can adjust the tempo value to speed up or slow down your clips’ behavior.
If you’ll be adjusting the Fantom-G’s tempo as an on-the-fly tweak
to your realtime control clips, you may want to set the Tempo Assign
Source parameter on the System Sync/Tempo tab’s to SYS so the tempo
doesn’t change as you select different live sets.
The End
We hope you’ve found this workshop helpful. Keep an eye out for other
Fantom-G Workshop booklets available for downloading at www.RolandUS.
com.