April 2009 Jazz Instrument News

Friday, 27 March 2009 12:15

Headway’s The Band Violin Pickup
This extraordinary rubbery, plastic strip wraps around the lower bout of the instrument and is held in place by simple velcro bindings. It’s clearly been well thought through by Headway’s R&D department, who have built the Band to withstand the rigours of the road with excellent ergonomics making it very easy to set up and use, with the pickup to the front and the jack socket to the back – so it’s not in the way when you’re playing. Simplicity is the key here. There are no onboard switches or knobs that inevitably get in the way, confuse and aggravate. Sound modelling is strictly for the amplifier and Headway’s own acoustic SH60 is a perfect match. Our sample band gave very few feedback problems, and performed admirably. OK, it’s not going to give you the clarity and clear results that you might expect from a good microphone, but we’d suggest it’s the next best thing. And then there’s the benefit of being able to move around and use the bow freely without any encumberance whatsoever. Thoroughly recommended.
For more go to www.headwaymusicaudio.com
Taylor Trumpets Pocket Rocket
As they say, you can always tell a Taylor. And it’s not just the sound – it’s the feel of the instrument, the balance and the build. The Pocket Rocket is typical of the marque. Expertly engineered, it sits nicely in the hand and feels very solid and robust with its heavy angled supporting plate lifted from the Taylor ‘Chicago’ custom trumpet. The surprisingly long valves with attractive blue tortoise shell heads, carry a good action and come with heavy domed bottom caps. This extra weight, along with the heavier pipework to the receiver is clearly a deliberate design feature, which adds to the tone and sonic punch of this instrument. The sound is consistent across the full range and is very bright and clear, which presumably is in some part down to the wide flared bell (wider than most standard trumpet bells). With polished pipework running into that large brushed bell, this is a very stylish little horn and one that is in every sense, typically Taylor.
For more go to www.taylortrumpets.com

Tascam DP 004 Pocket Studio
Running off the mains supply or four AA’s/LR6’s, the four track (two track simultaneous recording) Pocket Studio is ideal for recording rehearsals, gigs or just plain simple ideas. A menu-based digital recorder, it has a surprisingly intuitive interface, which is set alongside a very ‘hands on’ front panel of dedicated level and pan controls. There are two built – in stereo condenser microphones to the front of the unit and two mic/line inputs to the rear, one of which can be switched for different levels of gain, so that an instrument can be recorded directly into the unit.

The Pocket Studio comes with a 1Gb SD card, which can be exchanged for an SDHC card should extra capacity be required for recording gigs, concerts etc. We found the partitioning facility very useful, as it allows cards to be split up into different sessions, each to their own particular length. Equally, the abilty to execute ‘punch ins’ made life considerably easier, as did the two short cut functions: return to zero and return to last recording position. Listening back to tracks is made simple by having a master volume on the speaker/headphone socket and feeding files via USB to computer is now standard fare. Some will frown at the fact that there is no EQ-ing facility onboard, but the simplicity of the Pocket Studio makes for an exceptionally user friendly machine. There is also the vexed question of recording in 16 Bit as opposed to the pro – studio standard of 24 Bit. But hey, I popped this tiny unit into my inside jacket pocket and went off to the beach, where WAV files took on a totally different meaning!
For more go to www.tascam.com 

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