The Roland JD-800: Deep Dive, Review and Sound Design Tutorial of Roland's 1991 Flagship Synthesizer

Thanks to Scott MacLean we have a new video showing a lot of how the JD-800 works in practice and explaining each section. 

His comments: 

"I realized recently that there are very few (I couldn't find any) YouTube videos that do a deep dive on how the JD-800 works, and how sound design is done on them. So I decided to rectify that.

In this tutorial/review, I go over everything you ever wanted to know about the Roland JD-800: The history of the synth, how the engine works, how to manipulate patches, how to do sound design, how to edit the effects, and more!" 

Thanks Scott!

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A really good demo of real-time use

This is a really good demo by Espen Kraft!
Nice show of real-time editing and some fantastic patches.

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Demo - Real Time Sound Editing on the JD-800

Interesting example of some editings.

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Live Editing a Modified JD-800

Image: Suono & Computer

Another example of the modified JD-800 turned into a module showing live editing while playing.

That give a nice idea about some possibilites.

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Using the JD-800 as a Programmer for the JD-990

What a shame! I found I already had posted something so here.
Please people, I'm really short on time, ask me to see where I saw more material like this.


The JD-800 can control most of JD-990 parameters. 

This comes from the Sweetwater.com Using the JD-800 as a Programmer for the JD-990

The JD-800 sliders can be set to send MIDI messages that can be recorded into
your sequencer.
When adjusting a selected parameter such as cutoff, resonance, panning, etc., the JD-800 transmits a series of system exclusive messages.

Use the following procedure to enable the Transmit Edit function:

On the JD-800:

1. Press MIDI.
2. Use the CURSOR UP/DOWN buttons to select “TX Edit Data.”
3. Press the INC (increment) button to turn this parameter ON.

On the JD-990:

1. Press SYSTEM SETUP so it is lit.
2. CURSOR to “RX Exclusive” and use the VALUE dial to select ON-2.
3. Press SYSTEM SETUP to return to the previous screen.

NOTE: You will need to enable this transmit function each time you turn the JD-800 on.

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Mac Logic Studio: a little Roland JD800 Environment

This is for the Mac users of the Logic Studio Pro.


I found this at www.logicprohelp.com forum posted by Virgo.

Roland JD800 Environment

by virgo » Mon Mar 26, 2012 4:13 am

As promised in this thread (click to see post), here`s my little JD800 environment.


I will probably add the FX section sometime.




Original download link:

JD_800_Makro2.zip 

JD800 Environment (590.51 KiB)

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Note: Logic Studio Copyright © 2012 Apple Inc.

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Roland JD-800 JD-990 VST Patch Editor VST for CTRLR

JD-VST Patch Editor

(updated at november, 16, 2014)



Good news to the Roland JD-800 and JD-990 worldwide users!

Christian Morency just released a beta version of a VST Patch Editor for the Roland JDs. 

This is a dedicated panel for the CTRLR software. This could allow you to visually modify your patch and control your JDs from your DAW.

You can read more about and download at the CTRLR forum: http://ctrlr.org/forums/search/JD-vst/  

If you download CTRLR from the website, please use the Stable version. 

As a Beta Version the software still have some bugs.


And also, there's a great topic at  Gearslutz: JD800 / 990 VST editor

The page include links to download.


Few notes:
You need to free your computer midi ports on which the JD is connected for CTRLR and assign them to CTRLR in the global settings. Download the panel (it's currently at the bottom of the device database). Once open from CTRLR, right-click on the panel and assign the midi device to the panel.

Download link:http://ctrlr.org/panels_deprecated/

Youtube tutorials:

JD-VST Tutorial 1:

JD-VST Tutorial 2:

JD-VST Tutorial 3:

Roland JD-800 Demo - Live Pads Piano Strings Organ Bass Leads

Some nice Roland JD-800 demos by VisceralVoids.

Despiste the record quality sound not being so good, it is easy to feel the great sound this machine makes.

Look the demo of interactive programming. User comment:

At 4:40 this video shows a pad that you can create live using the JD-800's effects and sliders. I am using a Roland DP-2 footswitch to hold the chord down while I set the JD-800's phaser & delay. Then I change the cutoff and rez, and pitch with the "pitch coarse" knob. To get the "whoosing" effect you could set LFO1 on the filter. JD-800's resonance in full effect here but this is not using high settings. Other sounds in this video include crystal rhodes, strings, piano, PPG sounds, catherdral organ, of course basses and leads.

A short demo adjusting the cutoff frequency and resonance

Adjusting the cutoff freq and reso on the Roland JD-800 to create the background.

See more Youtube Synthspassed videos.

Software and Patches for the JD-800 and JD-990

There are very good professional software supporting  the Roland JD-800 and JD-990, but if you want a non-pay choice, these are the best.

The JD-800 Patch Organizer created by Laurent Lecatelier-Dudec (France), was released as freeware in 24/04/1999 (date in original author´s site) and is no more available from the programmer´s site.

In more recent years, Gwydion Elderwin (Australia) created a JD-800 Randon Bank Creator and a Jd-800 to JD-990 Bank Converter.

About the patch banks here.

The first I found many years ago, was compiled by Stephen Drake, the guy who kept most of JD material available for years. This site is proud to pay him our tribute. Thanks Stephen!
The first internet banks are so-so grouped, thus makes some sense.

Gwydion also have done a strong work removing duplicates from hundreds of patches, adding lots more and creating a library for each synth. Still is missing time to classify all that stuff into categories.

Missing all you my friends, I know business and daily life take time, but I would be happy to receive some news. 

The bank files are in .rar format. You need Winrar or compatible to extract it.


Also: 

Links for other JD sites, stuff and foruns. Permanent list

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NEW JDTools - Patch conversion utility for Roland JD-800 / JD-990 and compatibles

Formats supported: JD-800 SysEx dumps (SYX, MID) 

JD-990 SysEx dump (SYX)

JD-800 VST / Zenology patch bank (BIN)

JD-08 patch bank (SVD)

ZC1 patch bank (SVZ)

Roland JD-990 Sysex Dump Utility for Ctrlr - by dnaldoog

Roland SUPER JD Synthesizer Module JD-990 Editor for Ctrlr - by dnaldoog

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Christian Morency released a Beta version of a VST Patch Editor for the Roland JD-800 and JD-990.
See the following post with some info, links and video tutorials:
JD-800 JD-990 VST Patch Editor VST for CTRLR

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A new post is added with a user created for the Logic Studio platform on Mac:

Mac Logic Studio: a little Roland JD800 Environment

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Downloads:

JD800 Patch Organizer                                                       230 Kb
JD800 pach banks organized by Gwydion Elderwin           499 Kb
JD800 Path banks internet collection                                     407 Kb
JD800 randon bank creator                                                     512 Kb

JD800 to JD990 Bank Converter                                            177 Kb

JD990 Patch Organizer                                                         230 Kb
JD990 Pach banks organized by Gwydion Elderwin              544 Kb


Roland SL-JD Cards Patches Not waveforms                    62Kb

Roland JD-800 SE Especial Edition Patches (a Brazilian version not in the factory presets). This was an interesting remarkable work from great Brazilian musicians with new exclusive patches. Most people forgot to save that and lose the patches made by Roland's Brazil people. Some (few) requires the Strings card.

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Roland JD-800 Filters and Aftertouch

Two videos by moretacos1. Visit is page at Youtube, there are lots of good material.

Mean while, I selected two:

Great Filters. Program or just move the sliders as you want.




Atertouch: