Frank Zappa once said something like, "Talking about music is like dancing about architecture".

I've encountered people who said they heard no difference between what was on a cassette and what was on a CD. That made no sense to me - until I realized, they were thinking I was asking them if the music itself was different on the CD - were there any songs not included on the cassette, or were the CD versions of the songs different arrangements. They weren't referring to hiss or bass response or any technical aspects of the sound.

A lot of folks are asking about how the Motif XS "sounds". Does it compare to this and that workstation? Does it have that same cool guitar sound that is in the Roland Fantom X, are the strings similar to Korg's new M3, are the orchestral sounds the equivalent of Giga format libraries like Vienna, are the drums any "better" (love that one).

Well as much as I may wax enthusiastic about how the XS sounds to me, there is only one way to judge for yourself how it sounds - hear it for yourself.

Like music - what is the definition of a good song? Yamaha's own Avery Burdette summed it up to me nicely, "A good song is - any song you like". A good synth sound is - any synth sound you happen to like.

It's an honor that anyone looks to someone like me to decide whether they should purchase the XS (or any synth, for that matter). But you know, as far as you the customer are concerned, I could be dead wrong. And if I were you, getting ready to part with a couple of grand or more, I wouldn't take my word for it when making a purchase. I'd listen before I bought.

I always try to qualify any statements I make with specifics. For example, I thought that the original Motif's overall timbre was lacking in the areas from 100hz to 400hz, and it was a little shrill in the area of 4khz to 7khz. Why would I say that? Because a lot of the voices were run through EQ's with a boost at around 250hz and some narrow cuts at 4 to 6khz (indicating that the above-mentioned frequency areas had problems). That's what I had to do to get the Classic's sounds generally to sit better in a mix or sound even, to my ears.

The ES sounded better in these frequency areas, and the XS represents an improvement again. In creating voices for the XS, I didn't have to boost any low mids or do as much narrow-notch equalizing in the upper mids and highs. And with the addition of the new VCM "analog" 5-band EQ in the XS, I finally have a high frequency rolloff band which allows me to make things sound more analog and takes away some of that high-end fizz that is the hallmark of digital sample playback. So I can boost the upper highs at 6.3khz, and then roll off anything above 8khz, getting rid of any noise or "hash" that might be present.

Just to say something sounds "better" is a vague statement. But even if a description includes very specific details, it won't mean anything to someone who is not an audio engineer and doesn't even know what "Hz" refers to. In that case, we're back to square one again - you have to hear the thing for yourself.