KORG Announce Nautilus – Streamlined Synth with KRONOS Pedigree

Korg have announced ‘Nautilus’ a new entry into their highly regarded range of workstation keyboards inheriting much of what users love about their flagship KRONOS including all nine sound engines, delivered in a more affordable, streamlined package.

Nautilus features a bold new design and is available in 3 sizes: 88 key with Korg’s renowned RH3 weighted hammer action, and 61 or 73 key with semi-weighed action. Unlike KRONOS however, aftertouch is not supported.

The sparse user-friendly front panel has been completely redesigned compared to its older sibling KRONOS with large rubberized backlit buttons for quick access to primary functions such as ARP enable and effect parameters. The six real-time knobs can also be tucked away by pressing them to prevent inadvertent alterations.

A 7^th knob is dedicated to ‘Dynamics’, a function inherited from Grandstage which allows for an intuitive increase or decrease in the instrument’s dynamic range. This is great for helping an instrument cut through the mix without introducing compression style artefacts or adding nuance and expressivity to instruments such as piano in more intimate or solo contexts.

The 8” colour touch screen is also showing off some features bound to make KRONOS users jealous including a nice new dark mode. It’s unclear at this point whether or not this represents a potential software update coming to KRONOS sometime soon.

As well as all this, Nautilus comes packed with a venerable smorgasbord of new sounds across three diverse categories which Korg describe in the following way:

“Unique” sounds:
The NAUTILUS brings you distinctive sounds including phrase loops, prepared pianos, found percussion and more. Many seldom heard-of musical instruments found in different regions around the world can be difficult to play, but distinctive phrases played on these instruments are featured on the NAUTILUS. Use these phrases as-is in your songs—let your imagination be your guide. The NAUTILUS features sounds that were sampled for the first time just for this instrument, including prepared piano sounds created by placing different objects between piano strings and recording samples, or “found percussion” sounds made by turning ordinary items into instruments to be struck. Not only do these novel and mysterious sounds provide an unexpected flavor to your songs, they offer broad possibilities for sound effects used in film and TV music as well.

“Current” sounds:
The NAUTILUS also offers the freshest sounds that blend in well with today’s music scene, including synths, drum kits, special effects and more. For synths, be sure to check out the EDM, electro and chiptune sounds for starters. Also, the NAUTILUS features more than 50 kinds of drum kits—sounds that most strongly reflect the changes in music over time. The special effect sounds offer useful material like drums added to dance music to create beats—sounds that you can put to use right away.

 “Standard” sounds:

We’ve brought together all of the most important sounds a workstation needs including piano, electric piano, guitar, bass guitar and more, covering all genres. For the newly sampled piano sound, we’ve also recorded the lovely sonic ambience of the studio, and you can mix the piano and ambience sound as you like with the new ambience sound. A new electric piano model with a characteristic thick sound has been added, which works great for funky playing styles. We’ve also added many phrases that let you playback actual performances of guitar and bass parts that keyboardists will find useful.

Here’s the rest of the feature list from Korg:

• Nine different sound engines offer massive expressive power
• New sounds offered over three broad categories
• The DYNAMICS knob makes delicate expression possible
• Make intuitive changes to sounds with the Realtime knobs
• A user interface designed for easy operation
• Convenient arpeggiator and drum track functions
• Setlist mode that demonstrates its power in live performances
• Open Sampling System
• 16-Track MIDI Sequencer / 16-Track Audio Recorder
• 16 Onboard Effect Processors
• USB/MIDI Host Ports Accommodate MIDI Control Surfaces
• Smooth sound transitions that eliminate dropouts when changing sounds, regardless of the mode you’re in
• 88-key model with piano touch, a 73-key model with a light touch and 61-key model availableShipment due in January 2021

  Expect to pay: SSP 

  $4499.00 – 88-key model with piano touch
  $3899.00 – 73-key model with a light touch
  $3299.00 – 61-key model 

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