I have been using a Roland C190 for two years now and over all I am fairly satisfied with it. It is used mainly as a home practice instrument for my role as organist to two churches with pipe organs. I also take the instrument around with me to the care homes where I play for the old folks. On occasion it has provided the accompaniment for services in small churches/chapels where there has been no other instrumental provision. I would say that it is in use for approximately twenty-five hours a week in all of its roles.
So, how has it performed?
The organ sounds are excellent, and making full use of the alternative voices available, allows for a wide range of classical music styles. (Though in the early days, I had to keep resetting the instrument to its factory settings after getting carried away with the possibilities !). I fairly quickly abandoned the 'two-manual' function as more nuisance than it was worth, with hands having to be often at the extreme ends of the keyboard to cope with the octave shift.
A volume (swell) pedal is absolutely essential for this instrument, and I obtained the Roland EV-5 for about twenty pounds and it works fine. Setting the volume pedal (which only affects the Man 11 sounds) to zero in the closed position, allows for interesting swell effects as you open the pedal while playing Man 1 sounds. Experimentation is everything !
I said above that the organ sounds are excellent. I would modify that verdict in respect of the Trumpet voice which is pitiful. The alternative sounds available to the Trompete settings are interesting but not much to my liking - you may feel differently. The instrument redeems itself however with the orchestral brass sound. This can be used as one of the best digital trumpet sounds I have heard - and its position in the Man 11 group means it can be brought in on the swell pedal to superb effect.
The orchestral sounds are generally of a better quality than the organ sounds, but the design team at Roland must have had a collective brain fart when deciding what to layer with what. It is impossible to layer strings with piano, or voice with piano or strings. These are unquestionably the most popular layers in other digital keyboards, and the configuration of the Roland in this regard is baffling.
The instrumental solo function (only available on Man 11) is effective, but takes some getting used to. Any degree of detache in the right hand will immediately shift the solo sound to the left hand which can be annoying, but practice makes perfect - as they say.
The Roland C190 is a complex instrument and any new user will be spending a lot of time with the handbook open. Time spent this way though will pay dividends.
Amplification. 'Out of the box', the Roland is a perfectly good home-use instrument, with more than enough volume and bass-to-treble quality to cope with whatever your home-use requirements might be. My own use of the instrument away from home, has involved using a stand-alone keyboard amplifier (15inch bass and a one and seven eighths treble thingy, 200 watts, and with a seven channel EQ) I had to pay attention to the bass effect with this kit and make sure the output sound didn't turn to mush. In fact the appearance of the EQ ended up as a 'down-turned mouth' picture, which is opposite to that normally found, but it works.
I also plug the Roland in to my p.a. kit, (a pair of passive twelve inchers plus 'tweeters' and fed from a 2 x 200 watt mixer amp). This particular setup has coped well accompanying over a hundred and fifty people in a church building which can seat three hundred. Levels were never more than two-thirds max. Thinking back, I recall that I also added in the keyboard amp to provide a bit of whoomph at the bottom end.
All in all, the C190 is a versatile and interesting piece of kit, a bit quirky in operation, and as I have found it, able to cope far beyond its designed use parameters.
Lastly, I also have a Viscount Vivace 40 organ which I keep in one of 'my' churches. The MIDI function allows me to play either instrument from the other with a whole range of interesting possibilities which I am still exploring. Needless to say, that Roland orchestral brass sound seems to figure quite a lot in my experiments !
I am sorry that I came late to this topic, but hope this has been useful for anyone interested in this instrument.
Best wishes
Chris Baker - Durham UK