How to Set Up a Roland RA 50 With MIDI Accordion

The Roland RA-50 is a real-time arranger with numerous features that allow a user to become a one-person band. It is played primarily by the user with a Musical Instrument Digital Interface (MIDI) controller. The Roland RA-50 can convert the signal of a wide variety of instruments, including a MIDI accordion tone. The Roland RA-50 normally splits the keyboard into an upper and lower section with different tones. This feature must be turned off for the entire keyboard in order to use the MIDI accordion tone.

Turn on the Roland RA-50 arranger. An indicator light will appear over the C4 key. This indicates that it is the current split point for the arranger.

Press the C4 key while the indicator light is on. This will turn off split mode. The entire keyboard now may be set up in the same tone.

Press the “Upper” button on the Roland RA-50 arranger. The MIDI tone for the upper section is used for the entire keyboard when split mode is turned off.

Press the “Group a/b” button.

Press the “2” button in the “Bank” section of buttons.

Press the “8” button in the “Number” section of buttons. This will set up the keyboard connected to the Roland RA-50 arranger to use the MIDI Accordion tone.

Press a key on the keyboard. It will either sound like a synth bass or an accordion. Press the “Group a/b” button again if it sounds like a synth bass. The synth bass and MIDI accordion tones have the same bank and number values. The MIDI accordion is in Group A and the synth bass is in Group B, which makes it easy to accidentally interchange the two MIDI tones.