From rmaccrea@verizon.net Fri May 29 14:31:07 2009
Subject:Re: Gregg Rolie's Santana sound?

Hey, Rob.
I'm in the western tip of North Carolina in the beautiful Appalachian Mountains. Lots of music here too, all amateur. People come here to retire from everywhere and many of them are artistic. So, in addition to old Irish and bluegrass from the mountain people, we have an eclectic mix of everything except the new stuff.

So you're an adopted newfie. I had some great friends from Nova Scotia who spent winters in Florida when I lived there. Heard many Newfie jokes... Love the accent, hey? Closest I've been is New York City.. anudda accent.

I have a Roland VK88 complete organ I bought back when I had money. After I bought it the money ran out, so I use an Optimus MPA250 PA amp into pioneer 3 way speakers and an old 1960's Magnavox console stereo with huge 15" drivers. Going to Florida next week, and hope my dad can rebuild a Hammond tone cabinet tube amp I have with his electronics parts lying around. I can use that for the organ tones into the 15's, and use the PA amp into the Pioneer speakers for the orhchestra tones.

I also have two huge old Allen organs. One has the largest set of speaker cabinets I have ever seen, and a huger 70 watt mono tube amp driving them.

I am trying to learn rock, but am much more proficient with jazz standards. My son does everything on his guitar with a souped up orange tube amp into a pair of celest 8" drivers in a matching custom made orange cabinet. He hooked this up mono to my VK88 and it sounds real nice, but the leslie sim suffers.

But, I appreciate this group because I have learned a lot.