Introduction
Over the years, many Yamaha owners contributed their songs to the PSR Tutorial. Proud owners of these arranger keyboards were happy to share their music with others. When the PSR Tutorial was launched, Yamaha had just introduced the new PSR-2000 series replacing the PSR-740 model. The PSR-9000 was the top of the line arranger keyboard at that time.
On these Yamaha arranger keyboards, it was relatively easy to create a midi file capturing a player's performance. So, I asked aspiring Performers to submit a "volume" of 10 midi songs and I would then provide them their own PSR Performer page on the web site. The requirement to submit 10 songs was intended to narrow the candidates down to more serious and dedicated players. That strategy worked and the PSR Performers section grew rapidly.
A Wealth of MIDI songs
Many performers submitted multiple volumes of songs, so you will find thousands of midi files available in these pages. Over time, players upgraded their keyboards and new PSR performers joined the group. As a result, you will find songs from a wide variety of Yamaha arranger keyboards from those early mid-range models up to and including the latest PSR-S series and Tyros models.
The Evolution to MP3
The Yamaha keyboards since the introduction of the Tyros3 (shown here) and the PSR-S910 made it easier for players to create MP3 files. It was still easy to create a midi file, but midi files created on a Yamaha keyboard sounded best when played back on a similar Yamaha keyboard. A midi file played on a computer, which did not have the wonderful instrument voices of the arranger keyboards, could not accurately reproduced the original performance.
By contrast, an MP3 file not only provided a good rendering of the performance, it could be played by anyone whether they had a Yamaha keyboard or not. Thus, a performer submitting a half dozen or more MP3 songs could be added to the PSR Performers section. Therefore, the performer's pages in this section may have midi songs or MP3 songs or both.
Archived Performer Pages
You may have already visited the PSR Performer pages. New songs are added regularly in that section and it is easy to sample and or download any of the songs provided there. New PSR Performers also appear in those pages.
All the archived performers originally appeared under the current PSR Performers. Many continued adding new songs to their pages over several years. However, when no new songs were added over a two and a half year period, the performer page was moved over to the archived section. Unfortunately, some performers are no longer with us and their pages have been retired (Alex Green, Bruce Milne, Dave Edwards, Del Kay, Frank Blecha, Jannie Kroese, Jerry Ernst, Kees Schouten, Morrie Reece, Neal Saunders, and Udo Becker).
On each performer page, you will find a picture of the performer and a brief musical biography. A bar at the top of the page (like the one shown above) shows the keyboard songs available on that page. MP3 songs are shown in a list below the artist's picture. Clicking on any of these songs should launch an MP3 player on your computer so you can listen to and/or download the song. Any midi songs from thqt performer are shown in a separate table that includes the tempo and style used to create the song.
While individual midi songs can be downloaded by right-clicking, all of a performer's midi songs can be downloaded in a single large zip file. These midi songs should play on any Yamaha keyboard you may have.
Navigation
All the archived performer names are shown in the sidebar shown on the right side of this page arranged alphabetically by first name. Click on any name to go to that player's page.
There are "Next" and "Previous" buttons provided at the top of each performer page. Those buttons will take you to the next (or previous) performer in the alphabetical list.
While Yamaha arranger keyboards have improved over all these years, you may be surprised at how good the music is from all of these keyboards, even the earliest models. So be sure to take advantage of these "archived" pages. There are thousands of MP3s available as well as thousands of midi files.