Just what the world needs — another remote MIDI keyboard. Well, Laurie Anderson's keyboard player feels he needs one anyway — he used one on stage in London recently.

The Lync is a velocity-sensitive, four-octave full sized keyboard with classy styling and robust construction which doesn't place too massive a weight around your delicate shoulderblades. Its controller neck can be adjusted to the most comfortable playing angle using an Allen key, and on the neck you'll find sprung Pitch Bend Up/Down and Modulation Positive/Negative wheels, a Patch Shift Up button and an Octave Switch Down button.

On the front panel is a Control knob for volume — unfortunately not all MIDI synths respond to master volume control over MIDI, but the Yamaha DX7 is one that does. Next to this is a Hold button which locks in any desired notes and allows you to solo over the top, followed by a Chord button which allows you to lock in a chord. Unfortunately the software isn't clever enough to stop the pitch bend and modulation wheels affecting held notes when you're soloing over them as it does on the Roland JX-3P.

Eight pushbuttons allow you to call up any one of 64 patches displayed in the two-digit LED window. Go from this Select mode to MIDI mode and you'll see that the first four buttons have built-in LED's; these refer to the fact that the Lync can be set to transmit on MIDI Channel 1, 2, 3 or 4, or any combination, for each patch, simply by toggling the 1-4 buttons on or off while in MIDI mode.

A non-standard Switchcraft connector and 20 feet of cable connect the Lync to its 19" mounting base unit, which as well as supplying power also has the four MIDI outputs which are permanently dedicated to Channels 1, 2, 3 and 4 (tough luck if you want to use Channel 16). Of course, you have to be careful with your patch assignment as with any other master keyboard; a patch shift to 11 on the Lync will call up Patch 1 on a DX7, Patch 00 on a Prophet 600, Patch 11 on a Korg, and so on.

The Lync is a joy to use but doesn't have as many facilities as the well-established Roland Axis (although the Axis does force you to select patches from the keyboard itself, which isn't very satisfactory). But beautiful metallic finishes only go part of the way to compensate for the high price — at least £1,000.

More details from Rod Argent's Keyboards, (Contact Details).