Buy one (2 on sale)
1983 (July)
Initially sold for ¥186,000
Yamaha's first full-sized remote keyboard controller, aimed at keyboard players on stage. The idea wasn't new at the time, the Moog Liberation popularized the concept a few years earlier, and the much lighter Roland SH101 and the Korg Poly 800 were already on sale.
The KX1, however, was just a controller, there was no sound engine onboard. And this wasn't received very well considering it costed more than a DX9 while not being a synthesizer. Yet it had a MIDI OUT on the back (made to be paired with a DX7 or DX9), plenty of controls to also send out program change signals, and the pitch bend ribbon was an exciting new feature.
It was available in white and red.
