NAMM 2025: Almost a year on from teasing a revival of its K2000 synth in the form of the new K2061 and K2088 keyboards, Kurzweil has indicated that they’re getting closer to being released.
Released in 1991, the Kurzweil K2000 was a 24-voice ‘VAST’ synth/sampler that, at the time, boasted some pretty powerful features. The K2061 and K2088 take the spirit of that instrument but use the latest tech to make them suitable for a modern audience.
As their names indicate, you can choose from 61- and 88-note keyboard options, both of which support aftertouch. The VAST tone generation system enables you to process multisamples, noise and waveforms with a wide variety of synth techniques.
You also get the original K2000 preset library - available here in a “resculpted” form - which forms part of the 2GB factory soundset. This features more than 2,000 programs and more than 500 multi combinations. As well as the K2000 sounds, you also get tones from the K2500, K2600, K2700, Forte, PC4, PC3 and SP6.
There’s 2GB of sample memory, too; no need for the 3.5-inch floppy disk drive that was fitted to the K2000.
Each K20 program can have up to 32 layers, and the supported synthesis methods include sample playback, virtual analogue, FM and KB3 organ. You can set up effects chains and dial in master FX, and there’s 256-voice polyphony.
There are 16 MIDI control zones and each zone can be tweaked with more than 30 hands-on controllers. You also get 16 arpeggiators, 16 MIDI CC sequencers and 16 Riff generators.
As you’d expect, the biggest difference between the two models is the keyboard. The K2088 has a fully-weighted hammer action, while the K2061 offers a semi-weighted synth action.
What we still don’t know is how much the new synths will cost and when they’ll be available, but hopefully there’ll be more news soon on the Kurzweil website.
