AUSTIN, TX. (Top40 Charts/ Media LLC) -Open Labs, Inc the leading designer and developer of computer-based music production solutions, today announced that the company's award-winning NeKo and MiKo keyboard workstations will be played during Prince's performance on the Pepsi Super Bowl XLI halftime show on Sunday, February 4th, at Dolphin Stadium in Miami. The event marks the first time that a computer keyboard instrument has been played live at the Super Bowl. CBS will broadcast Super Bowl XLI starting at 6:25 pm EST.
Morris Hayes and Renato Neto, the renowned groove-funk keyboardists with Prince's New Power Generation, or NPG, band, will play the new Open Labs Gen3 MiKo and NeKo during the halftime performance. Introduced earlier this month at the Winter NAMM conference in Anaheim, California, the Gen3 MiKo and NeKo are the latest incarnations of the award-winning product line that Open Labs originally introduced in 2004. The Open Labs Gen3 MiKo and NeKo represent the first line of keyboard workstations to incorporate a Windows PC-based architecture and are now the first musical instruments to use Intel Core 2 Duo processors, offering processing speeds up to 70% faster than Gen 2 models.
'Prince is one of the most technically demanding artists working today, and the Super Bowl is one of the largest telecasts in the world, so we are delighted to have such a grand stage on which to debut the Gen3 MiKo and NeKo instruments,' said Victor Wong, chairman of Open Labs. 'We have essentially redesigned our products to create a powerful musical experience that is only limited by the user's imagination.'
'The Core 2 Duo processor line enables faster real-time operations, and we can't think of a more demanding real-time situation than live musical performance. The Open Labs team provides a great example of the innovation that is being brought to music creation,' said Diane Bryant, vice president in the Digital Enterprise Group, Intel (Nasdaq: INTC). 'We believe that the convergence of the PC workstation and the music synthesizer keyboard will support creativity for new generations of composers and performers.'
'The power and creativity embodied by Open Labs is well-represented by the renowned artists who use these platforms, and we are pleased to see that the Microsoft platform has helped enable these developments,' said Liron Shaked, director of the Worldwide Consumer ISV Group at Microsoft Corp (Nasdaq: MSFT). 'These innovations, in combination with the cutting-edge enhancements in Windows Vista, will serve to dramatically expand the creative possibilities for today's digital artists.'
'The combination of Intel's latest processors and our future migration to Windows Vista ensure that Open Labs instruments continue to offer musicians and producers sustainable world-class performance without peer,' continued Wong.
The Open Labs MiKo and NeKo Gen3 keyboards are the first portable digital music and internet media creation systems that combine the power of Windows PC architecture, a large-format touchscreen interface, and internet connectivity in a compact, user-friendly instrument.
The Gen3 series enable users to record up to 140 tracks of 24-bit audio; play up to 500-note polyphony, and support up to 300 plug-ins in a single instrument.
The Gen 3 MiKo and NeKo feature Open Labs suite of software applications - Karsyn, mFusion, and the Open Labs Navigator - which are a breakthrough set of technologies that allow users to control different musical keyboard devices and software packages through a single interface. Together, they create a clean, efficient environment for creation and performance. Instead of a complicated general-purpose computing environment, the 15-inch touchscreen interface presents a streamlined user experience ideally suited for efficiency in the studio, and clarity and speed on stage.
'The Open Labs MiKo and NeKo provide me with the power of a recording studio in a single piece of equipment, and this greatly expands my musical canvas' said Hayes. 'I have been a staunch supporter of Open Labs equipment from day one, because it is rugged, portable, and ultra-powerful, and it represents the ultimate state-of-the-art in music technology.'
The Super Bowl is annually the nation's highest-rated TV program. More than 141 million viewers watched last year's game in the U.S. Super Bowl XLI will be broadcast to a potential worldwide audience of 1 billion in more than 230 countries and territories.
