Jordan Rudess comments on his live keyboard setup

The way I change sounds is with a single pedal. In Dream Theater I use one 2500 Kurzweil keyboard and a 2500 rack unit as well. Every time I step on my pedal (which is assigned to data increment) with my left foot, it changes the keyboard layout and sounds completely. I use the “SETUP” mode of the Kurzweil. One second I might have strings in the R.H. trombones mixed with timpani in the L.H. and when I hit the pedal I’ve got Voices, Piano and Chimes in the RH and a huge sound effect in the LH. Also each pedal step brings me sequentially through our performance.

So I begin with sound 200 and end up the night at 500. Busy left foot!! In addition to all that, one of the zones in this SETUP is usually assigned to control the images on our large screens. These images are generated from a MAC program called Videodelic which responds to midi controllers. Both my instruments are maxed out Kurzweils having 128 meg of ram in each.