Parker NiteFly SA Guitar with Factory Roland Ready GK-2A and Roland GR-300 Guitar Synthesizer

Published on Jan 31, 2020 WayneJoness

"In August of 2006 I found this really, really rare Parker NiteFly SA guitar on ebay. This was a stunning NiteFly SA with a factory installed Roland GK-2A kit. I have never seen one of these before or since. As the Roland kit was factory installed, all the controls, knobs, etc. fit seamless with the standard controls. This NiteFly SA was a true jack-of-all-trades guitar. In addition to the sweet custom DiMarzio pickups, the guitar also had a Fishman pickup installed for acoustic tones. And topping everything off was the Roland 13 pin GK output as well.

In my MIDI speed tests, this guitar has proven to be a real tracking champion as well. Response time was a blazing 15.96 milliseconds using the Roland GI-20 Pitch-to-MIDI converter. This is a tracking speed that is on par with the latest technology available.

In the video, you can see the guitar demonstrated with the Roland GR-300. At the time I was making the RC-1324-PDL, a pedal that accepted a modern 13-pin input and supplied a vintage 24-pin output. The pedal included trimmers for each string, plus two filter preset settings, modulation control and resonance, as well as output presets. The pedal needed to replicate the controls found on a vintage guitar synth controller which are not a part of the GK-2/GK-3 design. You can hear the guitar controlling a Roland GR-100, GR-300 and GR-700.

As much as I loved the sound and flexibility of this guitar, I was never able to adjust to the thin, carbon fibre neck. Do not get me wrong, the neck is awesome, with its stainless steel frets and dead-on intonation. But I found the neck a little fatiguing, as I really prefer a fatter neck. And so, like many guitars, it eventually left and found another owner courtesy of ebay."

Parker NiteFly SA with Factory Internal Roland GK-2A and Roland GR-700 Analog Guitar Synthesizer

Published on Jan 31, 2020 WayneJoness

"This video demonstrates using a Parker NiteFly SA with a factory Roland GK-2A internal pickup. This is a rare guitar, with the Roland electronics installed at the factory. This is the same pickup as found in the original Fender Roland Ready guitars. A RC-1324 converter is used to boost the signals from the Roland 13-pin output to be compatible with the 24-pin system. This enables the Parker NiteFly SA to play a vintage Roland GR-700 Analog guitar synthesiter."