Kawai R-50 lll 1988 - Black (Rare)

The Kawai R-50 III is the rare Japan-only version of Kawai’s late-80s compact drum machine. Visually and functionally it is the same box as the regular R-50, but internally it carries all three official sound EPROMs at once. (R-50e, R-50, & R-100)

ROM select on power-up

• Hold Pad 1 + power = R-50e electronic / industrial set (CP2)
• Hold Pad 2 + power = R-100 acoustic set (CP1)
• Hold Pad 3 + power = original R-50 “jazz/fusion” set (CP3)

Core specs (same as the standard R-50)

• 24 PCM samples per ROM (so 72 sounds total on the III)
• 8-voice polyphony (voices do not cut each other off the way many contemporaneous boxes did)
• 10 non-velocity pads (accent button for dynamics; velocity works over MIDI)
• Per-pad: tune (±8 / 16 semitones on pitched sounds), level, pan, accent, plus onboard gate, short delay, and flanger
• 50 preset + 50 user patterns, 10 songs
• Stereo outs + one assignable individual out
• MIDI in/out with decent implementation (note mapping, song pointer, SysEx dump)

No official production figure exists. Kawai never listed the R-50 III in catalogs or on their site, and no factory count has ever surfaced.

What is known:

• It was a Japan-domestic-only variant. It was not exported.
• Even long-time Japanese techs and collectors treated it as a rumor until units started appearing. One experienced Japan-based tech said he had never seen one until recently.
• Surviving examples turn up only occasionally on Yahoo Auctions Japan. Closed listings show a small handful of genuine R-50 III units selling over years, not a regular trickle.

That pattern usually means a short, limited domestic run—hundreds at most, possibly low hundreds—rather than a full production model like the regular R-50 or R-50e. There is no serial-number block or service bulletin that lets anyone count them and if you don't buy it, I get to keep it.

"From the smoke of the northern forges came the rare Kawai R-50 III, a lost war-drum whose stored thunder still answers the call. Few halls still keep this iron; when its pads strike, the longhouse shakes as if a whole clan of skins had risen from the ice. Even a lone warrior may wake that buried storm and ride it into battle."