beginner advice needed

[shellypops]

Hi I'm wanting to learn to play the piano by taking lessons and doing lots of practice at home, however, I don't have room for a piano...would a keyboard do? I know piano's normally have 88 keys and most keyboards only have 61. How would this affect my progress? Do I really need to get a piano to learn on?

[sirprize]

There are certainly many 88-note electronic keyboards available but you have to ask yourself what you want a piano or electronic keyboard FOR.

If you want to be able to play classical music with all its nuances, shades, subtleties and sheer range there is NO substitute for a real piano for a very simple reason: when the protocols for the control of velocity, dynamics and timbre (among other things) were internationally agreed in the early 1980s they allowed for only 127 increments of differential within each musical parameter.

Not only is this an absurdly small number for musical expression but the engineers who designed this MIDI protocol (they didn't bother to ask musicians) arranged all the increments equidistantly. The least they could do was to group the largest number of increments nearest to zero as the human ear is most sensitive to change at low dynamic levels. This is the reason why it's near to impossible to play with any sensitivity on MIDI keyboards.

Electronic keyboards are VERY good at certain functions....sequenced-recording, multi-timbral variety etc....but hopeless at others. My recommendation is to get yourself a good 88-note keyboard but don't expect miracles of playability! And start to make room for the real piano you will eventually long for.

[PianoGuy]

Get one of the little Steinmayer S99 6-Octave jobs. Not the best piano in the world, but an rrp of GBP1495 means that you could probably bag one for about 1200. They're unique in their class, not bad performers and hold value OK-ish. Choice of black (best) or poly mahogany (OK-ish) 73 keys and more touch response than a MIDI keyboard.

[Bill Kibby]

Speaking as someone who loves pianos, plays pianos, and deals with piano history, I have to say that many excellent musicians would regard the comment that "it's near to impossible to play with any sensitivity on MIDI keyboards" as extremely offensive. Rick Wakeman, for one, produces some extremely sensitive, expressive, evocative music on MIDI keyboards.

[PianoGuy]

Rick Wakeman, for one, produces some extremely sensitive, expressive, evocative music on MIDI keyboards.

True. And Jools Holland doesn't.

[fumbler]

Hi,

Well maybe, but I don't think that Shelly is at either the Holland or Wakeman stage yet.

If you can't get a 'real' piano in your room then go for a good digital. Despite what many say, playing a digital keyboard will ruin neither your ear nor your touch. Many 'classical' players use digital pianos without suffering ideological or commercial death.

There is a vast range of touch across real pianos. I am used to my K121ZT, and I think my teacher's Weber grand is Satan's own piano. I can only thump on it as the action is so weighty.

So learn on a digital if you want. When you're in the Wakeman/Holland class - several years down the line I guess - you will probably have the means to move to a 'real' piano if you wish.

Oh yes, you really do need 88 keys, or most of them anyway.

Rgds.

[Bill Kibby]

I have to agree that there is an awful lot of rubbish talk about realism, and it all centres around the question of whether an electronic piano sounds like a real piano, or feels like a real piano. I love the Clavinova, but some people have commented that it is not as realistic a piano as the Roland. In the end, it is a musical instrument, and I judge it by the quality of the music I can produce on it. The problem here is that every piano can sound or feel different, and since there is no possibility of a perfect, ideal piano, there cannot be any useful discussion of whether the electronic ones are better or worse. Apart from the useful feature of being able to play in headphones, many of these instruments are just so good now that I can understand why so many poeople abandon the real thing, especially where central heating is involved.

The fact that science can examine and measure art to show thousands of levels of dynamics does not prove that the musician has the power to purpose select one of these levels, I doubt anybody could adjust their playing to select one of 128 levels purposely.