Over the last several weeks I have been deep in research for a new digital piano, spending a lot of time looking at Roland, Kawai, and Yamaha models, and seeing this made me giggle. I doubt I would ever buy even one of the less traditional-looking production models (like the Kiyola), but I am glad they have fun with creating wild concepts like this.
Got the kids a $2k Roland FP 90x for Christmas to replace a $1k Casio. I don't play but they liked the Roland action when we tried their models in stores over Yamaha, Casio, and some others. Now that we have it- incredible instrument, well worth the upgrade, good match for their skills. It is a really, really good sound producer, better than most analog pianos I've heard, though I can easily tell the difference between it and their teacher's Steinway grand. The sounds emitted by the Roland are very fine, but still digital. It feels like a $10k digital would get much closer to being able to trick a listener into thinking it was a fine analog.
To me even the very highest end digital pianos still sound digital, but they are close enough and the benefits of digital outweigh what you might sacrifice in sound for most people.
I've noticed there is also fierce debate between digital pianos that are based on sampled sounds versus modeled. I believe most Roland digitals are modeled with Fourier series, while all/most of their competitors are sampled (not sure about Nord). That said Pianoteq is a popular after market VST that will bring a very convincing top tier modeled sound to even a low end digital piano.
For anyone price-sensitive, I highly recommend getting the cheapest 88-key hammer-action keyboard you can find and hooking it up to Pianoteq Stage rather than buying a dedicated digital piano.
Exception if you're going to travel with it. Built-in sounds save you on setup time.
I’m not extremely concerned with sound quality, both because I intend to play around with lots of VSTs and because I‘ll be upgrading from a Roland RD-700SX which has served me incredibly well but which is very outdated when it comes to the sound engine!
Sounds like a good approach to me. Buy for the best action your budget will allow. With VSTs you can tailor the sound to your liking. I don't have a stake in Pianoteq, but if you aren't aware they claim that version 8 is going to be brought to iOS soon.
If you use a decent quality open back headphone, I feel like this is even more true, because the onboard sound becomes irrelevant.
The FP-90x is currently at the top of my list. The price and portability makes it much more practical for me than the bigger console pianos, even though I am very allured by some of the nicer actions with longer keysticks. I’ve played the RD-2000 enough to know I’ll enjoy the action, but I haven’t been able to find an FP-90x in a showroom yet to hear it in person. The piano sound samples I’ve listened to aren’t super impressive, but I’m not super concerned about that.
One of the things I plan to do is connect my iPad and laptop and play around with all the newer piano VSTs that I’ve missed since being away from that world for about 10 years. Sadly Kawai pianos don’t work as USB audio interfaces, so you can’t pipe the VST output back into its onboard speakers. The Roland pianos all support this feature, as do I believe most or all Yamahas.
It's a matter of taste I guess. I had a Yamaha and switched to Roland and much prefer the chunkier key action and the slightly brighter/compressed piano tone. Definitely important to try it in store.
My absolute favourite is the Nord Grand, but it's a little too expensive.
Ooo, yeah, I saw one of those, didn't get to listen to it. It does seem like it would totally be about taste and preference.
Was really pleasurable, also wistful, taking my son to try them out. We could just hang out in this large room in a retail store in the middle of NYC for a few hours, he just playing whatever was there. Sometimes other kids would drop in too. That kind of relaxed vibe now incredibly rare.
And though I can hear and feel the music, I can't make it, never learned. Don't have time and space to do it now. Really glad he is getting it into his brain at a young age.
I believe the Nord Grand uses Kawai’s Responsive Hammer III action, which is also on the much cheaper (and excellent!) Kawai ES920 portable digital piano.
You could go Kawai VPC-1 which is just the controller, and then connect it via MIDI to whatever you like. That way, you get a wooden action without paying for the sound engine (I've got my VCP-1 connected to a CP Reface):
I looked up the VPC-1 and while I probably would pay a bit more just to have speakers and a sound engine - the weight difference is interesting. It's 29.5kg for the VPC-1 vs. 17.0kg for the ES920!
The VPC-1's weight is, from what I can tell, reasonable given the action it uses. Its bizarrely named "RM3II action" is much closer to the Grand Feel action they put in their high-end digital uprights than to normal portable digital piano actions. Also, the ES920 is significantly lighter than its competitors.
Did the same search about a year ago, ended up ordering the CLP-775 after testing Kawai and Yamaha in stores. It _finally_ arrived last month, completely love it so far. On the somewhat cheaper side the 745 also felt great in store.
I don’t think you can go wrong with the equivalent Kawai models either. They somehow didn’t quite do it for me when I played them in store (compared to the CLPs), but couldn’t quite pin down what it was, and it was probably just a personal thing.
Anyway, definitely second FlyingRobot’s recommendation about Piano World (though seems like you’re set on that) and trying before settling on anything.
Good luck, sure you’ll end up with something you love!
The CLP line is from Yamaha ;)
Just to give a +1 to the CLP-775, I also chose that one and it's a joy to play. While the CLP display looks a bit more 'dated' than the Kawai models it starts up a lot faster and response is instantly. The Kawai models I tried have some low-end mobile chip which needed some time to boot and touch screen response was slow.
It's really interesting. I tried Kawai and Yamaha digital pianos in the store and I didn't like the key action of the Kawai at all, nor the sound. Now my piano teacher has an “actual” (non-digital) Kawai grand and it feels just like the digital one -- not my favorite.
Kawai makes quite nice digital pianos. The CA95 that we bought about 5 years ago has real wooden hammer action and a wooden soundboard. It also reproduces the harmonics (through digital samples) that you get when you hold the sustain pedal down and play a different string (resonant frequencies can vibrate other strings that you haven't played).
I highly recommend them if you are considering a digital piano.
You can get this feature at their lowest end model of that series (CA49), though it may lack some other aspects of the resonance modeling that they reserve for higher end models. I believe almost all digitals starting at $2000 across the board have this feature, and the limiting factor that'll hold you back from hearing it all at the lower end of the price range is the audio setup that comes with the keyboard.
I remember discovering this feature when I held down all keys from A0 through E1 (without sounding them), depressed the sostenuto pedal, and then played a bunch of other keys.
That's the term I was looking for: resonance modeling. When you hear it in action you realize why most digital pianos sound so terrible. A quality digital or virtual piano models all the resonant frequencies and is a joy to listen to.
I wonder if that’s the predecessor to the CA99. I played that in a showroom and the Grand Feel III action is fantastic. I’m just not sure if I want to pay like 2-3x over what a portable digital piano would cost.
Looked at those exact brands about a month ago. Went with the Yamaha N1x hybrid. (Which means it has a conventional acoustic action with hammers and everything) so far pretty happy with it. I suggest going over to the piano world forums and doing a dive. The threads on these models are long. Also above all go see them in real life if you can.
I sort of prefer the ones without. The Kawai CA95 doesn't have it, but it does have a line input and USB/5 pin MIDI in/out, so you can simply place a tablet (iPad or Android) on the music stand and use a USB cable to play whatever digital synths or piano emulators you want to download.
Not having a built-in tablet means it is future proof and can work with the latest tablet, even a decade into the future.
>means it is future proof and can work with the latest tablet, even a decade into the future.
My preferred digital workstation (cubase) works (started with an atari version) great - also on my phone. My son has the same phone - does not work (slightly different processor? Different size sd card?). I can't find the forum message where someone went out and got a new tablet for the program..doesn't work.
"Future proof", isn't even today proof.
I can't wait until I get prompted to install updates while playing, have to pay a subscription fee to use the sustain pedal, and have the instrument become non-functional 15 years after purchase once the manufacturer finds the service is no longer profitable and decommissions its server.
"Roland Cloud is an evolving cloud-based suite of software synthesizers, drum machines, and sampled instruments for modern creators."
It's not hard to predict how that's likely to pan out in the coming years.
I recently saw a second hand Roland AT-900 organ for sale near me (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mfm_AYqI1No). I'm tempted. The fact that comes with all it's sound and functionality built-in and doesn't have any internet connectivity which can be used to disable said features after my subscription expires makes it more compelling.
Yeah, I don’t get most of these plug-in companies. They require an internet connection to work. I love using software synths, but knowing that any time from next week to next decade I won’t be able to reproduce the sounds I’m using to record my songs scares the hell out of me. With a hardware synth, I can at least have the ability to back up the sounds and buy another instrument if the current one dies. I can literally use the same sounds I made in the 80s on many different synths (Rolands, Yamahas, etc.). That’s worth a lot to me.
Yeahhh Roland kinda sucks lately. This concept has some cool stuff, but in synth land they kinda missed the boat. Everyone else is doing this awesome pure analog renaissance and Roland is just doing emulation. They’re not even leading digital - that’s Hydrasynth.
Let's be clear: this is not real. It doesn't "make use of" drone speakers because it's fictional. This is someone saying "wouldn't it be cool if we had drone speakers" and paying a digital artist to knock together some renders. The piano might exist, but those drones don't. They aren't even a viable design - broad, flat supports and a wide flat gondola right in the air stream? Single hub? What stops it from spinning, are we meant to think it has counterrotating blades (cuz they are hella noisy even by drone standards)? Where are the blades anyway?
Nonsense. Fiction. Not even plausible fiction. Might as well have them hover by magic. HN, move on.
Well, I wish I could see it at CES (as they state it will be) to confirm or disprove your assertions.
Can't you just have an extra noise cancelling drone that creates an equivalent cancellation sound wave?
Even if it is "fiction," it fits into the "science fiction" category and I love it as such. The rendition is such a beautiful idea that I'm happy they created the web page to showcase the idea.
This is a fine example of why Roland isn't really relevant in the electronic music gear market any more. They have a great legacy and great marketing department, but I can't remember the last time they released a product that really excited people.
They're releasing plenty of products that excited people, it's just that the Roland products that are exciting all came out 20-40 years ago, and they just keep re-issuing them in various formats.
Personally I'd buy the crap out of a Jp8080 Boutique :)
They haven't invented anything new AND exciting for a good decade, though.
I've always thought of them as a maker of reliable workhorse stuff. The MIDI keyboard I have from them has been rock solid and it's outlasted at least two others.
My point isn't a dig at their quality (which is excellent) but at their lack of technological innovation for the last ~20 years. Their products are very good, they're just extremely risk averse and resting on a reputation they earned in the 1980s.
Ok, but why do they need to be exciting and innovative? I would almost rather they didn't, lest the company pivot into something of the sort and eventually abandon their existing product line.
Besides, a lot of "innovation" in the music space seems to be about how many different ways we can bolt on cloud functionality
Roland says that they're exciting and innovate in their marketing materials, but most of their potential buyers don't find them to be so in recent years.
This PR exercise is not about how Roland is sticking to its proud tradition of timeless, handmade craftsmanship, but about how they are so cool and pushing the technological envelope. The market reaction might be summed up as 'amused skepticism' eg https://www.synthtopia.com/content/2023/01/06/roland-creates...
I get that this is a concept, but why not use lighter-than-air drones? Either hot air (I'd see about an electric heater, no idea how feasible that is), or little helium blimps. Then just little fans to keep them in place, which could be quieter.
I think I mostly want to see little blimp/airship swarms be a thing that I could buy, given a lottery win or two.
The Piano seems to be Android-powered and is connected to the internet. Wouldn’t use this even if Roland paid me to.
It’s startling how much things have changed from when I first started using computers, when it seemed that nearly anything could be improved through electronics. Nowadays adding a computer means malware, spyware and losing support after two years.
The drones seem entirely impractical, but also in keeping for a 21st century concept piece.
Also in keeping, and something I truly despise, is the ubiquitous and obtrusive thick-bezzeled touchscreen just slapped in the middle. I don't think it looks good in the render and looks even worse in the photo.
Instead of spending money developing ways to introduce noise into the speakers, I'd have rather seen the screen match the curve of the panel; though I'm not sure if shaped screens are even possible yet. At the very least they could have done a nicer job of blending the screen in for this art piece.
> As of now, the drones’ propellers are still somewhat noisy. But as quiet drone technology becomes available, they’ll be able to add it to the existing framework.
That is not what ‘drone’ means in a musical instrument context.
Unless the function of these drones is to emit a constant underlying tone to add to the musicality, allowing you to mimic bagpipes, a banjo or a tambura. Which has clearly always been the ambition of any serious pianist.
I know I'm reiterating what others have said, but a STRONG +1 to the folks who are advocating for a Yamaha P-515. I bought one a year or two ago, and it sounds amazing, has great feel, is sturdy, but light enough to move.
It's even a render, I think. Just add 6 seconds of one of Rachmaninov's recordings under it (https://youtu.be/L3Xp2Djqh3s?t=30), and you'll have a good impression.
Can somebody give me a quick rundown on the Roland boutique modules? I'm shopping for an 808 and I'm not sure if I want to go with Roland's solution or the Behringer.
Reverb is the result of latency, and in large spaces the audio signal to distant speakers is delayed to minimize dead spots due to wave interference.
Which is to say musical experience is complicated and hence live sound design is also complex in ways that aren’t casually obvious.
The rule of thumb is sound travels one foot per millisecond (30cm per millisecond). So at 30m, ten milliseconds latency wouldn’t change the spatial perception very much even without correction. Of course 90ms is plenty of time to correct for latency if you want to be spot on.
My wild ass guess is a microphone on the drone could be used to sync the remote speakers with the piano speakers to phase align the sources.
Basically ordinary audio signal processing succumbed to compute about twenty years ago.
Haas would like to disagree. If you experience a second wavefront within ~2-50ms you'll still localise to the first, even if the second is up to 10dB louder.
Unless I misunderstand the psycho-acoustic point of the comment, it would seem that we are in agreement about the effects of 10ms latency on audio experience.
My intent was that 10ms latency correlates to about 3m. The difference between perceiving reflections at 33m/110ms and 30m/100ms is unlikely to have a significant impact on a live music experience...though it might matter in a recording studio or in live performance monitoring.
Sure, but you can't play begin to play the sound until you have enough bits that you can decode what was sampled, and that always means you have to wait at least a couple of milliseconds. Conventional analog radio allows you to play out the modulating waveform with sub millisecond delay.
>>> As of now, the drones’ propellers are still somewhat noisy. But as quiet drone technology becomes available, they’ll be able to add it to the existing framework.
So really everything you would expect from hanging a speaker from a drone, noisy and power hungry.
My immediate thoughts. If only pianos were typically positioned in the same spot for a long time, allowing to do those measurements once and hang the speakers appropriately from the ceiling. Or make a speaker array in the base and do all sorts of spacial Fourier/phased array madness.
I guess if you want a gimmick piano you can have it.
DJI has made a shocking amount of progress at making its drones quieter over the past few years. What used to sound like a loud swarm of bees 20 feet overhead is now almost imperceptible.
It’s not just the volume of air but also the speed that it’s moved at. Large slow propellers are quieter and more efficient than small fast propellers. (But less maneuverable.) In the limit, I could see this being done by big, spidery drones with huge props relative to their weight, like a scale model of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AeroVelo_Atlas.
Unlike Newtonian theory, in audio engineering all points in space are not equivalent. Some points are between a pair of ears, some are not.
A common audio engineering strategy these days is to direct phase shift effects of multiple point sources vertically, e.g. linear speaker arrays. For audience members, reinforced and canceled frequencies fifteen feet off the ground don't effect musical experience.
I can think of a few genres of music where drone sounds would not feel out of place. Unfortunately, they're genres of music which aren't suited to a piano either.
Seriously. My first thought was playing the piano while waiting to be shot by a sniper. Ever since I saw some of the Syrian war vids, I just can't disassociate that sound from mortal danger.
> As of now, the drones’ propellers are still somewhat noisy. But as quiet drone technology becomes available, they’ll be able to add it to the existing framework.
I don't believe the limitations of physics are anywhere near what current drones sound like. They are loud because zero effort goes in to making them quiet. It's not so much the moving air that makes them loud, its the whining motors and bearings that are loud. If you were able to encase those motors inside and perhaps put some effort in to making the air stream less turbulent, they could be a lot quieter.
Although I still can't see drones being good for this even with good designs.
It is certainly not "whining motors and bearings" that makes them loud - it is the fact that you are creating massive periodic pressure differences with the blades. It is the same reason helicopters go thump-thump-thump, but scaled up in frequency. Have you ever heard a quiet propeller? About the best you can do is increase the size and decrease the speed (more efficient = less power dumped into the air), add more blades (minimizes circumferential pressure variation), and add a duct (eliminates tip vortices). But eventually you hit weight limits on all of that. At drone sizes, unless the drone is impossibly feather-light, you're always going to have some sort of whine.
Even in the absolute theoretical best case scenario of an idealized disk-shaped actuator inside a duct with proper lip shaping and 0 turbulence around the actuator, the shear boundary of the high velocity output plume is unavoidably going to cause turbulence. The best you can do is "woosh".
