Piano-like keyboard?

[HQ2]

My lad has piano lessons which he seems to enjoy. We have a piano at home which he sometimes practices on, but with varying clubs and activities there never seems to be enough time.

He's an early bird and is often up hours before anyone else in the house. There is opportunity here for some practice but too early for the piano (even muted), so I was thinking maybe get him a decent keyboard and headphones. He already has a keyboard which is not much more than a toy.

Pianists in the family (wife's side!) say keyboard not the same and they're right I'm sure. But surely *some* extra practice is better than none.

Any suggestions for a keyboard? No idea on budget, maybe couple of hundred - but happy to spend more if good value.

[NDA]

You want something like this:

http://www.dv247.com/computer-hardware/m-audio-oxy...

The search term would be 'fully weighted midi keyboard' and 88 notes.

[V8FGO]

As NDA says, or search for digital pinao. My lad has this model.

http://www.gear4music.com/Keyboards-and-Pianos/Cas...

[rolando]

Neither of the above have the sustain and soft pedals of a "real" piano. I would suggest a Clavinova or similar digital piano.

[HQ2]

Thanks for the comments guys. Remember this keyboard needs to have a 'put it away' feature as it will live in a kid's bedroom and battle for space with his desk, the model railway, his lego, scale models, latests fads and all sorts. It will also only be used for the times he wants to practice but is the only one out of bed - any other time we have the piano.

Reading online it seems the 'polyphony' is something to consider when choosing (with 64 suggested as acceptable), but not sure if should be a concern when we have a 'proper' piano to practice on (as the polyphony feature comes at a cost).

[Du1point8]

This one is supposed to be good

http://www.gear4music.com/Keyboards-and-Pianos/Yam...

Bit more than a few hundred.

[Super Slo Mo]

Quite a bit over your suggested budget (i.e. more like £4-500), but I recently got a Yamaha P105 'stage piano', with a wooden stand. (Edit: As in the link in the post above!)
It can, of course, be used with a cheap metal folding stand, and comes with a single sustain pedal as standard, rather than the 3 pedal board that you get with the wooden stand.

Weighting is fairly close to a real piano, although it's a lot more sensitive when playing Pianissimo, so where on a real piano if you press the keys very softly you won't get a sound, on this it'll generally still play a note. It means it's not quite as good as the real thing, but is fine for practice and developing finger strength. The main grand piano sounds pretty good too, as it's sampled from Yamaha's CFIII concert grand. Polyphony is more than adequate for most people.

It's small, relatively portable, and relatively light weight. I'd strongly consider looking at one if you just want a keyboard that's close to a real piano in terms of weighting and sensitivity.

[davepoth]

HQ2 said:

Thanks for the comments guys. Remember this keyboard needs to have a 'put it away' feature as it will live in a kid's bedroom and battle for space with his desk, the model railway, his lego, scale models, latests fads and all sorts. It will also only be used for the times he wants to practice but is the only one out of bed - any other time we have the piano.

Reading online it seems the 'polyphony' is something to consider when choosing (with 64 suggested as acceptable), but not sure if should be a concern when we have a 'proper' piano to practice on (as the polyphony feature comes at a cost).

Polyphony is the number of tones the piano can play at the same time. If all you are using it for is playing the piano, you'll likely never notice an issue if you only have 12 note polyphony - assuming your son only has 10 fingers.

Extra notes are only useful if you are going to be using the advanced features of the piano, such as playing back an existing tune and playing over the top of it, using multiple instruments at the same time, controlling other devices, and so on.

[telford_mike]

I recently bought a Korg Havian 30 which I find very good.

http://www.korgpa.com/products/pianos/havian-30/ko...

It's a little above your budget, but it has all the polyphony you could ever want, proper weighted hammer action keys etc etc. Main thing for me was that it only weighs 15kg, so it can go in a bag and hide away in a wardrobe when not needed.

[NDA]

rolando said:

Neither of the above have the sustain and soft pedals of a "real" piano. I would suggest a Clavinova or similar digital piano.

You buy the pedals and plug them in. Simples.

[Disastrous]

davepoth said:

HQ2 said:

Thanks for the comments guys. Remember this keyboard needs to have a 'put it away' feature as it will live in a kid's bedroom and battle for space with his desk, the model railway, his lego, scale models, latests fads and all sorts. It will also only be used for the times he wants to practice but is the only one out of bed - any other time we have the piano.

Reading online it seems the 'polyphony' is something to consider when choosing (with 64 suggested as acceptable), but not sure if should be a concern when we have a 'proper' piano to practice on (as the polyphony feature comes at a cost).

Polyphony is the number of tones the piano can play at the same time. If all you are using it for is playing the piano, you'll likely never notice an issue if you only have 12 note polyphony - assuming your son only has 10 fingers.

Extra notes are only useful if you are going to be using the advanced features of the piano, such as playing back an existing tune and playing over the top of it, using multiple instruments at the same time, controlling other devices, and so on.

Not quite - if you are playing sustained chords for example, it would be very easy to exceed 12 notes, and when that happens, the earliest notes just stop very suddenly. Very odd sounding...

[chevy-stu]

I recently sourced from Gumtree a Yamaha P80 digital stage piano for about £275. Feels pretty realistic, full size keyboard, has 2 headphone outs, sustain etc..

[Super Slo Mo]

Disastrous said:

davepoth said:

HQ2 said:

Thanks for the comments guys. Remember this keyboard needs to have a 'put it away' feature as it will live in a kid's bedroom and battle for space with his desk, the model railway, his lego, scale models, latests fads and all sorts. It will also only be used for the times he wants to practice but is the only one out of bed - any other time we have the piano.

Reading online it seems the 'polyphony' is something to consider when choosing (with 64 suggested as acceptable), but not sure if should be a concern when we have a 'proper' piano to practice on (as the polyphony feature comes at a cost).

Polyphony is the number of tones the piano can play at the same time. If all you are using it for is playing the piano, you'll likely never notice an issue if you only have 12 note polyphony - assuming your son only has 10 fingers.

Extra notes are only useful if you are going to be using the advanced features of the piano, such as playing back an existing tune and playing over the top of it, using multiple instruments at the same time, controlling other devices, and so on.

Not quite - if you are playing sustained chords for example, it would be very easy to exceed 12 notes, and when that happens, the earliest notes just stop very suddenly. Very odd sounding...

I was just going to post the same comment. It's easily possible to exceed 64 notes sounding simultaneously, in a quick run up the keyboard with the sustain pedal pressed, for example.

There are plenty of pieces of music where 128 or more polyphony is desirable, at least, to get the authentic sounding reproduction. Another example would be holding down the sustain/damper pedal, on a real piano this action means all the strings are undamped, and thus many of them will resonate when a single note is pressed, noticeably changing the sound of the instrument. A good digital piano should be able to replicate this.

[suthol]

I've got a Yamaha clavinova for sale but the postage from Oz would be a killer.