Acoustic or Digital Piano?
A digital piano is a modern electronic musical instrument, different from the electronic keyboard, and is designed to serve primarily as an alternative to a traditional piano, both in the way it feels to play and in the sound produced. The goal of the manufacturers is to provide an accurate simulation of a real piano.
Advantages to a digital piano include:
1. Price: a good quality digital piano is not cheap, but compared to a good quality acoustic piano, it is significantly less expensive and there is also a significant used digital piano market.
2. Ability to use headphones and practice quietly
3. Never needs tuning
4. Easier to move and place in the home
5. Built-in metronome
6. Ability to record
7. Various digital inputs and outputs, including being able to connect your phone or computer to the piano directly
8. Different available styles of keyboard sounds like organ, harpsichord, strings.
An acoustic piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. Pressing a key on the piano's keyboard causes a padded hammer to strike steel strings. The hammers rebound, and the strings continue to vibrate at their resonant frequency. These vibrations are transmitted through a bridge to a sounding board that more efficiently couples the acoustic energy to the air. When the key is released, a damper stops the string's vibration and the sound.
The advantages of a good acoustic piano start with the fact that it's the "real thing," inherently capable of nuances that are difficult for the digital piano to emulate. The experience of playing an acoustic piano — the harmonics, the vibrations, the touch, the pedals, the visual appeal, the interaction with the room, the connection with tradition — is so complex that digital pianos cannot really compare. When I finally purchased a good quality acoustic piano, I was amazed by how it impacted my technique. All of a sudden, I could hear lots of nuances in sound that weren't possible on my digital piano. Also, I was finally able to use a pedal properly to enhance the quality of sound.
Buyers of acoustic pianos do need to be careful. Not all acoustic pianos are created equal and there are plenty of new acoustic pianos on the market that I feel are actually inferior to a fine digital piano. So, it really helps to try out lots of different instruments so that you have some idea of what sort of sound, feel, and capability you require to like your piano. I purchased my used Steinway from Ben Klinger at Classic Pianos in Bellevue and I probably tried about 30 pianos in his showroom as well as 100s of grand pianos in various showrooms over many years. Interestingly, Ben wrote a short book about buying acoustic pianos called, Why We Play, which describes the value of personally connecting to a specific piano during the buying process. It certainly worked that way for me. Although I was just casually looking (and playing) various pianos in the showroom, I happened to sit down at one piano and instantly loved it like I had loved no other piano. It can happen that way sometimes if you are lucky.
I still use my digital piano, but mostly because it has headphones and I like to practice early in the day when people are still asleep. However, I love my acoustic piano. It is such a treat to open it up, sit down, hear the sound, feel the keys, use the pedal the way it was meant to be used. My digital piano still helps me learn, but my acoustic piano brings me joy.
A digital piano is a modern electronic musical instrument, different from the electronic keyboard, and is designed to serve primarily as an alternative to a traditional piano, both in the way it feels to play and in the sound produced. The goal of the manufacturers is to provide an accurate simulation of a real piano.
Advantages to a digital piano include:
1. Price: a good quality digital piano is not cheap, but compared to a good quality acoustic piano, it is significantly less expensive and there is also a significant used digital piano market.
2. Ability to use headphones and practice quietly
3. Never needs tuning
4. Easier to move and place in the home
5. Built-in metronome
6. Ability to record
7. Various digital inputs and outputs, including being able to connect your phone or computer to the piano directly
8. Different available styles of keyboard sounds like organ, harpsichord, strings.
9. Electronic transposition so that you can play your song in one key and have it sound like a different key with the touch of a button
10. Easy to record one hand and then play along with the other hand
etc. etc.
I recommend playing the best available digital piano from all of the three leading brands: Kawai, Yamaha, and Roland to see which digital piano model would be best when you are looking to buy an instrument as the market is constantly being updated with new and better models. I have personally found that as you become a better pianist and musician, you will start to notice the limitations of the digital piano compared with the acoustic piano. With time and design ingenuity, these differences will become smaller, but for now there are still significant differences between the best digital and acoustic pianos.
I practiced for many years on the best digital piano I could find while I was studying for my music examinations. Although I was able to "get by", I was also significantly impacted by not being able really hear how differences in my technique sounded on my practice instrument compared with a "real" acoustic piano. It was only after I purchased my own fine acoustic piano that I truly realized how handicapped I had previously been by my digital piano during my piano examinations.
etc. etc.
I recommend playing the best available digital piano from all of the three leading brands: Kawai, Yamaha, and Roland to see which digital piano model would be best when you are looking to buy an instrument as the market is constantly being updated with new and better models. I have personally found that as you become a better pianist and musician, you will start to notice the limitations of the digital piano compared with the acoustic piano. With time and design ingenuity, these differences will become smaller, but for now there are still significant differences between the best digital and acoustic pianos.
I practiced for many years on the best digital piano I could find while I was studying for my music examinations. Although I was able to "get by", I was also significantly impacted by not being able really hear how differences in my technique sounded on my practice instrument compared with a "real" acoustic piano. It was only after I purchased my own fine acoustic piano that I truly realized how handicapped I had previously been by my digital piano during my piano examinations.
The advantages of a good acoustic piano start with the fact that it's the "real thing," inherently capable of nuances that are difficult for the digital piano to emulate. The experience of playing an acoustic piano — the harmonics, the vibrations, the touch, the pedals, the visual appeal, the interaction with the room, the connection with tradition — is so complex that digital pianos cannot really compare. When I finally purchased a good quality acoustic piano, I was amazed by how it impacted my technique. All of a sudden, I could hear lots of nuances in sound that weren't possible on my digital piano. Also, I was finally able to use a pedal properly to enhance the quality of sound.
Buyers of acoustic pianos do need to be careful. Not all acoustic pianos are created equal and there are plenty of new acoustic pianos on the market that I feel are actually inferior to a fine digital piano. So, it really helps to try out lots of different instruments so that you have some idea of what sort of sound, feel, and capability you require to like your piano. I purchased my used Steinway from Ben Klinger at Classic Pianos in Bellevue and I probably tried about 30 pianos in his showroom as well as 100s of grand pianos in various showrooms over many years. Interestingly, Ben wrote a short book about buying acoustic pianos called, Why We Play, which describes the value of personally connecting to a specific piano during the buying process. It certainly worked that way for me. Although I was just casually looking (and playing) various pianos in the showroom, I happened to sit down at one piano and instantly loved it like I had loved no other piano. It can happen that way sometimes if you are lucky.
I still use my digital piano, but mostly because it has headphones and I like to practice early in the day when people are still asleep. However, I love my acoustic piano. It is such a treat to open it up, sit down, hear the sound, feel the keys, use the pedal the way it was meant to be used. My digital piano still helps me learn, but my acoustic piano brings me joy.
Good post!
ReplyDeleteMy rule of thumb (which suspect you'd agree with) is that it's all about the $$$$.
The tech is now good enough that upright pianos are obsolete (digital is better at same price point). So for students/buyers, stick with digital piano below some floor. And as digital (relatively to price) improves, that floor keeps going up. It was maybe $2k two decades ago. Then maybe $3k or $5k a decade ago.
That is to say, for most people starting out, go digital. But if you enjoy, and become truly serious, at some point you have to train on a baby grand to progress. It would be interesting to plot where they cutoff to go analog/real piano is on a chart. Am sure the price point has been going up over time.
Yes. I agree about digital pianos at as a starting point for most buyers, however there are always exceptions. For some people having an acoustic to start IS a good idea. Some people are very sensitive to the sound, touch, etc. and it really does help you with all of those issues to have a decent acoustic.
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