Welcome to the Piano World Piano Forums Over 3 million posts about pianos, digital pianos, and all types of keyboard instruments. Over 100,000 members from around the world.
Join the World's Largest Community of Piano Lovers
(it's free)
It's Fun to Play the Piano ... Please Pass It On!
Could you have gotten where you are with a DP? I have gotten this far on a DP. The upright held me back. I've advanced more in 6 months with the DP (CLP240) than in all the prior years on an upright.
Does/did it limit your progress? No, it enhanced my progress.
Can you imagine getting to where you are today if from the beginning you had used only one of the best DPs available now? I would be much more advanced if I'd not lost a decade playing on an upright.
I'm delighted by the touch/feel of the DP. The sound is not as rich as the upright. But at least it's always in tune. And, with headphones, I can play much longer than I could with the upgright, at any time of day or night.
Could you have gotten where you are with a DP? I have gotten this far on a DP. The upright held me back. I've advanced more in 6 months with the DP (CLP240) than in all the prior years on an upright.
Blaming your years of lack of progress on an acoustic piano, saying that the acoustic hindered your musical growth, and crediting your advancement to the digital is stating facts with half-truths. If you had had a good acoustic piano to start with, or if you had exchanged your poor upright for a good one instead of for a digital, you would be crediting your early musical growth or your more recent progress on a better acoustic instrument and not on going from an acoustic to a digital.
[...]I find the Grantouch an incredible practice instrument. I use it with headphones sometimes, especially wearing it only on the left ear or only on the right ear to stimulate left or right brain thinking.
fredericch ;
You may know more than I about left brain vs. right brain thinking, but I am somewhat nonplussed at your suggestion that either is dependent upon which ear is doing the hearing!
from : www.funderstanding.com/content/right-brain-vs-left-brain "Experimentation has shown that the two different sides, or hemispheres, of the brain are responsible for different manners of thinking. The following table illustrates the differences between left-brain and right-brain thinking:
Left Brain Logical Sequential Rational Analytical Objective Looks at parts
Right Brain Random Intuitive Holistic Synthesizing Subjective Looks at wholes"
Hi BruceD and MarkH, Thanks for the brain stuff. I'm very curious about it and will probably start a new topic discussion about the effects of left ear/right ear - left brain/right brain. I have to study the medical document that Mark linked. It is very interesting!
As far as whether I would have gotten as far on a DP, I think not. There is no substitute for knowing the acoustic sound. Digital sound cannot reproduce the complex interactions of harmonics. NOr the complex mechanics of a piano action. Once you have experienced an acoustic piano, both physically and emotionally (what I consider the listening experience), you can imagine it and fill in the difference, but you can't imagine what you haven't experienced. Even if your imagination is simply to say "there is an area here that I cannot imagine", you are better off than thinking "this is what a piano sounds like." Like any strong emotional experience (falling in love?), you don't know what you're missing until you've done it yourself, and then you can recall it without ever having to experience it again. How much time you need to spend with a real acoustic piano before you emotionally and physically "know" it is the question. How long did it take before you got to a bike-riding skill level that you could not forget? And our emotional reaction to sound is constantly changing and growing with our growing experiences, so our perception of the acoustic piano sound will always be changing and deepening. So I would not want to have a young student practice exclusively on a DP for any length of time. Once an adult, I think it would be possible to go for a long time on a good, weighted DP without too much physical or emotional damage, as long as there are live piano concerts to attend and the occasional friend's keyboard to keep the experience alive.
Has anybody pointed out that the original question is a logical impossibility that cannot be answered except with a hunch? Given that there's no "control group," there's no basis for responding with either yes or no; one can only speculate.
Has anybody pointed out that the original question is a logical impossibility that cannot be answered except with a hunch? Given that there's no "control group," there's no basis for responding with either yes or no; one can only speculate.
Has anybody pointed out that the original question is a logical impossibility that cannot be answered except with a hunch? Given that there's no "control group," there's no basis for responding with either yes or no; one can only speculate.
Steven
Great point. It's all speculation.
Good point, Ken. Until pretty recently, digital pianos didn't exist.
John
Current works in progress:
Beethoven Sonata Op. 10 No. 2 in F, Haydn Sonata Hoboken XVI:41, Bach French Suite No. 5 in G BWV 816
Current instruments: Schimmel-Vogel 177T grand, Roland LX-17 digital, and John Lyon unfretted Saxon clavichord.
Has anybody pointed out that the original question is a logical impossibility that cannot be answered except with a hunch? Given that there's no "control group," there's no basis for responding with either yes or no; one can only speculate.
Steven
Yes, I wanted speculation, and recall that in my original post, I have in the body, "Rephrasing: Can you imagine getting to where you are today if from the beginning you had used only one of the best DPs available now?". So in order to even begin to speculate one must have some knowledge of "one of the best DPs available now".
..there is an experiment in the computer artificial intelligence community where a person types questions to be answered by the "person" on the other end and then makes a determination of whether that person is a real person or a computer program. Maybe the manufacturers need to do a similar experiment (and maybe they do) with their high-end digital pianos vs acoustic pianos. Is it real or is it digital?
It's called the 'Turing Test', after Alan Turing who suggested it, and has been attempted repeatedly. I'm not up on the latest AI literature, but my belief is that no machine has yet 'passed'.
If I understand you correctly, an equivalent test for DP versus Steinway would be irrelevant because you regard these as different instruments. I agree with this view. However, if one wished to make a point, I suppose this would be as good a test as any.
When I was experimenting with synthesizers (pre-history, I know) I concluded that it is not possible to reproduce the wave form of a piano digitally because the number of degrees of freedom is essentially infinite. I suppose the focus of modern modeling is not to attempt this, but to isolate those elements that generate a sound as near to the sound of a piano as the ear can detect (if this is one's aim).
Whether one succeeds is, I suppose, a question of 'whose ear'? Mine has never been able on any CD I've ever heard to recognize a sound that more than roughly resembles that of a live orchestra.
This is all tangential to the OP's question. I hesitated to comment on this since I have not played a modern DP. However, as I understand, speculation is encouraged.
For most of my life I played on a Yamaha which has a bright tone, so it didn't sound much like a Boesendorfer, and surely was far removed from Beethoven's Hammerklavier. What I liked about it (amongst other things) was its sheer physicality. You could really get a nice belt on it, and it always came back for more. Try as I would, I could never reduce it to matchwood This is what I believe I would miss on a DP.
I find it very hard to believe that listening over headphones to one's own rendition of, say, the march from Schumann's Fantasy in C, can send tingles from head to toe, as it does when one lets it rip on a concert grand. But then, I'm an old fart.
If DP's are as good as posters in this thread suggest, then I suppose the physical instrument will die out. Well, if the piano, then why not every other physical instrument as well? None has a wave-form as complex as a piano. Why, for heaven's sake, risk a heart attack trying to make a reed vibrate when one can get the same sound and timbre by pressing a key?
I own/play a Yamaha P-80. I have a good amplifier, and decent headphones.
When I only play the DP for a while (I don't own an acoustic piano, but that's another story), it sounds fine.
Then when I sit down at a well made grand (Mason & Hamlin, Steinway, Estonia, Bluthner, etc.) I realize once again the severe limitations of the DP.
I'm game to try the newer models (I go back to the days of ARP, Moog, Fairchild, etc.), but for all the reasons already mentioned in this thread, I find it difficult to believe a DP can accurately replace a fine acoustic grand in touch and/or the subtleties of tone (harmonics, overtones, etc.).
But, as I said, point me to the ones you believe are up to it and I'm more than happy to give them a try, and come back to talk about them on PW.
My Keyboards: Estonia L-190, Roland RD88, Yamaha P-80, Bilhorn Telescope Organ c 1880, Antique Pump Organ, 1850 concertina, 3 other digital pianos ------------------------- My original piece on BandCamp: https://frankbaxtermrpianoworld.bandcamp.com/releases
Me banging out some tunes in the Estonia piano booth at the NAMM show...
RRB, you're not understand my intent exactly (and it has nothing to do with what I think), my point was that if a listener can't tell the difference (i.e. identify the digital piano vs the acoustic piano) in a "blind" listening test, then there IS no difference.
It's called the 'Turing Test', after Alan Turing who suggested it, and has been attempted repeatedly. I'm not up on the latest AI literature, but my belief is that no machine has yet 'passed'.
Not to drift too far off topic, but there have been many agents to pass the Turing test in individual cases. It's largely a function of the person trying to make the decision between AI and human, which is why it's more useful as motivation for AI research than as a concrete measure of AI.
Ironically, you can say the same thing about the "Kenny test"
my point was that if a listener can't tell the difference...in a "blind" listening test, then there IS no difference.
What sort of listener? You can't mean any listener, as that would have to include someone who couldn't distinguish a flute from an oboe. So you must mean an informed, experienced listener. But how experienced? Where does it end?
Or perhaps you meant if a listener can't tell the difference then for that listener there's no difference. I'll grant you that . However, that's not the same as saying there IS no difference (implying, none exists, no-one would be able to hear it).
Not to drift too far off topic, but there have been many agents to pass the Turing test in individual cases.
That's a problem I've always had with this 'test'. I've been fooled myself by AI software, for one minute. Where does one draw the line? Who decides how the 'conversation' should proceed? What the heck is intelligence, anyway? Does the software have to be able to conduct a dialogue on Shakespeare's plays, or the late string quartets of Beethoven?
I hate it when people say it's ONLY AN IMITATION of an acoustic. The fact is that it's an instrument in it's own right that one of it's features is that it just happens to be able to duplicate the characteristics of an acoustic piano.
"...just happens..."?!?!? As far as I know, it is the only reason they even exist.
Quote
The second part of this is as far as sound production I disagree with completely and that as much a reason it hasn't been brought up as any.
Huh?
Quote
The reproduction of sound is quite complex and constantly evolving. Do you listen to the radio? To a CD Player? An IPOD? All these devices are intended to store and reproduce the complex sounds of music and most people seem satisfied with the results.
Most people aren't classical musicians who work with acoustic instruments. But anyway, people generally don't mistake the real sound of a full orchestra in a concert hall for what comes out of speakers. Or even a pipe organ.
Quote
A digital piano has some extremely complex sound modeling and creation software that attempts to duplicate that complex set of sounds generated by an acoustic piano. Is it perfect? (see above)
Sound waves are sound waves - vibrations in the air. If a piece of technology can recreate or reproduce those same vibrations in the air our ears and brains can't tell the difference. A book I'm currently reading gets into a lot of this kind of discussion: "This is your brain on music" by Daniel J. Levitin.
There is no piece of technology that can reproduce the sound waves produced by my piano when I play it, in the space in which it is located. That is physically impossible at this point.
Quote
I don't know if this experiment has ever been done, but there is an experiment in the computer artificial intelligence community where a person types questions to be answered by the "person" on the other end and then makes a determination of whether that person is a real person or a computer program. Maybe the manufacturers need to do a similar experiment (and maybe they do) with their high-end digital pianos vs acoustic pianos. Is it real or is it digital?
I can't imagine why they'd waste the money. It's absurd to think that most classical players who are accustomed to grands wouldn't be able to tell the difference between playing a grand with the lid up and playing a DP.
RRB, you're not understand my intent exactly (and it has nothing to do with what I think), my point was that if a listener can't tell the difference (i.e. identify the digital piano vs the acoustic piano) in a "blind" listening test, then there IS no difference.
I recall a famous response to some question that went something like: "It all depends what you mean by 'is'".
There 'is' no difference for that listener, but who cares unless it's you?
An objective definition of 'is' would involve a study of the time dependent sound spectra of the various instruments playing pieces that cover the range of sounds achievable by a pianist. It's an easy experiment, but rather pointless.
Since I seem to have misunderstood you, let me state my own opinion clearly. This is that, as each piano is an instrument unto itself -- some folk prefer Steinway, others Yamaha, Boesendoefer etc. -- so is each DP. If someone prefers listening to, or playing a DP that's fine with me.
I've stated what I think I would have missed if I'd spent my life playing DP's, and that's all I have to say on the subject.
Just as a matter of interest (I apologize, we are way off topic), I do wish you would not use the phrase 'acoustic piano'. A DP generates sound and so is as 'acoustic' as a piano. So, please, why not just 'piano', and 'digital piano'?
The only thing that in my opinion favours the growth of dp s is price, size, and the possibility of playing it with headphones. Acoustics are very inconvenient; they're heavy, thus expensive to move around, take up quite a bit of space, and very noisy, out ofthe question if you live in a small apartment. Silent sysetms i think will eventually be cheaper. I'm in the market for an upright and i don't get why a 4000 eur piano costs an additional 25% with silent included. Anyway, it's the convenience of a decent reproduction of piano touch and tone in a cheaper , lighter instrument that makes dp s popular. But in terms of sound quality, there is just no discussion. Dp s are not even close to the real thing. Plus they need to be amplified, which an acoustic does not.
It's like comparing a Hyundai and a Ferrari. Both do the job, but they're not quite the same thing , are they.
It's called the 'Turing Test', after Alan Turing who suggested it, and has been attempted repeatedly. I'm not up on the latest AI literature, but my belief is that no machine has yet 'passed'.
Not to drift too far off topic, but there have been many agents to pass the Turing test in individual cases. It's largely a function of the person trying to make the decision between AI and human, which is why it's more useful as motivation for AI research than as a concrete measure of AI.
Ironically, you can say the same thing about the "Kenny test"
my point was that if a listener can't tell the difference (i.e. identify the digital piano vs the acoustic piano) in a "blind" listening test, then there IS no difference.
Quick question: Is this a test where a person is in the room listening to a DP and then an AP actually being played? Or are we talking about a recording of each? If the latter, the sound has already been changed.
It's called the 'Turing Test', after Alan Turing who suggested it, and has been attempted repeatedly. I'm not up on the latest AI literature, but my belief is that no machine has yet 'passed'.
Not to drift too far off topic, but there have been many agents to pass the Turing test in individual cases. It's largely a function of the person trying to make the decision between AI and human, which is why it's more useful as motivation for AI research than as a concrete measure of AI.
Ironically, you can say the same thing about the "Kenny test"
That's the Chaffin Test to you buddy!
Hey, how about the Moores test?: If at some point blindfolded top-flight pianists can't tell the difference between the best DP and a concert grand by playing them, then we have a difference that is no longer a difference. (from a post of mine from long ago in a different thread)
This is what I believe I would miss on a DP.
