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The CP4 Stage as the new replacement for the CP5 has added, for the sake of increased realism, artifacts from the acoustic piano world, such as the let-off notch and the graded key weight.

Question: Do YOU welcome the increased realism OR
Do YOU think that DPs can be better than APs without those artifacts?

The question is meant to be broad, the CP4 Stage vs CP5 is merely an example.

I think DP's have some way to go before those questions become interesting. But I'm more pragmatic than some people.

Excellent question. I guess in my opinion it depends on how difficult it is to transition back to the acoustic after playing on the digital. For example, I find that playing on a digital (without letoff simulation) doesn't make it particularly more difficult to play an acoustic (which does have this). That is, I think the letoff friction makes playing more difficult, but it's not something I need to train on to be used to on an acoustic. For that reason I think it can be left out.

On the other hand, I kind of think the grading is important. On an acoustic you can tinkle out high notes very quickly and with little effort while the lowest notes require quite a strong hand. While this may not be a good thing, I think it's something the pianist needs to be accustomed to. I sometimes find myself playing high notes too heavily on acoustics because acoustics are graded more strongly than graded digitals. All digital pianos seem to have unnaturally heavy keys on the extreme right hand.

One artifact that I would like but that is not emulated in any digital or hybrid I know of is the fact that playing with the pedal down requires less force (because you don't need to lift the dampers) than playing with the pedal released. I wish digitals had that, but I realize it's a hard thing. As it is it seems that most of them emulate the heavier weight of the released pedal, which is why they tend to be on the heavy side. Excellent for Bach. Not so much for more modern stuff.

TLDR: I like grading but I don't like letoff simulation.

The pursuit of increased realism is nonsensical because digitals are played at a greatly decreased volume of sound because thats why most people buy them in the first place...to not disturb neighbors.

For example, even with headphones, the noise of keys bottoming can be so audible that even the neighbors won't put up with that.

This constraint alone kills the pursuit of realism.

The latter.


Hear, hear!

I would like that when you play a glissando fast and soft, the DP sounded, as in an AP, which sounds even if the key does not move down more than a couple of milimeters...
Would it be possible if DPs used optical sensor instead of rubber switches?

The normal optical sensors that we see in, for example, the AvantGrands are essentially beams that get broken when the hammers pass through them. In the sense that interests you, they are pretty much equivalent to the electromechanical sensors in typical digital pianos.

The actual issue is not the sensors but the hammers. When you play a fast gliss and make sounds without pushing the keys all the way down it is because the hammers had enough momentum that they popped all the way up. Digital pianos also have hammers but they don't seem to be as completely free swinging as their acoustic counterparts. I'm not sure what the underlying cause is, but inasmuch as there is a difference in this respect, I'm confident that it is the physical mechanism of the key and hammer, not the sensor, that is to blame.

BTW it would be technically feasible to build a sensor that continuously measured position and calculated whether a hammer would pop up (aftermarket midi strips calculate how much light is reflected off the bottom of the keys but they don't do anything as smart as what I just suggested). I just don't think that type of sensor/computer is cost-effective. Or perhaps the manufacturers don't see it as necessary.

I thought at first that you meant sound artifacts. Re-reading, I think you're referring to tactile artifacts.

I think they're probably necessary. There's always some chance you'll want to play accoustic pianos as well as digitals. And after a couple of hundred years of tinkering with the mechanism, we can probably assume that the feel and the feedback work.

If you did mean sound artifacts, there are pros and cons. I would imagine that some noises are by-products of the mechanism and getting rid of them would be fine. (The whispering noise as the felt of the V-shaped dampers come out from between strings irritates me, for example.) On the other hand, there are noises that are part of the piano's sound and we would miss them. I think of the Hammond tonewheel organ, for example, where the engineers tried for years to get rid of some of the artifacts like the click, only to find that that was an essential part of the Hammond sound for most people.

The biggest artifact would be greatly increased middle frequencies; acoustics tend to have this when you`re close to them. Like, playing. If any DP manufacturer set up a digital in like manner, sales would drop I imagine.

I suppose an external amplification system would be better, or an in built graphic equalizer like Pianoteq has. Then you can decide . .

I’m highly suspicious of letoff simulation. I believe it can only be a technical hazard for the broad majority of keyboard players and even those who aspire to a high level of skill. If that turns out to be the case then all I can see here is a coterie of market leaders trumpeting the drive for traditionalism in an effort to seduce market demand by fostering a naive notion that ‘authenticity’ can only be a good thing . Once that demand has been nurtured, it’s going to be difficult for a manufacture to persuade its clientele that by giving you less, by taking features out, you’re getting something better. That’s where we are with letoff.

More than anything else I would like to see a body of evidence – verifiable, not anecdotal – that letoff simulation is an asset in a DP piano action (I realise there's no current alternative in an AP). Until then, IMHO, the only beneficiaries are those few pros who routinely find themselves having to perform on APs and who want their DP practise sessions to feel as similar as possible. In the age of Youtube and E-citals where ever more performances are delivered on ever-improving DPs - excellent in their own right – it looks like we might be catering for an ever-diminishing minority.

If so, the market tail is wagging the market dog.

+1, especially the part about action being lighter when damper pedal is pressed. This is actually rather important aspect of AP action, certainly more perceivable than let-off. I suspect this is partly the reason why I overpedal on acoustics.

Actually, I rather think that it's more likely that because your DP doesn't sustain anything like an acoustic, you over-pedal on acoustics.

I certainly find that I can get away with all sorts of pedalling sins on most DPs that I can't on acoustics - I can even keep my right foot down all through the first movement of Beethoven's Moonlight (which is actually what the composer requests - though admittedly his period Broadwood had poor sustain. Like most present-day DPs....). On my V-Piano, I have to dial the decay time to +60 to simulate the level of sustain similar to that of a small grand, and +70 for a concert grand.

Yamaha has finally seen sense - and realized that many people who play DPs also play on acoustics.

As I've said before, if you never play on real pianos, you'd do away with grading and let-off, and lighten the key weight loads........which is similar to what you'd get in cheap keyboards, come to think about it.

But if you have any aspirations at all of playing on real pianos, you'd want as many of the so-called artefacts built into the action as possible. The sideways-shifting of the keyboard when the una corda pedal is depressed obviously isn't possible, nor the lightening of keyweight when the sustain is depressed.

But the grading is so variable on acoustics that it's the one artefact that I believe is unnecessary, because on acoustic pianos, the better the piano, the less the grading in general. I hardly notice it on a Fazioli concert grand, but it's very evident (and obtrusive) on a Yamaha baby grand that I once played.

It is strange to me how there is an assumption that an, "acoustic", indeed, ANY "acoustic" is superior to any digital, for me that is not the case, and I have the upright acoustic Hirsch piano to prove it.

There is a difference in acoustic pianos. For example, an upright does not have the same feel as a grand.
With the realism of modern digitals I think that a good digital is not worse than an upright, just different. In many cases, my own included, the digital is vastly better.

There are so many terrible upright and grand acoustic pianos around the world and people still play them.

To an extend any inability to adapt between the different types is down as much to poor pianist ability of the performer as it is to a difference in keyboard response.

I agree, though I see fake letoff as less of a technical hazard, and more of just guys sitting around the lab, instructed by their PHB to spitball ways to make the key mechanism more "realistic" when a bulb goes off and one of them (let's call him Moe) says "hey, we can easily put a $0.02 little rubber thingie in there you can barely feel" whereupon Larry goes to fetch the 20 gallon bucket of key grease and Curly is off waking up marketing.

Same with key weight grading, in most DPs it isn't nearly as prominent as in a real life, which is a good thing because I see these practices as something of a glass half empty. I don't see this ending well - at this rate we'll soon be forced to own DPs with slightly unlevel, warped, scraping, yellowed keys.

Sonically, I'd like more realistic variation from DPs. But when it comes to the keys, uniformity of action and lack of friction strike me as good goals, and both of these are undermined by IMO dubious marketing practices. Why can't the stooges be working on getting us better sound?

Yes, that's what I've implied in my posts here (and even in Pianist Corner ) several times. I've berated my childhood Yamaha vertical often enough - OK, I did get to ABRSM Grade 4 on it before I went on to better pianos in another part of the world, but last time I paid a visit, it really was as bad as I remembered, with brittle and almost unvarying tone and keys that kept sticking: my DP is miles better in every aspect.

I've also said often enough that any serious pianist need to be able to adapt to any action (yes, even a harpsichord or clavichord or pipe organ ), and it seems odd to me that some people think there is such a thing as the perfect action. Spend an hour in a big piano showroom, and you'll find all sorts. And if that showroom has reconditioned as well as new pianos, and uprights as well as grands, you'll have a field day...

But what cannot be denied is that common to all of them is that escapement 'notch' feel, and if that causes a problem with your technique when playing softly and slowly, you'll never be able to play on any acoustic satisfactorily. Which is why I've never understood why Yamaha abandoned it on its Clavinovas until reinstating it (apparently - I've not seen it myself) on their latest model.

Is the hammer itself an artifact?

The hammer was needed for mechanical sound generation. But the hammer is not needed for electronic sound generation. A counterweight would do. With 2, 3, or more sensors.

Yes, and no DP has hammers except for the AGs and NU1. In those Yamahas, the hammers have nothing to hit.....

I wouldn't say that. It doesn't look like a regular hammer, but all hammer action digital pianos I've seen have hammers. Anything with a counterweight that's not rigidly attached to the key is a hammer in my book.

It is odd that those Yamaha hammers don't hit anything, though. I guess they have their reasons.

I can easily imagine that