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It makes me wonder, what the producers of digital pianos can offer in the future, so maybe you will share some of your ideas (or knowledge?). I know that producers don't share information about future products, but we have our needs, dreams, expectations... so?

The main difficulty is to achieve sound and feel as close as possible to a real thing. Some of us claim that top models are great and completely enough, some of us claim that they are still far away from sound and feel of actual grand.
I hope mechanics of the keyboards can be significantly improved, but it will not change completely; I'm sure we are slowly getting closer to humans invention and available materials border. If we are talking about the speakers, we are bordered by the size and weight of them, so no miracles expected.

I think most of changes we will see in electronics: maybe they will spend more and more energy on sampling, so they will offer 10 or even 15 layers, much more string resonance samples etc. So the memory of our pianos will be expressed in more and more gigabytes? Of course, the interaction between strings is impossible to sample in every combination (or maybe it is?), so more and more advanced mathematical models will appear. I hope the sound will be more and more realistic, so that recognizing what sort of instrument was used (real or digital) on solo piano album will be impossible for most musicians. Is it possible? Or maybe you think it will be always far away?

I suppose the way pianos look won't change very much - it's obvious. Adding some LCD or plasma screen will be a standard, I think the producers will offer us a bigger numbers. Polyphony - 512 or even 1024. Tens of thousands of sounds on synthesizers like Fantom or Motif (who will have time to listen all of them?), and about thousand of sounds and thousand of accompaniments on top stage pianos. For 1000$ we will be able to buy an instrument with better quality than today top models, so budget pianos will be more and more friendly; only thing can stop this possibility is strategy of producers, who will save the best technologies only for the more expensive models to maximize gains. Price of top models shouldn't be much bigger compared to the present.
I think the more electronics is the bigger weight, specially in the first years inventions appear. As time goes by, it should be more and more lighter, until weight of the keyboard and it's mechanism is only border.

Sounds of e.pianos and organs should be perfect (it's already very good on Clavia's instruments), but there will be major difficulty in sampling orchestra instruments: they will sound extremely realistic (again, hard to recognize on CD), but I think it won't be ideal.

Maybe my numbers are unrealistic? I am too optimistic? You have great knowledge and experience, so share!

I think we might be surprised how realistic it can get one day in not so distant future.

I believe the road to the future is in mathematical models and not sampling - even 20 layers of sampling can't give the real feel.

The true difference in touch, legato, volume, sympathetic resonance, attack and other factors.

The problem is I am afraid even mathematical models can't give us that much as long, as the only input from keyboard will be MIDI velocity we know today. There are limitless possibilities of hammer strokes giving the same volume (and therefore - represented by the same MIDI velocity from the keyboard) but different sound.

I find it very difficult to really enjoy Debussy or Ravel on digital pianos, because most of the subtleties of touch are gone.

I wonder how good are Disklavier pianos with true grand piano action and digital sound - I have never played them.


M.

Great topic Kiedysktos,

I wonder if Yamaha, Roland, or Kawai might find it simpler and more cost effective to license the products of Galaxy, Ivory, or some of the other independents and then pre-load them into their pianos. In the case of Yamaha, I would suppose buying one or more of the small independents outright could be a possibility. Can you imagine a menu of Fazioli, Steinway, and Bosendorfer on demand inside your digital without the interface loop. I could sure go for that!

Myself and a friend of mine have had this exact same discussion the last 3 years walking around NAMM and seeing the same old same old.

They would have to make the sample fatter for live use. That shouldn't be a problem you'd think with all the "tech heads" they pay to develop new products at Yamaha, Roland, Kurzweil, etc.

I'd think it would only take one company, probably Yamaha, since they probably have the most dough to put into R&D, to put a DP out with this technology. Others would follow suit.
The action would still be one main issue but it certainly would improve upon things has they stand now.

I suppose Roland could be the first. Yamaha has no interest in selling pianos that are not sampled from their own acoustics.

I am afraid there would be many law problems involved in using sampled pianos of other brands and using their names.


M.

If DPs could be made to REALLY sound and feel like a piano, I think the piano manufacturers would have a problem, wouldn't they?

Yamaha might be reluctant to sell such a DP, risking loss of piano sales to the lower cost DPs.

Roland would have no such problem, of course.

As for libraries, I agree with turnadot:
Me too! Or, forget about the licensing ... Yam/Rol/Kawai could produce their own libraries.

I don't know how many of you have tried the HP207 or Yamaha CLP380 but, in my opinion, they are getting close. Maybe not close to the high end Steinways or other top grands but the CLP380 today felt and sounded better than the low end acoustics. This is just my opinion so please don't flame me out.

from whitj No reason for anyone to flame you out whitj. There are many great boards on the market and many happy owners, but one can always wish for more...especially after living with one sample set for a year or two.

Dave Ferriss posted on another thread that he chose a Yamaha because it was a better role player in ensemble gigs. He also mentioned that the Roland's warmer tone might make it a better choice for solo work. I think that's true especially in smaller more intimate settings. Now if Dave could have both (or more} on tap in one board, that would be peachy.

from Mati
I've wondered about that myself. I don't think it's an insurmountable problem. Galaxy can label its sample 'Steinway' even though Garritan is the official 'Steinway' software library. Ditto Ivory. On the other hand, I've read that Ivory uses 'Ivory Italian Grand' instead of Ivory Fazioli for legal reasons. I hear lots of chatter about Roland's Superior Grand being a sampled Steinway but I have yet to read any official statement from Roland saying that. Whatever the difficulties, I'm sure money would take care of them.

From what I understand Yamaha could license an independent Bosendorfer library without legal complications (unless it wanted to sue itself }

I think you are right, guys. There are many good samples available on our computers, like software pianos, or even other sounds, like VST plug-ins which represent also other instruments samples - they are already used in many studios. (but of course not for making classical music)

So maybe our onboard minicomputers will be more like our computers? Easy re-programmable? Clavia allow their users to freely download their new released sampled and load it into dp using USB. In the next years our interfaces should be more like those in modern cell phones, so maybe there will be even some version of windows?
Of course different brands means different sample formats, so I don't prepare for easy switching between them.

They have no option we can already see, that many of us would buy an actual piano, if there were no DP's. But it doesn't stop Yamaha competing: they would rather sell digital instruments than none

The digital piano of the future will be the ability to teleport a Steinway concert grand.

The DP designer's problem is they're attempting to make a cheap copy of a piano. Guys, think out of the box! (you don't need keys for a start)

This is true. You don't need to accept as fact that any given acoustic or acoustic pianos in general are the be-all end-all of musical keyboard sounds. I think Roland's various current generation pianos reveal that while they may have initiated from a sample, Roland is more into enhancement of the core sample than Yamaha or Kawai. This is probably for the reason already stated...that Roland has no acoustic to peddle among its products.

But if by "outside the box" you're referring to modeling rather than sampling, to me the software from modeling doesn't stack up against the software from sampling, at least yet. And I'm not rating it for accuracy in replicating an acoustic, just for its musical appeal.

Musical appeal as a piano.

But the resulting instruments couldn't be called a "digital piano." DPs are what they are because of demand. There is a market for for very small instruments that feel like a real piano. I know I don't want to have to deal with the weight and constant tuning of a real piano, so I prefer a digital. One benefit to me is that when I sit down in front of a real piano, it won't feel so foreign to me. That couldn't be said if you were practicing on an instrument without keys.

Any instrument built without keys simply can NOT be called a digital piano by its very definition. I just googled the definition of "piano" and this was the first result:

"a keyboard instrument that is played by depressing keys that cause hammers to strike tuned strings and produce sounds."

You're talking about a completely different instrument. That's fine, but it won't fit the market's demand for what we now know as a digital piano.

Max.

No, no, no. Musical appeal as music! I really don't know where you're going with the idea of a keyboard without keys. Thinking outsdide the box is one thing, but thinking outside of the category is another. How about a pan flute that sounds like a kettle drum?

Why don't you say what you want from a digital piano of the future?

A different or even better sound than a piano and keys that don't need moving.

They have already
built the digital
piano of the future.
It is called the
Williams Encore and
you can buy it sight
unseen online for
about $500 US dollars!
I see no problem with
buying sight-unseen
online as long as it's
with established retailers
because they are careful
to only stock
good-quality instruments.

Sorry to hijack the thread. I just couldn't resist.

...And now back to your regularly scheduled programming...

But Keyboardkluzt, the future is already here:

https://www.buythepiano.com/vcc/allstar/giovanni/460803/

Seriously, the only thing I see in the near future of digital pianos is subtle changes and bells and whistles.

A company did make a digital that was based off a full piano action. How much closer to the real thing could you get? As far as I know, it did not sell very well or was too expensive and I think it is no longer being made.

Rich

I see you are rather pessimistic Maybe I'm too optimistic from the other hand, but just look at the changes on the market in the last few years; keyboards, sounds, user friendly facilities - also look at the development of software pianos. Also, look at our needs. If there is demand, adequate supply should appear.

Which company do you mean?

My opinion is different to the Mati's, I think the future is in advanced multi-gigabytes sampling, supported by mathematical models, specially in resonance issue. Pure-mathematically made piano sound could be very playable, but I don't think it can give us true sound of living grand piano.