Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Digital Pianos - Electronic Pianos - Synths & Keyboards The digital piano sound is really boring .....

Well having a library of different piano samples is of course an option but wouldn't it be nice if all of the pianos in your library very slowly drift out of tune over time so that each experience is a new one?

I think not. I haven't chimed in before because obviously people posting in this thread don't agree with me, but in my opinion it's crazy to want a piano to go out of tune in any degree, ever (detuning for saloon effect is different, and is valid). Getting a different timbre by loading up a different library is a genuine improvement and gives real variety, but emulating weaknesses of acoustics like going out of tune is, to me, an unambiguously bad thing.

this whole discussion reminds me of people that add digital noise to digital photography to get that grainy film look... I'm not saying this is wrong or not but it's the same situation: Trying to emulate a 'weakness' from an 'old' medium.

I tend to agree. I don't think looking for random changes in a piano sound from day to day is the answer to the boredom factor. Keeping your practice and musical selections interesting and varied is the main weapon against that sentiment. I don't think anyone with a well tuned acoustic piano would wish for that tuning to drift - it's both expensive, irritating and detrimental to performance. If you practice something to sound a specific way, the last thing you want is random changes that affect the interpretation you've worked so hard to realise.

In short, I don't accept the premise that it's the random changes that keeps you interested in a piano's sound. What you need first and foremost is a piano sound that is rich and complete enough to satisfy you and fits well with the music you play. If it doesn't, you can use different sample sets via PC, or the different pianos stored in your DP. Playing variously detuned pianos doesn't fit the bill in terms of quality. The random tuning changes have more potential to irritate than titillate. If you have a bad tuning day, you won't enjoy your practice at all.

People wanting their DP to go out of tune, that to me can only mean one thing: DP's still cannot provide the rich experience that a real acoustic can. The result is people striving to make their DP's more realistic and falsely assuming that the detuning of acoustics is something desirable, which of course it isn't. There are other qualities in an acoustic to strive for, but it going out of tune is certainly not one of them.

Please, don't generalize

No, it would be terrible. I bought a digital piano in part because my upright would go out of tune, with awful results. Problem solved.

I would restate your idea as "Wouldn't it be great if a piano never went out of tune?" Yes, it's called a digital piano.

But, if you really want detuning ... some piano libraries have a "chorus" setting, adjustable from just-a-little to grotequely-much". Have at it.

I agree that 'random' changes are not the answer, and yet I find that my AP is not always exactly the same instrument, but seems to respond and sound differently every day , in a coherent (as opposed to random) and yet unpredictable way, and that's one of the things that makes playing on a real piano more challenging and interesting.

Often when the day before I have experienced a beautiful singing tone when playing a piece, maybe because my hands were warm and supple or I was more relaxed or more "into" the music, I have some expectation when I sit to play - but - it's not usually the same experience and I have maybe to make more effort to get to the same point or I have to touch the keyboard differently.

In my experience a good AP responds in a subtle way to the player's state and this does keep things interesting and alive. For example a different touch can create a different sound or a different overall impression on an AP and that's something that is not possible on a DP, although some of them offer more variety than others.

It's also true though that this is only part of the whole experience of playing and when you are really interested in a piece any keyboard shaped instrument will do.