I've played a lot of keyboards and the sounds are great, especially the bass, but the expressive touch is a joke. It doesn't come close to an acoustic piano... David Ilvedson, RPT Pacifica, CA 94044 Original message From: "Leslie Bartlett" To: pianotech at ptg.org Received: 1/5/2007 6:10:22 PM Subject: FW: electronics replacing pianos? Danny was ptg for several years, but living nearly a hundred miles from the chapter, and now working more in sound and electronics, is no longer active. but I sent him the thing below, and he offered his reply. His email is below if you wish to respond to his viewpoints. I'm not smart enough to know. les bartlett From: Danny Moore [mailto:catalinasound at sbcglobal.net] Sent: Friday, January 05, 2007 7:21 PM To: l-bartlett at sbcglobal.net Subject: RE: electronics replacing pianos? There are a couple of things that always strike me as peculiar any time this discussion comes up. First, digital recording and current “high-end” microphone technology will certainly capture anything and everything that even the finest piano can produce. Many of the big guys are using 24-bit depth at 192 KHz sample rate. That’s a faithful reproduction of 96,000 hz and a noise floor greater than -96 db – what’s that, the 28th partial of C8? Our hearing peaks out around 20K if we’re young and haven’t spent the last 35 years playing in rock bands. Second, when we say that digital pianos don’t sound as good as the real thing, let’s compare apples to apples. We invariably make that comparison to a S&S B or D, or perhaps a Kawai EX at a price point of over $100,000. Perhaps they don’t even sound as good as a Yamaha C3, but that’s still over $30,000. Let’s take that “professional level” Roland RD700SX at $2195 or a Yamaha CP300 at $2195 and see how they stack up. They sound far better than a used spinet or even a new Pearl River vertical at the same price. In fact, they sound considerably better than a Samick SIG57 5’ 7” grand at over $14,000. Let’s face it, there are many, many brand new pianos out there, vertical and grand, that cost $20,000 and more that won’t compare in sound or touch to one of the $2K pro electronic keyboards. (Not to mention that you can move it from venue to venue and it’s still in tune.) Finally, the most baffling thing to me is, with all the wonderful and very expensive technology out there, the record (OK, Compact Disc) buying public out there demands their sound. After spending $3,800 EACH for a coincident pair of Neumann U87 Ai microphones, they run them through Rupert Neve equalizers, Manley compressors and every other high-end signal processor available to compress and change the sound to what the public demands – a $2,000 electronic keyboard! I submit to you that the problem is not with digital instruments or poor recording techniques but with the general public and popular culture. The masses only know what they know – that is, old spinets in parents’ living rooms and Sunday school classrooms that didn’t sound good or play well when they were purchased in 1955 and haven’t been tuned since. Popular culture doesn’t demand the subtleties of a Fazioli, they just want to hear music that they like, be it classical or country, and record label executives are happy to give them what they want. Case in point: Who decided that young, urban black people like rap? The people who make large bucks off of young urban black people, that’s who! People like what they are fed with no regard for what is “good” or “tasteful” or “artistic.” Or consider this . . . after spending the zillions of bucks to capture that 6-figure piano on those $3,800 microphones with the absolute best and most expensive technology available, we take the impeccably done recording, compress it to MP3 (which literally deletes 80% of the audio data) and listen to it on an iPod through ear buds! You’re welcome to share my point of view if you think anyone is interested or you may just hit Delete. Later, Danny -----Original Message----- From: Leslie Bartlett [mailto:l-bartlett at sbcglobal.net] Sent: Friday, January 05, 2007 5:13 PM To: Danny Moore Subject: FW: electronics replacing pianos? From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of reggaepass at aol.com Sent: Friday, January 05, 2007 7:21 AM To: pianotech at ptg.org Subject: Re: electronics replacing pianos? ..and the piano seems to be one of the hardest instruments to faithfully reproduce through recording, if not the hardest. Any thoughts as to why that is? Alan Eder -----Original Message----- What they ultimately proved is that no matter how good the recording and the playback systems, there is always some extra lows and some extra highs and some extra nuance that just plain won't record or playback. I think the same holds true for even the high-end sampled electronic pianos today. They do sound pretty darn good, but they don't really sound real. And I don't think that they will be able to reproduce a real enough sound from an electronic device anytime soon enough for it to effect many of us. -- Geoff Sykes -- Assoc. Los Angeles Check out the new AOL. Most comprehensive set of free safety and security tools, free access to millions of high-quality videos from across the web, free AOL Mail and more. -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.432 / Virus Database: 268.16.6/617 - Release Date: 01/05/2007 11:11 AM -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.432 / Virus Database: 268.16.6/617 - Release Date: 01/05/2007 11:11 AM -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.432 / Virus Database: 268.16.6/617 - Release Date: 01/05/2007 11:11 AM -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.432 / Virus Database: 268.16.6/617 - Release Date: 01/05/2007 11:11 AM -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/20070105/f6cc5bff/attachment-0001.html
This PTG archive page provided courtesy of Moy Piano Service, LLC