Electronic keyboards

[Dave2002]

Do electronic keyboards have a serious role in music teaching? I suspect they do.

Anyone here own up to having one, or access to one?

[Joseph K]

They definitely do. At least a small electronic keyboard is indispensable for learning harmony without spending loads and needing the space for an actual piano.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

They can be useful, as can other instruments, but for many, they are crappy little toys with a demo button.

[Dave2002]

for many, they are crappy little toys with a demo button.

Pity really, as even some of the relatively simple ones have amazingly good technology inside them.

[rauschwerk]

I have taught electronic instruments (organ and keyboard) for about 25 years. Keyboards were really primitive when I started out, but now the better manufacturers offer some really decent instruments. I teach to the Trinity exam syllabus which encourages students to play piano style and therefore read bass as well as treble clef.

[MrGongGong]

This is what you need

[Dave2002]

This is what you need

What is that one?

[Constantbee]

Do electronic keyboards have a serious role in music teaching? I suspect they do.

Anyone here own up to having one, or access to one?

Highly recommended either as a preparation for something bigger, or in its own right. Keyboards have their own repertoire these days. I use a Yamaha 220 which is small and light and runs on mains or batteries. A plug in sustain pedal is useful as an accessory, to get used to the idea of pedalling. I'm looking for a portable amp at the moment.

[MrGongGong]

What is that one?

ARP 2600

I've wanted one of these for a long time

[Dave2002]

ARP 2600

I've wanted one of these for a long time

This seems like the beginning of a quiz. Picture round. I’m not doing well.

What is this one?

What’s special, and why do you want one?

[MrGongGong]

This seems like the beginning of a quiz. Picture round. I’m not doing well.

What is this one?

What’s special, and why do you want one?

It's a Buchla 200 series
his instruments are quite rare and have a very different way of generating and modulating the sounds than others. This one was developed with Morton Subotnick

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I could do with one that feels like a piano, but is battery operated for busking.

All suggestions welcome.

[Richard Barrett]

ARP 2600

You can get a very nice virtual ARP2600 from Arturia for the fraction of the cost of a real one. I made this entirely with it, although actually the keyboard wasn't employed at all:

https://soundcloud.com/r-barrett/disquiet-2018-electronic-music-originally-in-8-channels

Never having had my hands on the actual product I'm not sure how accurate the emulation is, although I rapidly homed in on setting up sounds and textures based on instabilities that cause them to change in a slow and irregular sort of way which I would associate with analogue circuitry.

Their virtual Buchla Easel is even better - you don't need that System 101 after all.

I've owned, among others, a Roland Jupiter-4, an Ensoniq EPS-16 and a Kurzweil K2500 over the years (although for the past 20 years or so my keyboards as such have just been controllers for computer software). All of these were, for their time, highly sophisticated instruments with possibilities far beyond the commercial priorities of their design.

As for educational purposes, well yes, as Joseph says, they're extremely useful in such situations, you can for example have a whole classroom full of them with one for every student, using headphones so that nobody disturbs anyone else, which is a much more hands-on way to learn about harmony etc. than the traditional more theoretical approach.

[Dave2002]

I could do with one that feels like a piano, but is battery operated for busking.

All suggestions welcome.

I think that’s a bit tough. For a bit more than £1000 (maybe £1400) some of the Roland portable pianos sound good, and have touch sensitive keys, but I don’t know if they have a convenient battery power provision.

There may be external battery systems which can provide power, but could be heavy. Ideally one would hope for a low voltage source which could feed straight into a portable device, otherwise an inverter would be needed to generate mains voltage. I think there should be an instrument with the features you want, but I don’t know how to find one.

If you don’t mind a noisy accompaniment, you could buy a generator

[Joseph K]

You can get a very nice virtual ARP2600 from Arturia for the fraction of the cost of a real one. I made this entirely with it, although actually the keyboard wasn't employed at all:

https://soundcloud.com/r-barrett/disquiet-2018-electronic-music-originally-in-8-channels

Never having had my hands on the actual product I'm not sure how accurate the emulation is, although I rapidly homed in on setting up sounds and textures based on instabilities that cause them to change in a slow and irregular sort of way which I would associate with analogue circuitry.

Their virtual Buchla Easel is even better - you don't need that System 101 after all.

I've owned, among others, a Roland Jupiter-4, an Ensoniq EPS-16 and a Kurzweil K2500 over the years (although for the past 20 years or so my keyboards as such have just been controllers for computer software). All of these were, for their time, highly sophisticated instruments with possibilities far beyond the commercial priorities of their design.

As for educational purposes, well yes, as Joseph says, they're extremely useful in such situations, you can for example have a whole classroom full of them with one for every student, using headphones so that nobody disturbs anyone else, which is a much more hands-on way to learn about harmony etc. than the traditional more theoretical approach.

That's a good composition! Thanks for the info.