Fans of Roland

TC3 · 2024-06-01T01:10:31+00:00

Since Yamaha and Kawai have their own threads already. 🙂 Who all owns and plays Rolands?

Bellyman

Thanks, TC! I appreciate reading your thoughts.

Lots of stuff out there to look at. Some with decent reviews, some not so great. And some that fit certain players better than others.

Had seen the ES120 and the ES520, but I had wondered whether I would be satisfied with that action. The ES920 steps up to the next level of actions, along with a step up in weight and a step up in price. I guess no getting around that.

Dunno, still on the fence. Gonna tear the Casio apart and see what's going on with it if I can, over the next few days. Knowing about the particular keys that tend to wanna "stick", I can somewhat play around that, at least in certain less critical settings. But it still is pretty tired. So I don't HAVE to do anything like NOW. I like shopping from that perspective, way better than the "oh crap, my main board died, I have a gig tonight" kinda thing. I actually took the Casio to rehearsal this afternoon. I got through. (A below middle C... if I play it with pressure towards the bass, it's fine. If I play it with pressure towards the treble, it will sustain indefinitely, just that one note, regardless of pedal. A repeat press usually releases it. I'm guessing that something in there is just close enough to being out of position that it doesn't always get the "off" signal as the key is released.) Have been procrastinating. I really can fix a lotta stuff. Even did some electronics work years ago. But still not exactly lookin' forward to gettin' in there.

Being in a 3 piece band, (piano, bass, drums), I can't get away with holding back or dropping out all that much. I sometimes wonder how piano players get those gigs where they're in like a 30 piece band and can read the Wall Street Journal while waiting for their tiny little part to come up. LOL! In all seriousness, when I started out in playing jazz, it was a 6 piece and for that, the Casio was pretty much everything I needed. Sorta feels like I shifted gears big time, now, though. Way more in the hot seat / spotlight.

Yes, will certainly be online to share the details if I latch on to another gigging keyboard. Either I'll like it or will find someone to commiserate with. LOL!! 🙂

rogerch

Bellyman I have an ES920 and I really like it. But I don't haul it around to gigs.

Supposedly the ES920 has a better action than the ES520 and ES120, but I have read that some people actually like the ES520/ES120 action better. If you have a chance to play them maybe you'll find you like the action in the lighter piano better as well.

Bellyman

I wish I could find some decent keyboards locally to try out. My best hope is probably going to be having someone like Sweetwater send me something to try out. Seems like showroom options are gonna mean a substantial road trip, not so easy for me to do right now. I suppose that's one of the prices I pay for not living in a major city.

rogerch

Bellyman I hear you! I bought an ES920 when they first came out based on youtube videos. Not a great way to buy an instrument but it worked for me.

I think the ES520 and ES120 have the same action. If a showroom is too hard, maybe order a returnable ES120 since it's the lightest Kawai slab (as far as I know)? I'm not really recommending this, just thinking out loud!

Hopefully you can fix the Casio and then you won't need to buy a new keyboard!

Jazzpunk

Bellyman I’m in Los Angeles and it’s getting harder and harder to find anywhere to try out DP’s. I’ve wanted to try out the Kawai VPC-1 and Kawai MP11SE for years but might as well be unicorns and no way I’m dealing with the nightmare of shipping if I bought based on reviews but ended up not liking it.

It’s a strange business paradigm we are moving into with the death of the brick and mortar stores. Works for some things but not so much for others.

Bellyman

rogerch Hopefully you can fix the Casio and then you won't need to buy a new keyboard!

Had a chance to tear into the Casio today. Found a bit debris, not exactly sure what, not a lot, around the sensors of the key that was misbehaving. Reassembled and played for a while, seems fine. (Dang, they used a lot of screws.)

Have a 3 hour outdoor gig tomorrow so I'm gonna set it up there and see how it does. I'll have my RD-2000 in the van, just in case I need it. It's not a "concert" type thing, just people coming and going, and I doubt anyone will actually sit and listen for more than a few minutes. (It's a "customer appreciation day" at a liquor store, kind of a big event for them, but it's not about us at all. But hey, it pays well.) Weather is not supposed to be rainy but there is the possibility of a few raindrops showing up, nothing likely substantial. So... we'll see.

I still would kinda like to upgrade a bit but so far, it's not an emergency. Might keep a lookout for a used one or maybe a demo at Sweetwater, or something that I can maybe get a better price. Not being in any kind of hurry increases my chances of that.

Anyway, will report back if the thing fails big time. LOL!!

TC3

Honestly, I buy most music gear based on online reviews, company reputation, etc. We always tell people to try things out first hand but that's rarely possible for me without multiple trips of a couple of hours each direction ...

Bellyman

TC3 Honestly, I buy most music gear based on online reviews, company reputation, etc.

Unfortunately, I find myself in that situation more than I'd like, and not just music gear. We do the best we can. 🙂

And... it's one reason I particularly like reading threads that talk about different keyboards, likes/dislikes, how they're used, what went wrong, what people really like, stuff like that. Some gets filtered, such as if someone says a piano action isn't fast enough for their synth work. I don't do synth work so that's not a factor for me. Or if someone mentions how very wonderful the piano action and onboard sounds are but it happens to weigh 80+ pounds (115 with the case, yikes!), and it's something I wanna gig with (NO!). Or sometimes there will be talk of a particular mechanical failure that seems to crop up, something worth paying attention to. Stuff like that.

rogerch

Bellyman I’m glad you were able to fix the Casio. Have fun at your gig tomorrow!

TC3

Bellyman That's great, definitely report back after.

I had a Casio PX-160 a while back, same action as yours if I recall. It got noisy very quickly but it was still pretty fun. Despite the short pivot, the action was fun to play, a bit on the light side but that might be good for long gigs.

Bellyman

rogerch Have fun at your gig tomorrow!

It went well. 🙂 Casio performed flawlessly. Customers enjoyed the music but only one or two actually sat and listened for a while. We did what they wanted done, some live (and lively) music. Got paid. 😉

The most irritating thing was an outside speaker for the radio inside that they couldn't turn off. We made enough noise that it was tolerable... except when they were using it as a bullhorn to announce winners of door prizes. :/

Like I said, got paid... and any gig that's a paying gig is a whole lot better than one that doesn't. People were happy and friendly. Very laid back atmosphere. The expectation was pretty low on the "performance" level, not much worry of wrong notes or mess-ups, stuff like that. It was a "live rehearsal" for another gig we have next week!

Probably more than you wanted to know. LOL!

Bellyman

Jazzpunk, yeah, it is definitely hard to find the "showroom" kind of places we used to 20 years ago. I guess having a lot of inventory tied up on a showroom floor can get pretty expensive.

About the only other option I can think of is having someone like Sweetwater send several to try out then return the ones that are the least desirable. I'm sure there is a restocking fee or some such, understandably. It might help me that I've bought quite a lot of stuff from Sweetwater over the years and they know I'm likely to continue buying from them. I also find that when I talk to my sales guy on the phone (there is one in particular), he pretty much always gets me a substantial discount of some kind. And my wife likes it when there is candy in the box when it comes. LOL!! 😉

Just finished playing through most of tomorrow's set on the old Casio. So far, so good. No issues. Hoping it's fixed for a while anyway.

If I weren't gigging, I think I'd have probably tried to get an MP11SE. It's just too heavy for me to hump around, my ol' back would not like it at all. Even the RD-2000 is pushin' the limits, I had to get a soft bag to carry it instead of the hardshell case. I just have to be extra careful. I have the heavy case if I think I need it. The hardshell case is something like 32 pounds, just the empty case, plus 45 or so for the RD-2000, that's probably 80 pounds if I put the pedal, a cord and some light accessories in there. The soft case is maybe 4 or 5 pounds at most.

TC3

Bellyman Yeah, the case is big and heavy, but it's the wheels and the sliders, man ... I'll let you know how that works out when I have to move it in the next few weeks!

TC3

Great review of the RD-2000 EX:

TC3

Sgisela St. James Infirmary. This was very groovy! And I’m glad you opted for the somewhat faster tempo. I’m not sure that I’ve seen many digital grands. It’s a very nice looking instrument and it would be great to hear your story of how you decided on it. If you’ve posted about this elsewhere, I’d love to get a link to that.

I thought I'd respond over here instead of taking up room in the recital thread.

So, first a response to the implicit question: "Why did you buy a digital grand instead of an acoustic upright for about the same amount of money?" The answer is pretty straightforward: because I neither want nor need an acoustic piano. 🙂 I don't want to get into any of the piano culture wars here, so I'll just say that an acoustic isn't something that was ever on the table for me, and not just for the usual practical reasons, but that's really a different conversation.

So anyway, my journey to the GP609. After a few other DPs in my earlier years, I decided that the PHA-50 action was the one for me. I have an RD-2000 for rehearsals and gigs (the first of which I just had recently, but that's another topic), but I also wanted another PHA-50 to practice on, esp. since my RD-2000 is in our practice room with my wife's drums and she needs to be in there when we're practicing at the same time but not working on things together.

I started with the DP-603 and enjoyed playing it with headphones, but the built-in speakers were not to my liking. I thought about adding on some monitor speakers, but I don't care for the aesthetics of that, especially since the piano is in our central "parlor" room, and I want things to look nice in there (both for us and guests). I considered some of the Roland uprights, but I didn't hear great things about the speakers on those either. At that point, I started looking at the Roland digital grands, and obviously settled on the GP609.

I'm VERY happy with it. Again, I love the PHA-50 action and I'm glad to have it on both pianos so that I won't be thrown off when I'm playing on either (especially when I'm playing with others). The 7-speaker sound system works with the soundboard and chamber, so the sound is actually partially acoustic, and quite wonderful. Finally, I love the look of it, and so does the missuz. 🙂 She's always imagined a grand piano in the parlor, so it wasn't hard to talk her into it, especially since it was a fraction of the price of an acoustic grand.

So there you have it!

Bellyman

Enjoyed reading, TC3. 🙂

I do like my RD-2000. It's not that I wouldn't love a real acoustic grand. Of all of them that I played and worked on over the years, I can see myself with a 7' Baldwin, perhaps, it's just a sound and feel that always "spoke to me". That said, I have no space for such a beast. It's just not gonna happen. I have less interest in an upright than I do in electronic keyboards so zero interest there. So... electronic works for me.

People definitely make different choices depending upon their needs, their wants, their situations, their tastes, and their budgets. It's actually getting more rare for me to even play an acoustic piano anymore as most of the places I frequent have electronic keyboards or expect musicians to bring their own. And to be honest, I almost prefer to have a known electronic than an unknown acoustic that who knows when the last time it was tuned or how bad of regulation it's in. Might be great, might be atrocious. With my RD-2000, I know it well, both sound and feel.

Joseph-Fleetwood

I had a Roland for the 18 months before I moved to the USA. I sold it because bringing it over would have been impractical and I needed the money to buy a keyboard here. It was the model HP603. When it powers on, the presets are kind of flat and it doesn't sound like a nice piano at all, but once I got into the voicing of the individual notes, and used all that virtual technician stuff to change it, it was quite amazing what could be done. I really enjoyed playing it. Also the touch was enough like a grand piano so that there didn't seem to be any adjustment required in the touch moving between a grand and the digital.

I think that as far as digital pianos go, Yamaha sounds the most accurate, but I think that Roland might be more playable in a way. It's not that Roland didn't always strive for accuracy, but they were always more interested in how a piano behaves so that from the point of view of the player it always felt like a real instrument. Not necessarily a real piano, but a real instrument in terms of the expression. That's what they achieved in the 80s with the RD-1000 and its babies. I remember being a bit sad when the sample based pianos came out through the 90s because they were never quite as expressive as the RD-1000 family (HP-4500, HP-3000, HP-5000, HP-5500, HP-5600, HP-6000, RD-300s, RD-250s, RD-200, and the Rhodes MK-80) even though they sounded more 'realistic'.

Disclaimer - I haven't tried a new Clavinova in about 4 years so I can't tell you how they feel. I even taught in a music store in recent months but I just didn't bother trying the new pianos, it was in, teach, out.

Bellyman

I find it interesting what different people find appealing. There are some who really do not like modeled piano sounds. And there are some who really do not like even well sampled piano sounds. It is also interesting that some manufacturers are hybridizing the two in their quest for the "perfect" piano sound.

Personally, I find that a piano sound that is "too perfect" becomes irritating to me over a short time. When I hear some complain about Roland's out of tune notes and funky tone in various places, I find it somewhat amusing because those things are intentional. I believe there are a few who have developed editors for some of the Roland keyboards to be able to easily mess with those types of parameters.

No one is wrong, only tastes vary from person to person. Just observing. 🙂

cheeeeee

Hi all, a new Roland fan here. I just bought a FP10 for travel purposes. I like it being compact, relatively lightweight, and with 88 weighted keys. It’s really perfect for keeping the practice going during travels. Compared with the Yamaha p525 that I use for silent practicing at home, the Roland action feels a bit heavier (which I don’t mind) and a little “springy.” But for its price - especially an unbelievable deal from the Guitar Center - that is good enough. The only complaint I have is the low volume output, with or without headphones. That makes me compensate by playing with greater force. After a weekend of practicing on it, I found myself playing loudly when switching back to my acoustic piano. I wonder if any of you have a similar issue with your Roland and if there’s any way to address it.

iternabe

cheeeeee The volume issue you mentioned is real. And as you mentioned, if you also play acoustic piano, setting the volume of your DP to the correct level is critical to avoid forming bad habit. This guy explains the problem very well.

I have a Roland FP-30X. I keep the volume at max when using the speakers or when using the headphone. There are ways to even set the volume more accurately to match your acoustic piano. If you use headphone, and the max volume is still not loud enough (either because the DP output is weak or your headphone’s impedance is too high) you can get a headphone amp with a volume knob. If you use the built in speaker, hooking your DP to a computer/tablet running Pianoteq and feed the sound back through you DP’s speaker will allow you to achieve louder sound (because the output volume can be increased in the computer/tablet, too). It’s worth to use a SPL (sound pressure level) meter to accurately measure the sound volume of your DP and your acoustic to match them.

My FP-30X does not travel. So I ended up buying a set of active studio monitor (JBL 306P MKii) and use them instead of the built-in speaker. The improvement in sound quality is significant, rivaling my pro-level headphone.

cheeeeee

iternabe thank you so much for all the great suggestions. It’s good to know that the low sound volume of my Roland is not because of a defect 😀. I’ll try all those methods, starting with the simple one of using a better set of headphones. I saw a lot of people say good things about Pianoteq. I know very little about it. I may give it a try someday. Measuring the volume of the acoustic and digital pianos to match them sounds like a genius idea!

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