Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Can you give examples of why we want 88 rather than 76 keys?

Hi all, thanks again for all the input.

We're not really much of a classical music listening family, so my guess is we'll be playing more pop/rock/r&b -- but I certainly want my daughter to be able to follow her interests, wherever they might lead.

In the end, the most "immediately obvious" reason to get the 88 is so that I can play a duet with my daughter. I totally understand that many of you have other "immediately obvious" reasons, and I hope we grow into those.

btw, do you have any favorite Web sites and/or YouTube channels for beginners? (We'll also be getting a proper teacher, but I'm curious to see what's out there...)

Ya get more keys for your money....da da.da da...more keys for your money...da da. da da...more keys for your money...and middle C stays in the middle to!...da da...da da da da

Oh just ask Rossy's Basset Hound... He knows everything.

For whatever reasons you get 88 keys, I'm sure it's the wisest choice. As for favorite websites.

http://www.youtube.com/user/bbdhrggl/

Don't be shocked by the introducing math tutorial, the piano tutorials are a little more down the page. Diverse tutorials, classical, jazz, pop and rock, besides basic things like scales, chords and rhytm practice.

http://www.youtube.com/user/Lypur

Mostly classical, but great videos on music theory and the basics of playing for beginners.

http://www.youtube.com/user/pianojohn113

Billy Joel, Beatles and Elton John song tutorials. Maybe not suited for beginners, but most people should be able to learn the songs, just takes time and practice. Unfortunately the lessons are not sorted by difficulty, that would be helpful.

Can I pick which 12 are missing? I never use G4# so I choose that one first.

With most digital pianos you can shift the 76 keys all the way to the ends of an 88 keys keyboard, left or right. Not sure if the shift has to be in steps of octaves or single notes. By default, usually the top and bottom notes are cut off, about six at each end. If you imagine you put the 76 keys keybed on top of an 88 keys one, it would rest somewhere in the middle, with (at least roughly) the same number of notes on either side, missing on the 76 keys keybed, compared to the bigger one.

You can't just take a note out somewhere in the middle, like G#4 is, and shift all other notes to the left (or right for that matter.) If you did, it wouldn't be a regular piano anymore, because the keybed is based on certain rules, mathematically and musically.

Fur Elise fits comfortably on my ancient ensoniq 76 keyboard. The low A is five keys from the bottom and the high E is 3 keys from the top. The top and bottom keys on particular instruments may not be the same.

Mine cannot handle Chopin's prelude in C minor. I could shift the range to make that fit, but I played that one enough on my childhood baby grand.

Despite the erred claim regarding Fur Elise, I would go with the 88 keys. The price difference could not be that much and I will likely run into other pieces that don't fit.

fwiw, it's not about price difference. Rather, the appeal of the 76 is that it saves space -- not just in our small apartment, but also if we ever get to the point where we want to take it someplace in a car.

Why is that a problem?

A few days ago I moved my Casio CDP (in box) using a bicycle with the thing strapped to my back. It was a tad wobbly but it was fine

Strangely enough my CDP doesn't fit properly in my dad's Toyota in the back I mean. It won't fit on the back seats either. You have to put it through the driver and passenger seat and rest it on the hand (parking) brake in the middle. If it wasn't an automatic the gear stick would get in the way.

Have you decided on a company and model and checked the specs? Are we talking about five inches and maybe five pounds? You can argue those points if you like, but it doesn't seem like a lot, unless you have to make major changes in furniture to accommodate the 88.

I did choose my 61-key model because of weight and size. The size difference to 88 is about 8 inches in width. For me, the weight was a bigger factor. Mine weighs 11 pounds and I have to set it up every time I want to play. I keep it under the bed at other times. A 25 to 40 pound model would be more strain on my back and shoulder.

How often might you realistically travel with the keyboard? Even so, the small differences don't seem worth much, especially if two people are available to move it.

"...Fur Elise fits comfortably on my ancient ensoniq 76 keyboard. ...Mine cannot handle Chopin's prelude in C minor. I could shift the range to make that fit,"

I've waited years to hear someone mention the Ensoniq here--- I still have mine. Made by geniuses way out ahead of their time, I loved it, and I hated it. Shifting the 76-key board's range by using the keypress combination got really old after so-many-thousand times, and I got so much over it that I would never waste my shopping time looking at a DP with less than 88 keys (unless I wanted a synth-style non-weighted keyboard with aftertouch). The feature was really intended so that one could take advantage of using the keyboard split to make room for the string bass or electric bass, or the upper registers of the clavinet and Rhodes.

You can still run out of keys a lot faster than you think. We have 88 keys because composers used them and pushed manufacturers to make them. (And, because that's about as much usable frequency range as you can get out of a hammered string.) And BTW, keyboards these days have three or four splits--- even more keys to run out of on a short board.

As for Fatar keysets... well, they make better and worse ones, but before you jump off that bridge, try the Search feature and see what other members of this forum have had to say. I would not touch one with a barge pole.

If you don't have room for 12 more keys in your house, do you really want one at all? Get rid of something.

This is where I keep my digital piano (88 keys of course.) Not sure if this is the best place for it, in the storage room, but the room is equipped as a work room, with a table and electrig plugs.

I also live in a very small room, and my DP actually lives in front of my closet (I guess i'm not much of a clothes horse anymore... my closet is mostly storage). Here's a pic of my setup (the room is so small you can see a corner of my bed in the lower right, which I was kneeling upon when I took the pic)

"...As for Fatar keysets... well, they make better and worse ones, but before you jump off that bridge, try the Search feature and see what other members of this forum have had to say...."

Whoops--- disoriented. I forgot what forum we are on. I should have said, "the Digital Pianos, Synths and Keyboards forum."

And btw, good luck with the Search feature.

My harpsichord has 48 keys. 48.

I have never missed a key. So unless you play extreme repertoire from romantique and post romantique era, you don't need 88 keys.

I wonder too. I never seem to get beyond 2nd C above middle C or 3rd F below middle C.

Um...because a piano has 88 keys and not 76.

Pretty simple concept.

I second the recommendation for 88 keys. Then you can play any piano repertoire you want, now or later, without worry.

The 76-, 61-, and 49-key digital keyboards don't have full piano range. They were meant to be portable, to be used on stage performing mainly synth/organ parts.

The cost savings going with the shorter keyboard isn't worth it, particularly with a 76- vs. an 88-key keyboard. The 49- and 61-key boards can be much cheaper, but they often have "organ-touch" instead of "piano-touch" keys.

With a 48-key harpsichord, that shorter compass was commonplace during the Baroque era, and if you play mainly Baroque harpsichord music, it will fit within this range. But many piano students are interested in learning to play music from the 19th-20th centuries, when piano keyboards had at least 85, and usually 88 keys.

This is 97 keys. More is always better . . . its just a fact of human nature.

It of course depends on the music you want to play with your keyboard. There are quite a number of classical pieces requiring 88 keys but they are generally at a very advanced level (e.g. Liszt Campanella, Ravel Jeux D'eau, Rachmaninov G# minor prelude etc). If you aren't going to play these say in the next 5 years, no harm with 76 keys. If you do end up needing 88 keys after 5 years, well, it's time for an upgrade anyway.

Good luck!

In addition to the other, very good points, on an acoustic piano the sound quality would suffer with fewer than 88 keys.

With an acoustic piano when the sustain pedal is pressed all the related strings will vibrate in addition to the notes actually played, giving a fuller, more complex sound. A digital piano might have sustain samples that include the missing keys but I would suspect with fewer than 88 keys that other corners were cut as well and the unit may not sound all that great.

I started on a digital piano and I found that the keyboard touch was critical to learning to play with expression so I would make sure that the piano you are looking at has the most realistic action possible.

Doug