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Kawai does have new sounds that were put into the CA67/97 series that are not in the current MP11, so upgrading the action to GF2 and adding the new sampled piano sounds would warrant a new release, IMO.

Take your point (SK pianos etc), just not sure those new sounds are a big leap in quality or that the sound chips are that much better. Maybe it would make commercial sense to make a revision (MP11-SK) should the present housing be adapted to suit the GF2.

I think 4 years between iterations is about right.

IMO the MP12 would need a big step of improvement in sound generation quality.
Just adding another outdated ROMpler sound in HI-XL format is not enough. For me that would need physical modelling at the level of Pianoteq at the least.

I find this as a bit of an odd position. Kawai did release an MP8ii to replace the MP8. And Apple releases a major new iPhone every single year. Do you mean that Kawai is mid-cycle on this DP and releasing a revision now would seem a bit rushed?



I think it's an interesting philosophical question whether Kawai or Yamaha will ever move to a fully modeled system. It's probably a very hard pill for them to swallow to say that they can better recreate their own flagship pianos with software simulation rather than carefully recording the instruments themselves!

And also, I think there's a difference between "worth upgrading from an MP11" and "worth buying for a new purchaser." New samples and GF2 keybed probably wouldn't be enough for existing MP11 owners to upgrade, but it could bring in new buyers who are concerned about the lack of feature parity with Kawai's other DPs. Maybe that's where another "MkII" moniker might be useful.

The newer sound chip (newer than the one in the MP7 and MP11) is already in the ES8, CN27, CN37.
The newer sound chip is much better than the older one, fuller sound, SK-grand is better than the
CFX-grand, IMO.

I had an ES8 at my house and played it for 2 days ... much better sound chip.
RH3 action in the ES8 is better than the RH2 action, better for pianists, but maybe not for
organ players.

So ... I'm not buying the MP7 or MP11, definitely not. I'm waiting.

I visited this forum today with this same question in mind -- when will we see the MP12, and the update of the MP7? I had an MP11, but lost it (along with everything else I ever owned, including a $150K music studio, when my house burned to the ground in a catastrophic wildfire in September, 2015). I loved the MP11, but the new sounds in the ES8 (and perhaps also in the CA67, and CA97?) sound a LOT better to me. And even if the GF2 is just an incremental improvement over the GF, better is better. I won't replace my MP11, but rather wait for the MP12.

The ES8 has the RH3 and the improved sound set. But I want all the editing and controller features of the MP series, which the ES8 doesn't have. But for the right person, the ES8 is an incredible instrument.

Of course Kawai could, and probably will, add a few more things to the new series, but just the new actions (RH3 and GF2) and the new sound sets (SK-EX, SK-5, uprights) that are already available on other models would be sufficient justification for a new MP release soon.

It was approximately 3 1/2 years from the MP8II to the MP10, and another 3 1/2 years from the MP10 to the MP11. It's now three years since the MP11, and therefore, if the pattern continues, we're getting close to the MP12.

However, the time intervals between the MP9000, MP9500, and MP8 were shorter -- 2 or 2 1/2 years or so -- so the intervals between new models has slowly been getting longer. Thus, if this is the trend, we might not see the MP12 (and MP7+?, or whatever it will be named) until early 2018, which would be four years since the current models.

But Kawai must also be mindful of the competition. Roland is a big competitor in the stage piano market. Roland has released two new generation stage pianos -- the RD-800 and the new RD-2000 since the MP7 and MP11 were released. Though still fine pianos, the MP7 and MP11 are NOT Kawai's current technology, and they are falling behind Roland in getting new, upgraded generation stage pianos out the door.

Personally, I'm very eager to get a new stage piano, having missed having one for the last year and a half. But I will wait for Kawai to implement its already existing improved technology before I buy. I hope it will be soon!

Wow, really sorry to hear about the fire! Hope you were able to get everything back up.

I thought this was a really well-reasoned post, and it's insightful to see the timeframes and the fact that Roland has released two flagship stage pianos since the MP11 was released.

As an MP11 owner, if I suddenly lost mine now, I'd probably hold off getting another one as well unless I was able to get a very substantial discount. I typically try not to get into the "what's around the corner" mindset, but just like buying an iPhone in early September, we're likely really close to the release cycle and presumably you can get a lot more for the same money by waiting a little.

Thank you for the kind sentiments.

Hello Savante, good to see you back!

Kind regards,
James
x

Ditto.



Or the same for a lot less money. RD800 was selling for $2500 a few months ago. They seem to have sold out, but musician's friend was selling it for 1800 the other day, they'd knock another 15% off on the phone, and give you 16% back in credits. so ~$1500 out of pocket, ~$250 in rewards points if you wanted to later buy (or at least offset the cost of) a stand or speaker set. GC still has the RD800 for ~$1530 through tomorrow with their president's day coupon if anyone was interested.

Now that Roland offers the RD2000 which is very very interesting, Kawai should be aware and will need to launch the MP12 to compete.

This is arguable. The RD2000 has 1000's of sounds and a plastic action. It is an excellent live instrument for a gigging professional. The MP11 has 40 sounds and a grand piano length pivot point on it's action. The MP11 is a bit heavy for gigging (which is why the MP7 exists), and the MP11 hasn't many of the functions that the MP7 or RD2000 have.

It seems to me that the market for the MP11 is: pianists who want a digital piano (that can be a stage piano), but whose main requirement is excellent action.

Now if you were suggesting that the MP7 could do with an upgrade, you might have a point; however, the MP7 isn't quite a direct competitor to the RD2000, as it's based at a lower price point. That said, the MP7 has awesome capabilities for the price, and it's drawbar organs are as impressive as the Kurzweil Forte's. Also, to my ears, Roland have not yet quite caught up with Kawai's Electric piano sounds (which are also awesome).

Where Kawai lack to the Rolands is in their responsiveness and dynamic control---of course a direct result of using sampled pianos instead of modelling. One might wonder if Kawai has the R&D to follow suit any time soon regarding modelled pianos. Roland have been developing their tech for over 2 decades, and Pianoteq has been going for quite a while now. Also, the modelling in the Physis came from an R&D department used to modelling sounds (organ sounds), so they had some kind of modelling basis already.

Perhaps Kawai will go down the route of massively increasing the sample memory to the multi Gb range.

IMO just licence PianoTeq and put every effort possible into Quality Assurance. Everything would be fine.

For the ToneWheel mode, licence the HX3 and put 9 (motorized) faders on the device.

They should license something like Garritan CFX and put it in its entirety! I wouldn't bother with fully modeled piano sound.

That will never happen. Kawai will never put a Yamaha piano in one of their products, nor will Yamaha put a Kawai piano in one of theirs! Both companies put only their own acoustic pianos in their digital products. Only companies that don't manufacture acoustic pianos will use any piano sample/model they can get their hands on.

As you may have heard, Muse Research have discontinued the Muse Receptor and are no longer selling hardware, wishing instead to licence their Receptor VST host intellectual property to other companies.

Probably because today's laptops are so powerful vs cost, the overpriced Receptor can't compete anymore, whereas it used to have the edge for lowest latency, the advantage margin is so slim now it's disappeared.
Glad I never bought one.

Anyway,
Now would be the perfect chance for Kawai to get in the action, buy that Receptor licence, before Yamaha or Roland or Korg snap it up and beat them to market, and make a super-duper MP12 with lovely GF action, and (the world's first!) built-in "Receptor" based VST player that could host any virtual piano or soundware...
...including perhaps a Kawai multisample bank(which they could easily include as their installed factory preset) if they exported their existing EX, Shigeru EX, and SK5 libaries into a VST software version. They could also sell that as a standalone software product too and make even more money!

Imagine a long-pivot Kawai GF action, pitch / mod wheels, 4 sliders and controller knobs, and the ability to read and run any library you have installed on an external SSD that connects via USB3.0 port on back of keyboard.

A fairly small colour LCD maybe Physis Piano size 480x272 pixels could probably suffice for the keyboard's navigation of presets and parameter adjustments using 0-127 data values, and you could have a standard HDMI socket on the back of keyboard to connect any 1080p display which could give you the full graphic GUI of Receptor engine and the VST piano's interface / Kontakt or whatever...

This can be done!!!
There is no excuse!!!
It doesn't have to be as large as a Receptor 2U box internally.
Think how small and powerful Intel NUC Skull Canyon computer is.
Those components could be made to fit inside a case as large as the MP11 size cabinet!

Nah, but as unlikely as it is, it would be possible for Kawai to decide to go the multi-gigabyte sample route the likes of Garritan. We clearly have the technology and budget today in 2017 to do this in hardware pianos.

Nah, but as unlikely as it is, it would be possible for Kawai to decide to go the multi-gigabyte sample route the likes of Garritan. We clearly have the technology and budget today in 2017 to do this in hardware pianos.

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