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I bought a Yamaha Stage piano for my performances. To my shock, some of the notes had a slight bit of falseness, and some of them had a little phasing (It sounded like a slightly misshapen hammer)

I would have thought that they would have sampled the best, and most perfect piano they had! I mean all the unisons are pure, but some of the sounds would have sent me looking at the bridge or hammers if i was tuning a C7.

Any ideas as to why this was the case? It is really slight, and I know that no piano is perfect, but come on guys, it's not ridiculous to bring in 5 different pianos to get it perfect.

Two things come to mind for me: one is that my understanding of a stage piano is not a digital, but rather a tunable piano with strings and pick-ups, for use in bands, such as the old Yamaha CP-70 and others. [I could be wrong - if so, I ask for correction on this.]

Second, I too have experienced digital keyboards (I am reluctant to call anything but pianos a piano) being not in tune. I have heard phasing "unisons" as well as intervals where the beats are clearly off. There is not much doubt for me that this cannot be accidental. The only thing I can think of is that the electronic sound in itself may sound too pure and artificial to the human ear. So they make the keyboard slightly out of tune, this may "trick" the human ear and brain into making the association with a real piano sound.

Sorry for the confusion supply,

My understanding (and I am certainly no expert on digitals) was that a "stage piano" was simply a digital that was designed specifically for a portable performance set of keys.

It is in contrast to other keyboards and synths because it has no extra features other than the piano sound. (and a couple others)

I was just shocked that such a purpose built machine could have sampled from a less than ideal sounding piano I hate feeling like there are "avoid notes" when I have to perform.

I think the people who claim that a digital piano "never needs tuning" do not know what it is for a piano to be in tune. I also do not understand why a digital piano would go out with a sample that is poorly tuned or worse yet, poorly voiced.

There may be a problem playing back the recording accurately enough for the notes to be in tune as well as an acoustic piano can be tuned, but voicing is just a bad choice of recording. All this is why I am so suspicious of electronic devices for tuning.

You misunderstand BDB. No one tuned any piano with anything, ears or ETD. What he is saying is that the piano that was used for the samples wasn't tuned and voiced before recording it. The sound that was there is reproduced accurately, false beats and all. I guess they wanted an "authentic" sound. I can think of several reasons why they would do this intentionally and a few of why it just happens to work that way. I wonder how many pianos they would sell if their $1000 keyboards sounded darn near as good?

Inevitably, when the discussion about the merits of digitals arises, I am told "And they don't need tuning!". To this I reply: "That's not correct, they DO need tuning. The problem is, they can't be tuned!"

My digital has a number of choices for different piano voices - the wrong number, of course. There are more than I'll ever use, but they are missing some I need. (why would I want a clavichord but not a harpsichord?)

But anyway: my owner's manual specifies that some of the piano voices are deliberately mistuned in various ways. One choice emulates a honkytonk, e.g., another has the three strings it sampled tuned off to get a chorus effect. I would say try all the various voicing combinations available before you conclude your DP is out of tune. And if you get to that point and aren't happy, you can always use the MIDI out into piano module, soft synth, etc.

Isn't that the truth.

I would expect this on a radio shack special, but this is a "thousands of dollars" set of keys. They actually have new pianos there for the same price. I am positive that it is not set onto a "honky-tonk sound"

I am probably just spoiled by my trusty Seiler...nothing can compare.

That was my point. If one instrument which costs thousands of dollars is not in tune, why should I expect any other instrument, even a tuning device, that is in that price range to be any better?

They can't be tuned? I say they can - to some degree. The Clavinova digitals can be adjusted up and down from A-440 to whatever cents value you want. You can choose from 7 temperaments. Not a lot to choose from, but it's as fast as pressing a button.

What you cannot do is alter the stretch or customize your temperament. Maybe that will happen in the future, but only a tiny percentage of pianists would care about having those features (mostly pianist/technician types).

Digital pianos will only continue to improve and become more realistic. I know this fact makes a lot of people unhappy (especially some dealers and techs), but that's the way it is. The real thing will always be better, but we have to accept the fact that digitals offer some benefits that are important to some buyers (smaller, lighter, less expensive, can practice silently with headphones, maintenance-free, "player piano" capabilities, MIDI I/O, and additional built-in sounds).

I find the silent practice option to be incredibly useful, so I have a digital just for that purpose. The cost was 1/50th as much as my acoustic.

In this case, if you cannot make an individual note sound a particular frequency, it cannot be tuned.

A digital piano is a musical instrument which is similar, but different from an acoustic piano. I have no problem with that. However, this claim that they "never need tuning" just cheapens the definition of "tuning."

To 99% of the population, if the piano sounds the exact same way next year as it does today (which is the case with digital pianos), then it does NOT need tuning. Simply put, if they don't have to hire a tuner to correct something that has "gone out over time", the piano doesn't need tuning, and that is how the rest of the world sees it.

Now, if you're a piano technician, and very picky about how a piano is stretched in the bass or treble, or you insist on using a particular non-equal temperament in all your tunings, and you disagree with the choices made by those who tuned and sampled the acoustic grand used as the original sound source, then you could rightly claim that the digital piano's tuning is unsuitable... for YOU, and that the inability to alter the stretch is a problem for YOU, and if you twist the logic enough, you could claim that digital pianos actually do need tuning, so that you can make your point. But that's a lot of hoops to jump through just to be an elitist.

And as for ETDs, they are incredibly useful tools, and many aural tuners have discovered how to use them to become even better tuners than they were before. Other tuners have simply noticed that they can do the same quality job as before, but in less time. If saving time leaves you enough extra time to make improvements in voicing, regulation, or repairs, then why not take advantage of the opportunity to do more for the client?

To 99% of the population, a birdcage piano that cannot hold its pitch at all will sound exactly the same way next year as it does today. Even I agree that it does not need tuning. Just burning!

I'm talking about phasing, and voicing problems particularily in the killer octave. The tuning and beat rates are about what I would expect from a good tuning.

Voicing issues would have to be evaluated individually for each digital piano (or software piano, if computer-based). I agree that a lot of digital pianos are dynamic disasters, but some have done a very good job of evening things out.

To make fair comparisons of digital pianos, it's probably best to use headphones so acoustic reflections and room modes don't influence the perceived frequency response.

You may have a point there. I was not using headphones. It was in a small carpeted room.

I have an older model Yamaha, the discontinued P-500. I can set frequency for any individual note fairly easily, though of course it is time consuming to do 88 of them. I can store this pattern to a preset button and recall any number of them instantly. I would think any modern DP can do the same, you might have to dig through the owner's manual. In that sense it is tunable. I can therefore alter either temperament or stretch. Inharmonicity is built in by the way the original note is sampled and there is no way to affect that - but then there isn't in an acoustic piano either. In acoustic pianos you adjust the fundamental while listening to the overtones. With a digital you could theoretically adjust overtones directly, but you don't because you are trying to emulate an acoustic, for better or worse.