Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Digital Pianos - Electronic Pianos - Synths & Keyboards Newbie needing advice on Roland RD300sx, please

Hi all,
I'm glad I found this forum, as I have a bunch of silly questions.

I'm primarily an acoustic pianist, but I purchased a Roland 300sx so that I can optimize my gigging potential. I also purchased a Roland KC350 amp. This is my first experience with anything electronic, and I've been experimenting with the different settings, and I can't quite get the sound that I want.

So... here's my dilemma. When I listen to the piano through my headphones, I'm pleased. But, when I run the piano to the amp, the tones sound a little "thin" to me. The sound lacks depth, and seems sort of "tinny". I've played a couple of gigs (small parties and coffeehouse type gigs), and I'm not pleased with the sound quality.

I did a comparison and I played the piano's "demo" recording through the amp, and it sounds great! It sounded full and rich with a lot of depth. What I'd like to do, ultimately, is to make my piano sound like the demo. I looked through the manual, to see whether the demo's settings were printed in the manual, and I don't believe that they are.

So, I'm really confused. I think that if the "demo" sounds great when I play it through the amp, then I should be able to get those same sounds by either adjusting the piano's settings or the amp. But, I don't know where to begin.

Has anyone else experienced this sort of problem? I know the sound I want, but can't figure out how to get it.

Secondly, I've read the recent posts about speakers versus a keyboard amps, because I wonder whether I should get speakers instead of an amp for the types of gigs I'm going for...I just want a fuller sound.

Any advice is greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Try using the mono piano sounds (piano patch 9 and 10). I'll listen to the demos on mine tonight and see if I can notice what you are hearing.

You will get a fuller sound from decent speakers. Also, a pair of speakers allows the stereo effect to show. Mixing the left and right channels to mono usually produces a less than pleasing result due to phase cancellation.

Another thing I just thought of. Try playing with the 5 different sound control settings and the touch setting.

Thank you, Mike,
...What type of speakers would you recommend?

bsp

Ok, I listened to the demos. The only one that has just a piano sound is demo 2 so I assume that's the one you're talking about. I played the first couple of bars of it on piano 1 setting and I could make it sound exactly like the demo as long as I played very heavily.

Sorry, not really. I've made my own speakers for the last 20 years or so.

How portable do you need and what size venues do you want to cover?

As for the speakers? Well, I see myself playing restaurants and small weddings. So, let's say a venue with about 150 people, tops.

...I'm sorry to pepper you with more questions,
but since you figured out the demo 2 settings,
what about the demo piece #1 ? What sound is that first setting.. is there layering involved in there???

To my ears, I'd describe it as a smooth jazz piano.. is that perhaps one of the electric piano settings???? If you're familiar with jazz tunes at all, it's the tune that sounds vaguely like John Coltrane's "Giant Steps"?

I *very much* appreciate your help in this..
bsp

Oh, and how portable? I'm a woman, so the lighter, the better, although my husband helps me quite a bit.

Hopefully someone with actual experience with current speakers will be able to help here. If you only need to amplify the piano, I would suggest getting powered speakers like these . I have no idea what any of these are like in use.

Having self powered speakers means less connections to make during setup and you don't have to carry an extra amplifier with you.

If you also need to run microphones through them, it would probably be better to go for a powered mixer and passive speakers.

For the size venues you want to play I suggest at least 150 watts per speaker. Preferably more.

I'm away from the piano again but from memory it's a multi track recording with at least piano drums and bass so it would be impossible to reproduce the sound without using a sequence playback device.

The nearest I can think of doing live would be to split the keyboard and use piano 1 in the upper section and bass patch 10 (bass + ride cymbal) in the lower section.

Another forum that may be able to help with this is the Keyboard Magazine forum at http://forums.musicplayer.com/

Most of the posters there are working musicians.

Many thanks for your help. Using the mono patch to the amp helped a lot, though I will definitely check out speakers.

Thanks again,
bsp