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Learn Piano At 70+ ?

Sal1950

Sal1950

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The Chicago Crusher
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Bought myself a Yamaha NP-12 keyboard this week. Never played any instrument before, except for dabbling as a kid.
Always wanted to but never put together the time. It will be interesting to see if I can put much together at my age. :oops:
 
Sal1950 said:
Bought myself a Yamaha NP-12 keyboard this week. Never played any instrument before, except for dabbling as a kid.
Always wanted to but never put together the time. It will be interesting to see if I can put much together at my age. :oops:
Click to expand...

That's awesome...I look forward to hearing how it goes!

Are you going to get a separate amp/speaker for it? I ask because my son just bought himself a keyboard and I'm looking into what makes sense. I've got him hooked up with a set of JBL306's and a sub, but that's not necessarily a final solution.
 
BDWoody said:
Are you going to get a separate amp/speaker for it? I ask because my son just bought himself a keyboard and I'm looking into what makes sense...
Click to expand...

It depends on what and how you’re playing. For example:
- if you’re practicing alone, good headphones with a small external DAC are usually the best choice
- if you want others to listen and you’re playing a keyboard with synth or semi-weighted action and using its built-in sounds, those are typically MP3 quality and a pair of active Adam’s is more than adequate
- if you’re rehearsing or playing in a club, the best bet is in-ear monitors and a DI box interface to the house PA system
- if you’re busking or rehearsing without a PA system, Roland and others make some nice portable keyboard amps with battery power
- if you’re playing a pro rig (eg a keyboard with true hammer action like the Kawai VPC1 and a sampled piano library like Synthogy Ivory II), the sound quality of your rig can match or surpass the recorded sound of a fine concert grand with pro mics and preamps in most studios. Synthogy has demo tracks on their website. In my experience, their American D sampled library often sounds better than the recorded sound of many Steinway D concert grands thanks to the specific piano they recorded, their prep (tuning and voicing), mic’ing, and the room sound of their studio. In that case, the bar goes way up as to your equipment choices for mastering and home playback.
 
Are keyboards like guitars? Or are they a 'one size fits all' sort of thing? I have several guitars I use in rotation. I'd like to buy several more, but it can easily get out of hand.
 
anmpr1 said:
Are keyboards like guitars? Or are they a 'one size fits all' sort of thing? I have several guitars I use in rotation. I'd like to buy several more, but it can easily get out of hand.
Click to expand...

Haha that's for sure! (I play guitar too.) Pianists typically have a couple boards, eg a light portable with 61 or 76 keys and synth or semi-weighted action and a heavy 88 key stage board with hammer action (like Nord or the VPC1), plus any number of different sampled sound libs that run on PCs and Macs with lots of different instrument sounds and effects. Fortunately those libs cost way less than guitars, amps, pedals...
 
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I tried learning with zero music knowledge at 23 y/o and already found it really difficult. I also can't recognize notes by ear for the life of me =(
Eventually gave up. Respect for giving learning piano a try at 70 years young!!
 
Veri said:
I tried learning with zero music knowledge at 23 y/o and already found it really difficult. I also can't recognize notes by ear for the life of me =(
Eventually gave up. Respect for giving learning piano a try at 70 years young!!
Click to expand...

To be fair, many professional musicians can’t identify notes by ear either :) But relative pitch (being able to identify intervals between notes even if the absolute pitch is unknown) is important.
 
BDWoody said:
Are you going to get a separate amp/speaker for it?
Click to expand...
I plugged it into my main HiFi here last night and was a bit underwhelmed from what I expected. Yes, I could get as much volume as I desired but without going all subjective it just seemed to lack life and dynamics? That was just using the analog/headphone output into my Marantz AV7703. I also have a Peavey guitar amp in storage that I may drag out just for grins.
TomJ said:
if you’re practicing alone, good headphones with a small external DAC are usually the best choice
- if you want others to listen and you’re playing a keyboard with synth or semi-weighted action and using its built-in sounds, those are typically MP3 quality and a pair of active Adam’s is more than adequate
Click to expand...
Humm, that gives me some thought, I've got my Emotiva DC-1 DAC sitting on my desk that I use mainly as my headphone amp now. Maybe I'll try plugging the USB out from the keyboard into it and then into the HiFi? Maybe it was the keyboards analog out that seemed to have something missing when plugged into the HiFi?
I'm sure not one to buy into sales/marketing BS but I did a lot of homework before buying the NP-12. I did read a lot of reviews that complimented it on its natural sound, supposedly voiced from Yamaha's TOTL grand piano? We'll see, a big part of it's choice was also it's low price, I didn't want to roll a bundle in it till I found out if I could learn at any level do to my age?
RayDunzl said:
Do you read music?
Click to expand...
No, but I'm hoping to fold it into my learning.
BDWoody said:
That's awesome...I look forward to hearing how it goes!
Click to expand...
Feel free to keep bugging me on my progress. That was part of my reason for posting here, I need a Mom and Dad to nag me to practice. LOL
 
That's wonderful! There is nothing quite like immersing yourself into playing music. the singular concentration is so great. My advice is to work with a teacher and give yourself some amount of time every day just to focus on playing. Someone who can give you a pedagogy to follow and some feedback to help you get over the invariable humps of frustration that come from developing a new skill. Everyone I know who has successfully picked up a new instrument later in life had a teacher that helped them stick to it and keep them motivated.

You're inspiring me to go dust off my cello.
 
Sal1950 said:
Who's that? LOL
Click to expand...

Maybe you'll become fond of J.S. Bach.

He has a lot of material that starts with one finger, then two, then three and finally four fingers.. (Fugues)


Example:

First 30 seconds is one finger (at a time)
Two fingers up to 54 seconds or so.
Then three fingers.
And finally at 2:46 he brings out his "watch this" finger and amazes everyone down at the club.

 
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Sal, youtube can be your friend. One can learn how to do almost anything... or so my son tells me.
 
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