Buying A Yamaha Digital Piano
How I reached the conclusion to with a digital piano over an antique
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I've wanted to pick up playing the piano for years. It's always been an instrument who's sound I really enjoyed and it just relaxed me. Songs heavy on piano or classical music I really
Enjoy. Recently I've been pressing harder to get a Piano and actually came in to an opportunity to get a used antique piano for free. It was in great shape and simply needed a tuning to be back in action. Here's what I learned.
Moving A Piano Is a Pain 
I called up one of my friends to help me go move this piano from this lady's house. Much to my surprise a piano may be the heaviest thing in any home any place! This was a 4 ½ wide by 2 feet thick item that stood about 3 ½ feet tall and my god was it heavy. I later heard from many people that antique piano's need at least 4 people to move them. I also scratched my hardwood floor trying to move this monster in my house before my wife declared it must go out! I then learned you can't even think about storing a piano in a garage which led to me eventually giving the piano to a friend that weekend.
Tuning A Piano Is Expensive And Recurring One thing that led to me giving the piano away was that it would cost $100 a year to have the thing tuned! I started looking around at digital piano's and upon settling on the Yamaha digital piano line I was startled to see I could get a usable instrument for $150 and a great instrument for less than $500! Why in the world was I bothering with this heavy beast that needed regular tuning when I could go with a Yamaha digital piano I could keep in the closet and move by myself? I'm learning here!! |
Well I got out and started sniffing around on the various digital piano reviews I could find. They're tough to sort through since most anyone could write them however one thing stayed certain throughout any opinion. Yamaha digital pianos across the board are always better than average and their beginner piano's are great for what they are. This was very reassuring because it meant no matter which digital piano I went with I was going to be happy. Why? Because I'm a total beginner and haven't developed any sort of ear for musical instruments beyond appreciating their use. So I started looking around Ebay, Amazon, etc for a piano. Here's what I found.
The Yamaha PSR series keyboards are great for beginning piano players. They're not very expensive and I've even read people saying they'd record with them though I doubt they were serious professionals. Depending on the age of the model number you can buy one on Ebay for $50-$200 but beware of shipping costs here. I also had a local piano store in Baton Rouge offer to sell me one for near the original retail so I would beware buying from a store used. This is great for someone who wants a more general keyboard with weighted key capabilities.
The Yamaha DGX series digital pianos seem to be really focused on playing piano as opposed to a digital keyboard in the PSR. They can cost over $500 but again if you search ebay you can get them for a marginal discount. I saw some more inexpensive ones but they were 10 years old. I'd probably buy something newer to hook in to my computer. This is probably more the direction I'll go since I'm really just interested in playing piano although I may change my mind looking at other models.
I reached some great conclusions. In 2009 when I make that leap in to learning to play piano I will do it on digital to save space, time and most importantly money. I also learned why there are piano moving companies. Maybe one day I'll get the real thing but it'll be AFTER I've learned how to play. -Jerry Wayne Odom Jr. December 2008
- Yamaha Piano Focused Portables - Yamaha has a couple of pages on their pianos. I found this section to be the best for reading on their various models.
- Amazon.com - You might not think to check out Amazon's musical instrument section but they've got some well thought out reviews of products.