I saw it on my way into town, somebody put out a casio WK-3000 piano out on the curb for free, with the stand power cord and even manual. The craziest part is its fully functional. Not a darn thing wrong with it 'cept some dust. Now I have to learn piano.
FYI, OP, a Casio WK-3000 is a digital keyboard, not a piano. Pianos have weighted keys, so the playing experience is a bit different.
(Allegedly, people learning to play are better off starting with a piano so they develop finger strength or something.)
Oh that’s a good shout actually, I now know the terminology differences! Thanks!
Plus it’s only a 76 key board vs the 88 keys on a real piano. So some songs are literally impossible to play on many electric pianos.
On the other hand, electrics don’t take up as much room or weight as much. Which makes them far easier to move and a lot easier to get help to carry down the stairs.
It looks like the WK3000 is semi-weighted, so not really light as a synth action, but not a hammer weighted action like your Roland.
I find the Roland FP’s action to be a bit heavier than my teacher’s Yamaha upright, but lighter than my Rhodes. If you get your technique down playing a synth or semi-weighted action, if you do decide to get a hammer action or acoustic piano later on, your fingers won’t have the muscle and/or muscle memory to play on the heavier action.
I had somewhat the opposite issue when I started taking lessons, as I’d been playing the Rhodes for about a year or so, and I was pounding the heck out of the acoustic keys. I got it tuned up by Vintage Vibe and the action is better now but it is still heavier. The other issue I had to deal with was I learned the Rhodes keys are a hair skinnier than standard piano keys, so playing the Roland I got when the Rhodes went in the shop or my teacher’s piano, all of a sudden my fingers had to reach further for octaves.
I think OP’s find is tremendous for someone interested in trying piano/keyboard/MIDI, but if they do decide to stick with it, they would probably want to upgrade at that point.
I own a digital keyboard with weighted keys. Would that be a digital piano?
Having played both electric keyboards with weighted keys and analog pianos, the feel of the keys are most definitely not the same.
Electric weighted keyboards all have nearly identical actions. Analog keyboards tend to be very individualistic. Electrics are smooth through their stroke, exhibiting an even effort. The initial press of the key is less effort. There is less inertia to over come in the system. You are just closing a switch with a weighted feel.
With an analog key, you need to not only over come the inertia of the key but also the hammer to get it to start moving, but you also have the friction of the pivot points to overcome. So it requires more effort to start moving before all the parts “break free” and then move more like your weighted electric keys.
It depends how hard the digital piano is trying to mimic an acoustic one. Some of them have “graded hammer action” where the keys have something approximating the inertia and friction you mention, as well as varying from heavier for the low notes to lighter for the high ones.
Except for the dust, I’d say it belonged to a kid who played it too loudly.
I cleaned out my house a couple of years ago and got rid of quite a few things that I probably could have sold, but didn’t want to bother.
Very true lol!
It could also be a new year’s resolution piano or something. Someone thought “I’m going to buy a piano and learn to play it” and it sat around taking up space without them learning it. They finally decided to just get rid of it.
Wife found a fully functional kitchenaid stand mixer on the side of the road with the only issue being the mixing head didn’t latch down securely. Tightened the neck screw a quarter of a turn and that thing locks up perfectly like it’s supposed to. Sweet!
I am envious!
A good old kitchen aid mixer is worth repairing if it’s in salvageable condition. Replacement parts are still available and repair videos are plentiful. Great mixers ✨
did it have a sign or something?
maybe you took someone’s piano who was moving
Haha! Yeah there was a sign: “free take all”. I’d die if I accidentally stole from someone
I hope it’s not haunted
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/220160555-free-piano-not-haunted
Found on curb. Kids love to bang on it.
Somebody somewhere has a very interesting story about getting rid of a piano
My sister bought a house which came with a piano simply because the previous owners couldn’t figure out how to remove the piano from the house…
Apparently that can be the biggest obstacle surrounding ownership–transferring one. Like pool tables, they can sometimes be priced cheaper than one may expect – primarily because the new owner is also going to be tasked with the removal of the extra-large acquisition…
This is why, when I decided to get my kids a piano, I got them a digital one. Way easier to deal with, logistically speaking. (And also has features like MIDI and the ability to use headphones instead of making the house noisy, which is nice too.)
Nice! Please keep us updated on your progress on !piano@lemmy.world
To be fair, Casios sound like shit. A Casio was my first keyboard. Great price, had some nice features. Probably got thrown out because it sounded like shit.
To be fair, it doesn’t really matter what the onboard synth sounds like if it’s got MIDI 'cause you can just hook it up to a better one.
Sure, just trying to justify why this was put on the sidewalk. For what it’s worth, I can get a midi controller with the same features as a Casio for cheaper if I go M Audio or something like that. Have had better experiences using a dedicated midi controller instead of an onboard synth plugged in thru USB/midi when I’m planning to hook it up to a computer or off board synthesizer.
Free is definitely better than cheap, though.
These days (and by that I mean for about two decades now) people are spoiled with PCs that can synthesize literally whatever waveform you want in software. As far as I’m concerned, standalone or onboard synthesizers are pretty much just obsolete entirely, with the only exception being little toy ones like the Stylophone or Otamatone.
Probably more like two arguments for musician vs producer. I’m a musician and teach music. If I walk up to an acoustic piano, I expect it to be high quality, consistent, and able to produce a wide variety of tones that cover all of my needs accessed through user manipulation. When I use a synthesizer and need a piano, I expect the same thing and prioritize those qualities.
A music producer that spends most of their time producing recordings instead of live playing may prioritize variety in tone and quality at the push of a button. I see both arguments. For me, the Yamaha on board synth is the winner, but sure, not as wide a variety as having every VST known to man at your finger tips.
Guess it depends on the VST. The marching arts use MainStage as a staple, and their onboard sounds are shit. They had an update recently that drastically improved/replaced a lot of piano sounds, but they’re recording/pop tune pianos. Very good, but don’t act like a piano through the dynamic range and release. There are some good piano VSTs, but you need to purchase multiple VSTs to get all the right sounds you want. I may use one piano VST for one movement and a different high quality one for another movement. Through my experience with a variety of industry standard piano VSTs played through any number of industry standard DAWs, I still haven’t found a setup that perfectly matches the nature of playing a piano and how it reacts to your fingers the way a Yamaha piano patch does. Take a Yamaha piano patch and put it through whatever filters you want, and you can get a highly realistic player experience with all the mushy gushy reverb or anything else you want.
I gotta admit, I’m not actually a musician (not since high school, anyway), so I’ll defer to your expertise. My perspective is more of somebody who remembers when SoundBlasters and whatnot used to matter and how they now don’t.
Free
I once saw a story about a guy who learned how to play on a paper piano…
Here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CEgjamDo9q8
Maybe old ones (I guess like Ops)?
I’ve got a CT-S1 as a portable I can chuck in the car & love that thing, it sounds awesome too, sometimes more so than my ‘proper’ weighted Yamaha keys…
Also, Yamaha easily has the best sampled piano sounds out there for consumer grade synthesizers. Maybe that’s changed in the past 6 years or so, but I haven’t been able to find a comparable piano in any VSTs or onboard synthesizers. It’s a shame they can’t seem to make percussion instruments at any realistic rate… have had to switch my ensembles to inferior products because Yamaha’s lead times are fuckin 2-3 years. Unbelievable.
Yeah, their higher grade stuff is fine. They corner a lot of the beginner market, which focuses on affordability and function over sound quality, so I sort of have that opinion of them. They are a legit company with good products at the higher end. Heavy hitters during the rise of synthesizer in the 60’s and 70’s.
Nice find!
I’ve got one of these. It’s old but extremely useful to learn on. You can get the pedal for them on eBay. If it isn’t acting right find the buried system menu to reset it to factory defaults.
Amusingly it also takes a shitload of D batteries as alternate power.
