How to adapt to different piano actions?

[baxter]

Hi all,

I have recently taken up lessons again after a 10 year hiatus. I have a Kawai CN3 digital piano  and my teacher has a Steinway grand.

I've only had two lessons so far, but I'm having trouble adjusting to the much heavier action of the Steinway. The Kawai's action is very light. Given my current living situation, the digital is my only option.

Is there someway to practice for the heavier action of the grand, or should I find that the more I play on it the more used to it I'll be?

B.   

 

[hfmadopter]

A lot of Kawai digital pianos have a lot of fudge room on setup to adjust them to how you play. If you have yours set the way you like to play on it then forget how your teachers Steinway is and just learn to adjust to it when you play on it ( over time you will desensitize a bit to that weight as you get to know the piano better). On digital pianos, when you set them to hard and soft or go into the menu and adjust the curve rates, really you are adjusting response time and velocity not actual weight. So the weight of the keys on your digital is the weight , you can't adjust that but you can make it act like it is slower and heavier, which may or may not help your cause.

All pianos feel different, my teachers Steinway had very heavy action, FWIW. My own grand had pretty light action. It's easy though to adjust action weight heavier on a grand if you know where to add the little weights. Not so easy to lighten it from original. I adjusted mine to be some what closer to the Steinway my teacher owned and since lowered it part way back to original again since I no longer play on that Steinway ( that was the heaviest action I ever played on and don't care to play on one as heavy again actually).