practicing digital

[kawai_cs]

I own a good digital piano yet I am having real trouble performing some of my current pieces in lessons where I play a very responsive grand. Especially in one of them (by Mozart) my tone comes out uneven, flat, sometimes some keys do not sound at all, argh...
It seems that I am not able to work on it at home because when I record the piece on my digital this problem is not existent! It is really discouraging.
I am wondering if I am just trying to make excuses (I admit I am not very fond of my current pieces). I think that most piano students are experiencing similar problem because probably most of them in their lessons play an instrument that is superior to their piano at home.
I also saw an interview with Gil Jetley, who won Chopin Competition for Amateurs and he practices a digital at home. It seems enough for him and I am not half as good so why would it not be enough for me?
I might get an acoustic instrument later this year but it is still at least several months until then. So I was thinking maybe I should ask my teacher to play different repertoire to work on skills that I am actually able to practice on my digital....?
I am wondering if any of you experience a similar problem? I would appreciate your advice!

[abbyes]

I do not have neither grand piano in my house nor an upright, I have a digital piano. Actually, I'm also facing the same problem than you, and it's not "excuses". I'm playing Mozart Sonata k 310 in A  minor, and it's impossible play it correctly on my digital piano. The phrasing, dynamics...there's no comparison playing them on a grand piano at the conservatory than playing on my digital piano. That's why I dont usually practice the sonata at home, I can't play it correctly on a digital piano. But they main reason is the pedaling, but I think that's just because of the quality of my digital. My pedal it's all or nothing, it kinda sucks...Sometimes I also face that problem of phantom notes ( keys that does not sound ).

I do not think at all that it's your fault, I think that digital pianos cannot reproduce the essence of classical music pieces.

[dcstudio]

your digital is perfectly balanced and each key is even..  this just isn't possible on an acoustic.  I know your pain though.  Even I get frustrated at a responsive acoustic piano after playing only my digital.   It's really not your fault and that is the main reason for people downing the digital.  They are far easier to play in that regard because they are so even and balanced.  The only way to fix the problem, though is to spend more time on an acoustic.

[xdjuicebox]

Develop the ability to adjust your touch to any piano. The only way to do this is to play on a lot of pianos. Sometimes, you'll have to consolidate your playing on a piano that isn't that well regulated. Sometimes, if you have absolute pitch and you're playing a piano that's very out of tune, you'll need to turn your absolute pitch off and rely only on relative pitch.

Key words, you need to adapt to each piano. I have an upright as well as a digital (that I play at night so I don't disturb people), and they are so different that it's ridiculous haha. See if you can find yourself some good quality acoustic time, you'll feel what Dorothy Taubman calls the "point of sound," which is where there's a little pop as the hammer strikes the string. Play with that.

A huge part of evenness is ensuring that all of the hammers fire at the same velocity, which means your KEYDROPS NEED TO ALL OCCUR AT THE SAME SPEED. If you can do that, you'll get perfect evenness every time. There's a million ways to do that, finger exercises, flinging your weight around, etc. Depends on your teacher and you.

[bronnestam]

I have a good digital at home but my teacher has an old, acoustic upright which I never seem to get fully along with ... so I have often been very, very disappointed when I have come there and played like ¤%&#, things I thought I did very well.

The problem vanished after I had been to a piano summer school where I spent a whole week playing on just acoustics, of all kinds. But still I often struggle with the pedal of my teacher's acoustic. And so I get exercises to help me solve these problems, and back home I cannot for my life re-create the issues I was supposed to work with ...

BUT - when we had a recital, we were to perform on a very nice Shigeru Kawai (grand) and my teacher was amazed to hear me playing on this. She said I had never played so good before. No wonder, as this grand is far more close to my digital than what her upright is! My digital is modelled after a Yamaha grand, not after an upright!

So, my conclusion is that it is really not just my "fault", it is my teacher's piano which is a bit special. Again, I have played on a lot of other uprights and normally I don't even think of the differences, at least not after the first 5 minutes. Yes, I also think it is essential to work on many types of pianos.

You need to practice on an acoustic if you are to perform on an acoustic. But this does not mean you need to OWN an acoustic. For learning a piece and do your daily practice, a good digital will do. For final refinements and polishing, you need a piano which is similar to the one you are to perform with - or, in ideal case, the very piano you are to perform with. This provided that you also have sufficient experience with acoustics in general.

[briansaddleback]

I hear your concern. For a while I had the same issue, where my fingers respond unevenly or with different not-intended dynamics when I go play /perform on an acoustic. However, the local college near me has many available practice rooms with differently responding Yamaha and Boston upright acoustic pianos. The control of these in particular was alarming for me in the beginning, I could not control anything on them. However, over the months, of me spending an hour or so on these acoustics once a week, I was able to control these acoustics relatively and now performing on them on the fly is not too bad anymore.

My point is, go see if you can find a local jr college that has a music dept w piano rooms (one that you are preferably an enrolled student of like me, however, usually to be enrolled just means to fill out an application, you get a student ID in 24 hours, and take a 1 unit class for cheap and you should have all privileges as the full music students do as well)
and play /spend an hour or two per week on these. Once a week. That is all you need at least that was for me, to get a somewhat handle on 'adjustment ability' for my hands/fingers.

Hope this help.s

[rockefoten]

You might consider getting Pianoteq. It cost a bit and you need a computer to run it on, but with the software you can tweak your piano a lot. You can choose if it should sound newly tuned or not, a bit damaged or not etc.

Im on a kawai ca 67 and struggle with the same thing. My teachers grand is so different. So I try to change the settings in pianoteq quite often, just to make myself more adaptable.

[kawai_cs]

Thank you for replies, Guys!
You comforted me a little bit because I was already starting to dwell on if there was something fundamentally wrong with my playing. Still I learned the piano practicing many various acoustic instruments in a music school I attended many years ago and got a digital only relatively recently.
Now, I have not been able to find a place I could practice an acoustic in my city so I will probably have to wait until I can buy my own later this year after I move. I will check out the college in an nearby city but it will be probably too much time to drive there.
I do miss that "point of sound" that one experiences with an acoustic instrument.
My pedal sucks too. It is just pedal or no pedal as you mentioned in one of the replies.
Now, I wanted to ask if you guys had any advice how I could use the time practicing digital best before I get an acoustic (it is not going to be sooner than at least 6 months). Taking into consideration the limitations of a digital piano how can one best use the time practicing when they only have access to digital piano?
Obviously it seems very difficult to polish especially some pieces (e.g. Mozart or some lyrical pieces) so how would you go about it? Learn many pieces now and work on touch and tone later?
Advice would be appreciated!

[kawai_cs]

You might consider getting Pianoteq. It cost a bit and you need a computer to run it on, but with the software you can tweak your piano a lot. You can choose if it should sound newly tuned or not, a bit damaged or not etc.

Im on a kawai ca 67 and struggle with the same thing. My teachers grand is so different. So I try to change the settings in pianoteq quite often, just to make myself more adaptable.

Rockefoten, welcome to to the forum and thank you for a valid suggestion. My dp has a few touch options so I alter them all the time. Still, it does not make the instrument any more responsive. I must however admit that I love one thing about dp - I do not have to listen to myself starting to learn a piece  aloud. I just turn the volume down.

[anamnesis]

Rockefoten, welcome to to the forum and thank you for a valid suggestion. My dp has a few touch options so I alter them all the time. Still, it does not make the instrument any more responsive. I must however admit that I love one thing about dp - I do not have to listen to myself starting to learn a piece  aloud. I just turn the volume down.

Try out different instrumental timbres, especially "cleaner" and more precise ones where you cannot get away with an uneven sound as easily as you could with the digital piano timbre.   

Going back and forth between the piano sound and the more clean timbre can help refine your ear to better respond to the piano sound in terms of timing. Sometimes the rich overtones of the piano sound can actually dull your ear due to overload, and you miss subtle nuances in timing.