Electronic Keyboard for Beginners

!±8± Electronic Keyboard for Beginners

The electronic keyboard is a "jack-of-all-trades" instrument. It's highly versatile and portable and an ideal choice of instrument for professionals and beginners, both young and old. If you've decided to purchase a Keyboard for Beginners, you may be overwhelmed by the mess of information available online. This article serves as a guide on purchasing a keyboard for beginners.

You may have come across terms such as synthesizer, arranger, workstation, controller, digital piano, electronic keyboard and so on. Many of these terms can get confusing especially when you try to research online, only to find inconsistent definitions across different sites.

Let's keep it simple. As a beginner, what you'll most likely want is a portable electronic keyboard. If you have a desire to graduate to the traditional acoustic piano in future and are considering a keyboard to test the waters, you may wish to consider a digital piano instead. While these are usually more expensive and larger, they emulate the sound and feel of the traditional piano much more closely than portable keyboards do. However, if your budget is tight, or space is a constraint, you can still choose a portable keyboard.

The following are some important features you'll come across when choosing a Keyboard for Beginners:

1. Touch-sensitive or velocity-sensitive keys. With touch-sensitive keys, the volume of the individual notes you play will depend on how hard you hit them, just as in a traditional acoustic piano. Getting a keyboard with touch-sensitive keys is recommended.

2. Size of keys. Get full-sized or piano-sized keys if you aspire to graduate to an acoustic or digital piano in future. You can consider smaller-sized keys (such as organ-sized) if you're buying the keyboard for kids.

3. Number of keys. At least 61 keys (black and white combined) so you won't regret not being able to play many songs later. If you're buying the keyboard for kids, then any number is fine. Note that a traditional acoustic piano has 88 keys.

4. Polyphony. This refers to the number of notes that can be pressed to produce sound (or "voices") at once. 32-note polyphony should be more than enough for a beginner.

5. AC adaptor power supply. Amazingly enough, some keyboards don't come with an adaptor as a standard. You can always purchase one separately, but remember to include it in your budget.

6. Weighted keys. This means that the keyboard's keys are heavier, much like a traditional piano's keys. If you plan to graduate to an acoustic piano in future, this feature is a must. Such keyboards are normally more expensive than those without.

7. Lighted keys. Though not essential, these can be helpful in your first few weeks of learning the keyboard. They allow you to play songs by simply following the keys that light up on the keyboard.

Hopefully this brief guide has helped you in choosing a Keyboard for Beginners!