Nord User Forum

I went through a period of being very picky about piano actions -- probably because all of mine at the time were substandard -- but, after improving the situation, it's not an issue any more. I realized that if you wanted to play something that felt like a fully-weighted piano action, you'd need help at gigs getting it on stage and then off again. Or perhaps throw out your back trying to do it alone when everyone else is busy with their stuff.

If you're playing at home, weight is not an issue, so there are many more decent choices. My standard -- how quickly can I stop paying attention to whatever it is that I'm playing on, and start getting into the music? I can do that pretty quickly on the NP4-style keybeds for weighted, and the NS3C keybed for unweighted. If there is better out there, it's not of much interest to me.

Janatuinen wrote:I have currently Electro 6D which I control with really old Roland FP2. I’m looking for better action and I tested this week both Piano 5 and Grand. I’m not fully satisfied with Piano 5 action, it’s a bit gluey. Nord Grand is quite nice to play even the action is light but at the same time the action is so noisy that it’s not the right one for me as I’m mostly playing with headphones when kids are already sleeping and I don’t want to wake them up. It’s much more noisier than my 15 years old Roland. Yamaha CP88 was quite noisy as well.

Suprisingly actions haven’t developed so much during 15 years when comparing to my Roland. I try to find now Kawai VPC1 for testing.

Check how much noise difference they have stage 2 vs vpc 1..

And hear also how better the same piano sound from vpc keybed

I visit a local store today and tried the NG and the 5 side by side for the first time.
I was a little bit disappointed with the action on the NG, it felt fake and a … bit plastic? I remember that feeling from my old Rhodes Mark II that I had years ago. It felt like it was meant that you should feel the mechanism, but it came to late after the sound in some way.
The NP5 was more like i remember my Nord Stage Classic 88, light, but still more enjoyable then the Nord Grand.
I want one for home use only, they had a couple Kawai right next to it, but I didn’t tried any of them.
Got a Viscount Legend’s Compact about a year ago, it ended up in my band and rehearsal room. The sound from the A pianos is OK, but the action is a bit strange with to little difference between low and full velocity. It can be managed, but it needs regular use to get used to. But I like the shape on it, and I have an organ clone on top off it ( and my NS3 HP on the top tier).
All EP’s and most of the synth stuff is still played from my NS.
I had a hope that the NG had the same room on top of it, but it hadn’t.

I need to visit the store again and use some more time on them. For me, I think a 73 keys could be enough, it will save me some money and space.

Yeah my impressions as well. Although I was going on muscle memory, not side by side.

My CP4 has sold and expect the CP88 to sell tomorrow. So I'm sort of back in the hunt for a lighter weight DP then the 48 lbs. of P515.

I was planning on just spending a little amount of dough on the P-125 for the few Jazz gigs I'm doing but considering the NP5 88. While the Yamaha is "good enough" for some jazz gigs and sounds and plays decent enough "for what it is", I've never been that kind of guy to buy something that's uninspiring but perfectly functional.

Although a rather large part of me tells me I'm crazy for getting in bed with another Nord again given their current QC issues relating to the action. Maybe if I can get an extended warranty covering that and in town service, I might feel better.

Dave Ferris wrote:Yeah my impressions as well. Although I was going on muscle memory, not side by side.

My CP4 has sold and expect the CP88 to sell tomorrow. So I'm sort of back in the hunt for a lighter weight DP then the 48 lbs. of P515.

I was planning on just spending a little amount of dough on the P-125 for the few Jazz gigs I'm doing but considering the NP5 88. While the Yamaha is "good enough" for some jazz gigs and sounds and plays decent enough "for what it is", I've never been that kind of guy to buy something that's uninspiring but perfectly functional.

Although a rather large part of me tells me I'm crazy for getting in bed with another Nord again given their current QC issues relating to the action. Maybe if I can get an extended warranty covering that and in town service, I might feel better.

I might have the solution for you for warranty extend… check bax-shop.com they have standard 3 years warranty and you can extend another 2 years but i cant find deeper details on that.. and their phones isnt answering when i am calling… they answer me in email but still didnt manage to figure out how it works ( propably because they dont sell to my country )

I can only comment from a Nord Grand perspective and my journey towards it.
I started with a used Kawai CA ..something from 15 years ago. It was too heavy keybed for me at the time.
I too liked the sounds from youtube videos, and I tried Kawais es8, mp7se and mp11se in a store in Stockholm. I could "understand" that mp11se is probably a better keybed action wise. But my fingers liked the mp7se keybed better. But the mp7se was also a bit noisy

So back to the noisy Nord grand. And I didn't get "it" using the cheap headphones in the store. So I went to the store again using my own headphones this time. Sennheiser HD-25 II amperior. Really good headphones by the way. Light and isolates well.
NOW I got it. Everything works together nicely, sounds, keybed feel, and no noise keybed. My neighbours might disagree though.. ha ha.

No regrets. If Nord ever where to release a Nord Grand 2 with a mp11se or vpc1 keybed it would of course be interesting option. But Kawai might never want to license it.

Also tried the Yamaha cp88. Also liked the piano sound, but it was a little heavy for my fingers .. at that time.

So I guess, everyones fingers is a little bit different. Now that I've enjoyed playing the Nord Grand a lot, maybe I can manage handle something heavier again.

Hi, can you confirm a différence between keybed of piano
4 vs piano 5 ? I have the 4 and feel a bit too strong. My arms hurt me a bit when playing a Long Time. I juste quickly tested the 5 i felt lighter but not sûre, because i hadn t m'y 4.
If you Can tell...
Thanks.

Jazzrock wrote:...I found the action quite light, so not really like a grand piano.
...
the action was heavier, so more realistic

I'm not sure about this equation "more key weight=more realism".

Essentially all of the pianos I've played in my life, from crappy uprights to quality grands and baby grands, had fairly light actions. Surely lighter than all the digital pianos I've had.
Apart from my impression, I also remember a very detailed article from a piano technician (was it here on in another forum?), who measured the force needed to press the keys on a big range of acoustic and digital pianos, and the digitals were invariably MUCH heavier than the real thing.

My (and his) impression is that piano companies have pushed this concept of heavier keys to compensate for the inability to recreate a real acoustic action, and as now we have generations of players who never touched a real acoustic and like heavier and heavier actions, the thing has taken a life of its own.

This was the post I'm referring to, but unfortunately the tables with the measurements data are not visible anymore, they were probably attached to a link which became corrupted.
Anyway, if you read the discussion you'll get a good idea.

https://forums.musicplayer.com/topic/17 ... chweights/

Spider wrote:This was the post I'm referring to, but unfortunately the tables with the measurements data are not visible anymore, they were probably attached to a link which became corrupted.
Anyway, if you read the discussion you'll get a good idea.

https://forums.musicplayer.com/topic/17 ... chweights/

The table linked in the opening post and also in others is still there at http://www.stewartschultz.com/Music/Sel ... 9(535).png and it seems to be quite complete