Sounds fantastic! Yeah, that's unreal.
I'm Grantley here from Better Music, I'm at Pier One in Sydney up with Mark Van Der Sluis,
looking at Roland's new 2015 launch, I'm really excited to be here and from the sound of it,
it's a cracker of a piano. Can you tell us about it, Mark?
Yeah look, a brand new generation of pianos here, this is the new HP and LX series, and
we're here with the flagship model, this is the LX-17, the tallest of all of them, the
LX-7 is under that, and then the HP-605 and 603. This entirely new generation has made
a departure away from sampling technology, so the sound you just heard not only sounds
like a spectacularly great grand piano sound, but it behaves just like one. Sampling, as
you know, actually just re-triggers basically a snapshot of audio, so each note that you
play captures the sound but it doesn't capture the behaviour, and on a grand piano, as you
know, Grantley, when you're playing, all of those notes have interference and all of this
harmonic activity, that you just can't capture with sampling. So anytime that you play notes
using this technology, you get all of that harmonic resonance and it's a behaviour that
you just can't get any other way. So a brand new sound engine, another great feature of
this new generation is the brand new action, so we have the new PHA50 and you can see here,
we've got wood. Now this is not you're everyday action, this is a hybrid action, so Roland
have looked at the best materials for a digital piano, baring in mind that acoustic pianos
have solid wooden keys, solid wooden keys work fine on an acoustic piano because they
hit strings, but on a digital piano there are no strings, so they have to hit sensors,
this action combines the best of both worlds, wood and plastic, to give you the ultimate
performance, the traditional feel and look of wood, but the rigidity and strength of
plastic. That also means that we can still do a ten year warranty on our HP and LX pianos.
So not only does it feel great, but it's also harnessed that with our high resolution sensing
technology, so you've got ultimate expression through the touch, and you seriously need
to try it, to know how good that feels. So it sounds awesome, feels brilliant, the sound
of course is largely due to this wonderful speaker system, so the LX-17, 2 speakers up
the top, four in the middle, and 2 cabinet ones. So in actual fact, like an acoustic
piano, I can open the lid, it's all coming at me, and that's, you know it's kind of strange
for a digital piano to sound that realistic, but that's what we have with acoustic projection.
Now previously we had wireless connectivity and that was using wi-fi, now we're using bluetooth. So
bluetooth opens up a whole new world because not only do we have great Roland apps, but
there's other apps, apps like Peer Score, sheet music direct, apps where you can download
music for free, and play along with it. Peer Score is just one fantastic example, so that's
a piece of music, I've downloaded that for free, and I can control the pages by simply
pressing the damper pedal, centre or left on the piano, now this works on all the models,
so I no longer have to try and do it manually, and this app searches the entire database
of YouTube videos, so if I want to try this piece for the first time, hear someone else
play it or watch a video of someone else doing it, I can just press play, and audition that
piece myself. Now this is playing through the speakers of the LX-17 so the entire experience
is right here with me, so it makes learning incredibly fun. And you can learn at your
pace all here in the comfort of your HP or LX piano, but of course like any piano, you've got to
play it and experience it for yourself so Grantley, it's your turn, batter up, let's try it out. First time...
So Grantley, a lot of people watching the video can't appreciate the feel and the touch
of this piano, so what's you're first impression of the action?
Well for me it's really very, very close to a grand piano feel, you can definitely tell
the action's really good, it's really balanced, nice and easy to sort of differentiate when
playing different tones and dynamic sort of ranges and yeah, I mean I'd love to play it
some more to find out some more.
Excellent!
Thanks for that Mark, I really loved having a go at the new LX-17 you've got here, I'm
looking forward to see the rest of the HP and LX range down at Pier One, we're going
to do a full review of this piano shortly through Better Music, and really look forward
to seeing you all come into the store and check it out for yourself. See you all again soon.