electronic keyboards

Believe it or not, keyboard instruments using electricity date back to the 1700s. The earliest such instruments used electricity to activate the mechanisms, but the sounds were still created mechanically. In the 1800s, electromagnetic circuits began to be used to create the sounds. In the 1900s, electronics came into the picture. Today, various electric pianos, electric organs, and synthesizers are in common use. But most consumers looking for a substitute for an acoustic piano, which makes a beautiful piece of furniture (that's heavy and needs tuning periodically), opt for an electronic keyboard. Usually that means a keyboard shorter than the standard 88 keys, and they lack the feel of the weighted keys on an acoustic. Sometimes they even lack touch sensitivity, meaning the volume can only be controlled by a knob and not by the force with which the keys are played. They have some number of preset synthesized sounds rather than the ability to edit the audio signals as a synthesizer does.

This model includes 100 instrument sounds and 100 drum beat styles.
It can also generate accompaniments by reading bass notes and chord types.

Here is a 61-key model. That's five full octaves.

---

Here is a 76-key model. That's still short 7 keys at the bottom end and 5 keys at the top.

This model features even more instruments and drum beats,
plus layering, effects, pitch bend, custom synthesizing,
multitrack recording, 16 channels for MIDI instruments, etc.

---

This one is classified as a digital piano. It has 88 weighted keys, giving it the range and feel of an acoustic.

This model is more specialized. Only five instrument choices,
tuning, transposing, effects, and a few other features.

On the other hand, here's a digital piano with features that
are comparable to those of the 76-key electronic keyboard.

---

---

~ FURTHER READING ~

This model only has 24 keys, but it has the longest span: 100 inches.

It does not require an ability to play by ear; you have to play by foot!
This makes it suitable for playing tunes such as "Walk On By" by Bacharach-David.

Between the speakers are the volume knob and other controls.
It imitates piano, organ, music box, vibraphone, trumpet, saxophone, violin, guitar, or harp.
You can record and play back up to 80 notes. Enough for 16 measures of Beethoven's Ninth.
There are ten demo songs included. (Try to convince someone that you recorded them!)
You can plug in an external sound source to play through the speakers . . . and play along.
Another entertaining feature is an instruction sheet written by someone for whom English is a second language.