BITS and PIECES
Best music room piano for the teacher:
Any of the upper end Casio Privias. Don’t go cheaper than $700.00. Look for wooden-weighted keys.
It will take a beating and continue to work. The samples are amazing. You’ll never have to get it tuned.
Don’t overwork the internal speakers; use an amp or run it through a classroom PA. Buy a case.
Yeah, with heavy daily usage, the keyboard will breakdown in about eight years but by then, you’ll be in a different school, right?
Best sustain pedal for teacher's digital piano:
M-Audio SP 2 - universal sustain pedal with piano style action for midi keyboards, digital pianos & more. Built like a tank. And when they fail, it is usually because of a screw that that has come undone inside the housing - a five minute easy fix.
Worst music room piano for the music teacher:
Any acoustic spinet or upright. Both create terrible sight-lines as well as too great a chasm between you and the class.
It will be out of tune 99% of every day of teaching.
Added detriment: your kids will learn to sing out of tune.
Best gigging piano:
Korg SV-2: Get the 88-key model WITHOUT speakers. Buy a keyboard amp. The best piano out there, bang for the buck. Tons of pre-sets. Killer Italian grand sound as well as classic Fender Rhodes and Wurlies.
No, it’s not too heavy. Maybe you are too weak?
Best keyboard stand for the teacher’s music room piano or the gigging piano:
A double X-brace. You’ll need stability; don’t go with a single; get a double.
Best overall piano books/series:
Alfred
Best source for budget a classroom keyboard lab:
Ebay and Amazon. Do your homework. Look for bargains and wait for sales.
Get 61-key electric keyboards with MIDI. Extra points if it has USB. I had a lot of different Yamaha models; they held up very well.
Buy the keyboards first, then the single X-brace keyboard stands. You can put the keyboards on the floor for a while until you get the stands. Don’t use chairs; have the kids stand. And you don’t need sustain pedals. If you have them, don’t connect them for several months.
Don’t loan them out.
Don’t buy cases. Keep the packing boxes for storage in the summer months.
Depending on how many keyboards you use, you’ll need extension cords and several 6-outlet, 200 joule, surge protector power strips.
You’ll probably want a 6-inch power extension cable for each keyboard power wart. It will allow you to use all of the inputs on the power strips. The reason: a single wall-wart tends to take up the space for two inputs on power strips.
Hardest truth to accept:
Every year several keyboards will break from wear and tear.
Does anything last with kids?
Two big reasons for electric keyboards:
MIDI (musical instrument digital interface) and USB (universal series bus): That’s how all electric keyboards (even the cheap ones) connect to computers, audio interfaces, DAWs (digital audio workstations) and soft synths (software synthesizers that are only computer code and don’t come with any hardware) like Pro Tool, Logic, and Reason. They don’t “roll tape” to record music these days. Recording is digital and electric keyboards are the primary way of inputting digital audio data.
I grew up writing music with a pencil and paper and still do.
On the other hand, I can do the “computer thing” and do it often– using DAWs as well as music notation software like Avid’s “Sibelius”.
Tip: kids are using this stuff at home. MIDI and USB are the recent past, now, and future: it’s about time all music teachers embrace them, read the f***king manual, and get on board before the next musical interface comes along and replaces MIDI.
Best gateway instrument for piano:
A chromatic xylophone
Biggest line of BS from music teachers getting fourth graders ready for band:
“Everyone wants to play drums!” No kidding, Captain Obvious, especially if you have been emphasizing drums, tambourines, shakers, maracas, castanets, sticks, wrist bells, bongos, triangles, egg shakers, jingle sticks, and Boomwackers for the past four years in your music room and don’t have a keyboard lab.
You reap what you sow.
What every music teacher dreads hearing when introducing band instruments to fourth graders:
Fourth grader (thinking about their keyboard or guitar at home): “No thanks, I’m good.”
Best music room piano for the teacher:
Any of the upper end Casio Privias. Don’t go cheaper than $700.00. Look for wooden-weighted keys.
It will take a beating and continue to work. The samples are amazing. You’ll never have to get it tuned.
Don’t overwork the internal speakers; use an amp or run it through a classroom PA. Buy a case.
Yeah, with heavy daily usage, the keyboard will breakdown in about eight years but by then, you’ll be in a different school, right?
Best sustain pedal for teacher's digital piano:
M-Audio SP 2 - universal sustain pedal with piano style action for midi keyboards, digital pianos & more. Built like a tank. And when they fail, it is usually because of a screw that that has come undone inside the housing - a five minute easy fix.
Worst music room piano for the music teacher:
Any acoustic spinet or upright. Both create terrible sight-lines as well as too great a chasm between you and the class.
It will be out of tune 99% of every day of teaching.
Added detriment: your kids will learn to sing out of tune.
Best gigging piano:
Korg SV-2: Get the 88-key model WITHOUT speakers. Buy a keyboard amp. The best piano out there, bang for the buck. Tons of pre-sets. Killer Italian grand sound as well as classic Fender Rhodes and Wurlies.
No, it’s not too heavy. Maybe you are too weak?
Best keyboard stand for the teacher’s music room piano or the gigging piano:
A double X-brace. You’ll need stability; don’t go with a single; get a double.
Best overall piano books/series:
Alfred
Best source for budget a classroom keyboard lab:
Ebay and Amazon. Do your homework. Look for bargains and wait for sales.
Get 61-key electric keyboards with MIDI. Extra points if it has USB. I had a lot of different Yamaha models; they held up very well.
Buy the keyboards first, then the single X-brace keyboard stands. You can put the keyboards on the floor for a while until you get the stands. Don’t use chairs; have the kids stand. And you don’t need sustain pedals. If you have them, don’t connect them for several months.
Don’t loan them out.
Don’t buy cases. Keep the packing boxes for storage in the summer months.
Depending on how many keyboards you use, you’ll need extension cords and several 6-outlet, 200 joule, surge protector power strips.
You’ll probably want a 6-inch power extension cable for each keyboard power wart. It will allow you to use all of the inputs on the power strips. The reason: a single wall-wart tends to take up the space for two inputs on power strips.
Hardest truth to accept:
Every year several keyboards will break from wear and tear.
Does anything last with kids?
Two big reasons for electric keyboards:
MIDI (musical instrument digital interface) and USB (universal series bus): That’s how all electric keyboards (even the cheap ones) connect to computers, audio interfaces, DAWs (digital audio workstations) and soft synths (software synthesizers that are only computer code and don’t come with any hardware) like Pro Tool, Logic, and Reason. They don’t “roll tape” to record music these days. Recording is digital and electric keyboards are the primary way of inputting digital audio data.
I grew up writing music with a pencil and paper and still do.
On the other hand, I can do the “computer thing” and do it often– using DAWs as well as music notation software like Avid’s “Sibelius”.
Tip: kids are using this stuff at home. MIDI and USB are the recent past, now, and future: it’s about time all music teachers embrace them, read the f***king manual, and get on board before the next musical interface comes along and replaces MIDI.
Best gateway instrument for piano:
A chromatic xylophone
Biggest line of BS from music teachers getting fourth graders ready for band:
“Everyone wants to play drums!” No kidding, Captain Obvious, especially if you have been emphasizing drums, tambourines, shakers, maracas, castanets, sticks, wrist bells, bongos, triangles, egg shakers, jingle sticks, and Boomwackers for the past four years in your music room and don’t have a keyboard lab.
You reap what you sow.
What every music teacher dreads hearing when introducing band instruments to fourth graders:
Fourth grader (thinking about their keyboard or guitar at home): “No thanks, I’m good.”
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