An electronic piano is a

keyboard instrument A keyboard instrument is a musical instrument played using a keyboard, a row of levers which are pressed by the fingers. The most common of these are the piano, organ, and various electronic keyboards, including synthesizers and digital pian ...

designed to simulate the timbre of a

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

(and sometimes a

harpsichord A harpsichord ( it, clavicembalo; french: clavecin; german: Cembalo; es, clavecín; pt, cravo; nl, klavecimbel; pl, klawesyn) is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. This activates a row of levers that turn a trigger mechanism ...

or an

organ Organ may refer to: Biology * Organ (biology), a part of an organism Musical instruments * Organ (music), a family of keyboard musical instruments characterized by sustained tone ** Electronic organ, an electronic keyboard instrument ** Hammond ...

) using analog circuitry. "Electronic Piano" was also the trade name used for

Wurlitzer The Rudolph Wurlitzer Company, usually referred to as simply Wurlitzer, is an American company started in Cincinnati in 1853 by German immigrant (Franz) Rudolph Wurlitzer. The company initially imported stringed, woodwind and brass instruments ...

's popular line of

electric piano An electric piano is a musical instrument which produces sounds when a performer presses the keys of a piano-style musical keyboard. Pressing keys causes mechanical hammers to strike metal strings, metal reeds or wire tines, leading to vibrations ...

s, which were produced from the 1950s to the 1980s, although this was not actually what is now commonly known as an electronic piano. Electronic pianos work similarly to analog

synthesizer A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis a ...

s in that they generate their tones through

oscillators Oscillation is the repetitive or periodic variation, typically in time, of some measure about a central value (often a point of equilibrium) or between two or more different states. Familiar examples of oscillation include a swinging pendulum ...

, whereas electric pianos are mechanical, their sound being electrified by a pickup and then amplified through an internal or external amplifier. The first electronic pianos date from the 1970s and were mostly made in Italy , although similar models were made concurrently in Japan. An exception is the range of instruments made by RMI in the United States from 1967 to approximately 1980, which was used by

Genesis Genesis may refer to: Bible * Book of Genesis, the first book of the biblical scriptures of both Judaism and Christianity, describing the creation of the Earth and of mankind * Genesis creation narrative, the first several chapters of the Book of ...

Yes Yes or YES may refer to: * An affirmative particle in the English language; see yes and no Education * YES Prep Public Schools, Houston, Texas, US * YES (Your Extraordinary Saturday), a learning program from the Minnesota Institute for Talent ...

Deep Purple Deep Purple are an English rock band formed in London in 1968. They are considered to be among the pioneers of heavy metal and modern hard rock music, but their musical style has changed over the course of its existence. Originally formed as ...

Elton John Sir Elton Hercules John (born Reginald Kenneth Dwight; 25 March 1947) is a British singer, pianist and composer. Commonly nicknamed the "Rocket Man" after his 1972 hit single of the same name, John has led a commercially successful career a ...

and

Rick Wakeman Richard Christopher Wakeman (born 18 May 1949) is an English keyboardist best known as a former member of the progressive rock band Yes across five tenures between 1971 and 2004, and for his solo albums released in the 1970s. Born and raised ...

. These early electronic pianos (including the RMI) are not velocity sensitive in that, like an

, they do not vary their volume based on how hard or soft the keys are played. "The major drawback of the RMI was its total lack of touch sensitivity. I found this very restricting, especially since any bum-notes are played at full volume, no matter how lightly you brush against them" ( Tony Banks, quoted in ). The first electronic grand piano was produced in 1979 and patented in 1981 by Wil Decker of St. James, NY. (PianoNova Co.) It contained the first full-touch-sensitive keyboard and working pedals . Electronic pianos became less popular in the 1980s when the

digital piano A digital piano is a type of electronic keyboard instrument designed to serve primarily as an alternative to the traditional acoustic piano, both in how it feels to play and in the sound it produces. Digital pianos use either synthesized emula ...

and polyphonic

became available and affordable enough for both professional and home use as an inexpensive, smaller and lighter alternative to an acoustic piano. In modern usage, the term ''electronic piano'' sometimes refers to either a digital piano or a stage piano. This is actually a misnomer, as electronic pianos use analog synthesis to generate its sounds while digital pianos normally use digital data sample-based synthesis. In addition, early digital pianos in the mid-1980s were often referred to as a ''personal electronic piano''.

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