Yamaha YDP-S54 digital piano is designed to give beginners and advanced musicians alike the experience of playing a real piano.
It represents the high end of Yamaha Corporation’s Arius series of digital pianos.
Its full 88-key grading Hammer 3 keyboard with synthetic Ebony and ivory keyboard feels like a real piano.
The sound is based on Yamaha’s nine-foot concert grand piano. It has three pedals.
Yamaha ydp-s 54 includes ten instrumental sounds and 50 song albums. Built-in speakers provide you with high-fidelity Stereo and concert hall reverb.
A built-in tape recorder allows you to listen to your performances. You can use it with your iPhone for more fun.
Appearance
Although it is considered a digital piano, it has a stylish contemporary look, more streamlined and compact.
There are no upright music stands, the top is completely flat, and there are solid full-height side panels.
The keyboard cover looks just like what you would see on a traditional upright piano. It includes a drop-down feature to prevent it from slamming on the keyboard.
Yamaha will provide a separate piano stool. However, you may choose to buy one elsewhere. The Height of the Yamaha bench can not be adjusted, and a more comfortable third-party alternative is available.
All in all, the piano is very slim in shape and weighs only 40 kg. This makes it an ideal choice for a small apartment or music room.
The GH3 keyboard
When you sit down to play Yamaha Ydp-s54, your hand might think it’s a concert grand piano.
This is due to Yamaha Corporation’s proprietary Graded Hammer 3 GH3 action.
It uses a real hammer attached to each key to provide a more realistic sense of touch.
The weighted keys have a heavy touch at the bass end, like a learning piano.
These detect the movement of the keys providing an accurate grand piano-like response. This allows for maximum expressive control and a very fast repetition of notes.
You can choose three different levels of key sensitivity to suit your playing style. Or turn it off.
There are synthetic ivory and Ebony on the keys, and the texture is lifelike.
Smooth Black keys absorb moisture and won’t feel slippery if wet.
The sound of the piano in a concert
The unique realistic sound source Yamaha YDP-S54 is the famous 9-foot CFX concert grand piano.
This piano is the first instrument of choice for International Chopin Piano Competition winners.
To reproduce the sound of this magnificent instrument, Yamaha YDP-S54 uses stereo recording at several dynamic levels with each CFX note.
For greater realism, it also includes the sound of each note being released.
Playing notes on a piano with a shock absorber pedal will resonate with other strings. Yamaha simulates this effect by adding a string and damping resonance digital signal processing DSP algorithm.
Yamaha ydp-s 54 offers 192 note polyphony. That means you’ll never run out of messages or even play giant chords under the damper pedals.
A complete set of pedals
Like a grand piano, the Yamaha YDP-S54 has three pedals.
The familiar shock absorber pedal is on the right, sometimes referred to as the “support” pedal. On an Acoustic Piano, this pedal removes all the dampers from the strings at once so that the strings are free to ring. Yamaha YDP-S54 accomplishes the same task using a DSP.
You can press half the damper pedal on an acoustic piano to produce a slight, continuous sound. This is called a “half-pedal,” and Yamaha YDP-S54 allows you to do the same.
The left-hand pedal is soft. As the name suggests, it makes the instrument play more quietly.
There’s a gas pedal in the middle. Acoustically, this pedal only holds notes that are held down when the pedal is pressed.
But Yamaha YDP-S54 does more than imitate a real piano! It gives you three grand pianos, two digital pianos, two organs, a harp, a vibrato, and strings. You can quickly select the sound you want by pressing the button on the left side of the keyboard.
Even better, you can use the duet mode to split the keyboard and assign different sounds to each half. Or use dual-mode to post two sounds such as piano and string to the entire keyboard range.
If you need to match another instrument or reason and convert the entire device up or down by up to 6 semitones, you can change the tuning.
To help you practice, the built-in metronome can be set from 32 to 280 beats per minute.
Excellent built-in sound system
The YamahaYDP-S54 includes a relatively powerful 20-watt per-channel stereo amplifier and a pair of 5-2.5-inch Oval Speakers. This way, you can play at almost full concert volume or turn it down to keep your neighbors happy late at night.
A pair of Stereo headphone jacks are also available when you need complete privacy. The second headphone Jack is useful for duets.
You can “sweeten” your voice with four different types of reverbs, so it feels like you’re performing in a concert or recital hall, club, or room.
A special Yamaha feature called Intelligent Acoustic control IAC automatically adjusts the sound so that you can get a balanced sound at any volume level.
Song recording
Yamaha YDP-S54 consists of 10 demo songs plus a collection of 50 classic music books.
If you want to practice together, you can play it in different rhythms.
It also includes a basic song recorder that can record and play two separate tracks.
This is useful for evaluating your performance or recording a background piece for an impromptu performance. It can also be used as a sketchpad for songwriters.
Yamaha YDP-S54 comes with 100k of user memory, enough to hold about 9 or 10 songs of average length.
USB extension
Yamaha YDP-S54 includes a USB host port that allows you to connect the digital piano to a variety of educational and entertainment music applications running on IOS MOBILE DEVICES:
The smart pianist is an iOS APP that analyzes songs stored in a library and displays chord diagrams so you can play with them.
It can also select a piano sound, control layer and split function, control transposition, tuning, and pedal set.
Visual performers allow you to visualize your musical performance graphically. As the pitch and intensity of the music change, the graphic animation changes over time.
Piano Diaries help you track your practice schedule and monitor your progress by recording your performances.
My music recorder is a free application designed for parents to record, archive, and share their children’s music practices and performances. The connection requires a Yamaha-UX1 interface.
Unfortunately, Android devices are not supported. Besides, you can not record MIDI data using a USB port or send Midi to YDP-S54 in Yamaha from an application running Windows or the Macintosh operating system.
The Final Conclusion
Yamaha YDP-S54 is ideal for novice to intermediate piano students or anyone who wants to play music at will. Serious pianists may find that it is not a complete substitute for a real piano.
Yamaha Corporation is the world’s largest maker of musical instruments. Their brand is recognized and respected by music professionals and institutions around the world. Many classical concert halls offer Yamaha pianos to visiting artists.
That means Yamaha knows how to make the piano sound good and play well. Yamaha YDP-S54 does a pretty good job of imitating the traditional sound piano.
Ultimately, your choice of the piano is a matter of personal taste. Of course, Yamaha YDP-S54 digital piano provides you with a very intimate concert playing experience, even in the smallest space.