Nord Wave question

[tayholliday]

My band is currently using a Nord Stage compact. We'd like something a little smaller and lighter and with similar synth capabilities and a decent piano sound. We rarely use the organ sound on the Stage. Will the Wave fit the bill? Or will single-sampled piano sounds be inferior enough to stick with the Stage?

thanks!

[Wout Blommers]

[jamesb]

I bought a Wave a while ago, so I could put it on my back and take the train to rehearsals. It actually comes with a few nice piano and rhodes samples, and I've made a few others from VSTs. Not being able to have velocity layers is a big limitation, but you can morph filter cutoff, amplitude and whatever else with velocity, so a rough approximation to piano response can be made. Good enough for loud rehearsals, not for trio jazz or classical! But, for what it's worth, I'm very happy to have a light great sounding and very capable keyboard that I can so easily cart around.
The electro3 might be worth a look if you're not into multi-timbrality or a tweakable synth.

[anotherscott]

I agree with most of jamesb's excellent response.

I would add that, if your piano needs are such that you can handle them on the 4 octave keyboard you already know the Wave has, then those available piano sounds will probably be good enough to get you by for your needs.

(Alternatively, if necessary, you could add a piano sound with very little in the way of additional weight or travel bulk by connecting a small module. Maybe a Kurzweil ME-1 or an SM Pro V-Machine.)

However I disagree about considering an Electro 3. You want similar synth capabilities to the Stage, and the Electro basically has none at all. What it cops from the Stage are the organ you don't care about and the piano. The one thing the E3 has that the Stage doesn't is the Sample Library function... but you get that in the Wave too.