Kurzweil has released SP6. The architecture of the portable and light 88-note keyboard is based on the LENA digital signal processor. Kurzweil SP6 adopted the essential characteristics of Forte SE, continuing the tradition of Forte and PC3 series.

Kurzweil top digital concert pianos are the guarantee of high level stage performing and studio work. The brand name, most powerful synth engine, plenty of splendid sounds and decent keyboards make any musician dream about these instruments. Chris Martirano of AMS company will demonstrate you some what the happy medium is all about – have a look at 6-octave Forte7 and Artis7.

Generalmusic, an Italian company which used to be quite popular, has found the investor from Finland and now is trying to break through the fortification of the today’s market with its new digital stage piano Promega 2+ which will be produced as a Generalmusic instrument. The fact that it’s going to have “GEM” on it will surely attract many musicians. The keyboard features a classic interface, uses sample playback and physical modeling techniques to generate waveforms though offers a bit limited sound library for a contemporary stage piano. Anyway, it sounds really great leaving no doubt about the quality and the panels look fine – as compelling as its voices. We’re convinced it’s right what you need to take on stage but it comes with the price which might seem too heavy to do it.

Roland’s digital stage piano surely hit the first day of NAMM 2017. Roland entitled it a “Stage Revolution” and we’ll try to find out whether it’s something new or the modification of something familiar and most important whether there is any point for Kurzweil to panic about its Artis/Forte series.

This time the update is considerable enough comprising 256 new programs, 80 multiprograms among which there are programs from popular K2xxx and PC3 series, new effects slots the number of which is twice bigger now and equals the number of those from Forte 7/8. If we count the total number of programs we should say that Forte SE surpassed the older models, so it seems that very soon we might learn about new firmware for Forte 7/8 as well.