Is there any downside to waterfall key shape?

[EricBarker]

Hear me out... why do piano keyboards still have a lip at all? Isn't this a remnant of early laminating processes where the top of the key was made from a separate piece? If a modern Steinway had waterfall-fronted keys, would you have a problem with it? Obviously weighted keys, and longer scale length makes a big difference, but is there any advantage to a lip? I find myself wishing that ALL keybeds had waterfall fronts. It makes it infinitely nicer to play organs/synths, and has little to no negative impact on piano playing.

Me thinks it's just "tradition", and people think "oooh, real piano" when they see that lip. Obviously it might take a bit of getting used to, but after that, would it be any worse?

[ElmerJFudd]

Fair enough.  I do play on the lip to make tenths on the white keys because I don’t have Liszt hands.  It also gives the key a bit larger playing area.  Other than being used to how it feels, idk.  I like the waterfall on organ centric boards - I know palming is a lot more comfortable with the rounded edge.  Traditions I suppose. 

[AnotherScott]

Waterfall is nice for the the smooth front for gliss, but all the waterfall keys I've seen are also shorter in length than piano keys, and a lip provides a little bit of extra length again... whether that actually matters to anyone, I don't know (other than the issue of some actions getting stiffer toward the back, so anything that keeps you away from the back could be helpful).

 

A related issue is, not just the fronts, but the sides. Waterfall are somewhat rounded on all sides. Non waterfall keys might be rounded on the side egdes, or they could be quite sharp, or in-between. If they are too sharp, they can interfere with painless organ playing. But a more rounded key edge makes it easier to trigger an adjacent note accidentally... which tends to not be an issue for organ but can be deadly for piano. You may need to focus on playing more accurately. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing is a different discussion. ;-)

 

[EricBarker]

That's a good point. I'm definitely against any modification that could be potentially bad for piano playing. Sides are a possibility (though, really, how much?). Key length is definitely a difference, longer keys are better IMO. More leverage means more consistency as you move up the key. That's why many people love the Rolands with the extended key scale (though I've never been particularly fond of Roland action). I know that true waterfall keys aren't just about the lip: they're shorter, more rounded on sides, and the black keys bend in the middle.

But the lip? To me that's something that has no real advanatge. Keep the length the same to the end of the lip, just have it drop off from where the lip would usually end. 

You mention about playing 10ths... I actually didn't think about that, and may be the one slight advantage. Yeah, I guess my fingers do tend to grip the lip a bit with 10ths. I'll have to try it on my Mojo next time I have it in front of me. I suspect I can still do it, but it might be a TAD more slippy. +1 for an actual reason!

[Mark Schmieder]

I once had a gig where they rented backline gear and I was mostly playing organ sounds. I was bleeding like there's no tomorrow by the end of the gig! Not sure that Yamaha P90 was ever the same again!

[Joe Muscara]

I've long thought it was dumb that waterfall keys seem to be only available for organ clones and the like. I'd love to have them on synths. If the action is unweighted, why should the key be piano-style? It doesn't feel like that anyway. Maybe some interesting synth techniques would have happened if we would have had waterfall keys on synths all these years.

[Delaware Dave]

I asked this question in a forum a few years ago.  In my view I see no reason for the lip; lipped piano keys are generally longer but a mfgr like Fatar could make the keys waterfall and piano length.  A few people responded and said that they use the lip to 'hang on' to a key while reaching with other fingers.  Personally, I couldn't envision how that was really possible, if you hang on to a depressed key in my experience the key tends to move up when you reach for another key.  I had a couple of organists tell me that that is why they prefer the L-series organs because of the lip and the ability to hang onto one of the lips on the top manual while reaching down to the lower manual.  In any event if that is their preference my experience is that these types of players must be in a small minority.  I would prefer all keys, including piano, to be waterfall, just adjust the total length of the waterfall key to be piano length.  My two cents.

[Baldwin Funster]

I've frequently been tempted to take a dremel and grind down the edges of square piano keys on my midi controllers to get a semi waterfall shape. I doubt I could get it perfect 61 times but the thought still comes up.

[Konnector]

I think all keyboards/pianos, etc. would benefit from waterfall keys. The piano keys would have to be slightly longer to compensate for the missing lip, but that's not a big deal. There's no reason in the world why any controller keyboard shouldn't have a waterfall keyboard these days. None. 

[CyberGene]

Waterfall keys look ugly to me. They remind me of an accordion and scream “cheap” 😀

[EricBarker]

My accord

29 minutes ago, CyberGene said:

Waterfall keys look ugly to me. They remind me of an accordion and scream “cheap” 😀

I’ve never seen an accordion with waterfall keys. The key fronts are usually pretty sharp. Sometimes they have a lip, sometimes not, but they’re not rounded like waterfalls. Mine certainly isn’t!

[MathOfInsects]

I love waterfall keys, and find it much easier to play "diving board" and "lipped" instruments with the WF keys than organ on diving board or lipped keys.

But I think they all have their place. I think each key has an associated hinge point and action, and it's possible I'd get just as used to the same key-type on all actions and hinge points, but I like the intuitive nature of knowing immediately what I'm going to get just by how the keys look.

I do use the lips for certain things, but I imagine I'd get just as used to other ways of doing those things if the lips weren't there. That's the cleanest context that sentence has ever been used in. 

I'd be down for keys that went the other way and had a wedge shape in front. Then your thumb could always be in play and you wouldn't have to move in for full-hand chords. Plus you'd be able to reach farther, effectively. Yet another idea I'll think of and do nothing about. 

 

[ElmerJFudd]

It’s about time for a visit from the KC Janko keyboard proponent. 
 

[CyberGene]

38 minutes ago, EricBarker said:

I’ve never seen an accordion with waterfall keys. The key fronts are usually pretty sharp. Sometimes they have a lip, sometimes not, but they’re not rounded like waterfalls. Mine certainly isn’t!

Hmm, you may be right, I searched for accordion pictures online and I see a lot of them with lips. I haven't seen many accordions, only my mom's accordion (which she never played and despised because she wanted a piano as a kid but they purchased her an accordion instead) and that one had waterfall keys. I will have to ask her if she remembers the brand. But even with that biased upbringing I had based on a single non-standard accordion, I still find waterfall keys ugly, cheap and non-inviting 😀

[Mighty Motif Max]

I have played waterfall-keyed accordions. I hate them - too easy to slip off the keys in many cases, depending on how rounded the ends are. Some are VERY rounded.

 

I don't have that problem with waterfall keybeds on keyboards - I think the playing orientation makes the difference.

[Paul Woodward]

Why do piano keys have lips??

 

https://www.worldpianonews.com/general/explainers/lipped-waterfall-and-diving-board-keys/

[Griswold]

"Humidity would often cause keys to stick, trapped against the key slip (the part of the case in front of the keys). The lip made it easier to lift free the stuck key."

 

I loved this rationale!

I do recall some sub-par uprights I have encountered through the years:)

[Baldwin Funster]

Ok so now we know why pianos have lipped keys.

The question remains why do almost all semi weighed square front keyboards have the lip, including the cheapest PSR to the even cheaper casiotone to even mid-priced midi keyboards. It has been said that buyers are used to it and expect to see it or that it helps when playing 10ths.

But I doubt a buyer of the cheapest casiotone ever noticed one way or the other and couldn't reach a 10th with 2 hands.

So is it a manufacturer thing? Is it easier to extrude a square front key that has a lip? 

 

OT ALERT.

 

But ultimately I'm more curious these days in the different types of black keys found all over the place. Some are flat on top, some have very rounded edges, some have a very pronounced arch to the shape. Sometimes a model will have radically different shaped black keys between the 61 and 73 versions. My question is why the arch? Is it supposed to remedy the key being shorter? Some other reason?

 

OK back to the T.

[Paul Woodward]

Most synths using a diving board style key so they can protrude without getting caught (yeah, really) and keep the body smaller. What you will have is decades of injection moulded keys still being produced. Waterfalls are kept for organ style playing hence not that many (Nord Electro, YC61, Roland VR-730 are all I can think of).

There is also the ‘argument’ that it extends the key ever so slightly making it easier to play. But you do have to ask why it is still there otherwise.

[AnotherScott]

8 hours ago, Jr. Deluxe said:

Ok so now we know why pianos have lipped keys.

The question remains why do almost all semi weighed square front keyboards have the lip, including the cheapest PSR to the even cheaper casiotone

 

From a marketing perspective, I think it also may contribute some sense of it being a "premium" or "quality" product simply because "it's more like a real piano." Lots more people have seen/played pianos IRL than have seen/played waterfall Hammonds. Simply, from the outset, piano was the model.

 

4 hours ago, Paul Woodward said:

Most synths using a diving board style key so they can protrude without getting caught (yeah, really) and keep the body smaller. What you will have is decades of injection moulded keys still being produced.

 

I suspect that diving board keys are cheaper to produce. Once you've got a mold, the additional cost pre item is based on materials. Diving board keys have less material (plastic) in them than waterfall keys.

 

4 hours ago, Paul Woodward said:

Waterfalls are kept for organ style playing hence not that many (Nord Electro, YC61, Roland VR-730 are all I can think of).

 

There are more than that, mosly with Fatar actions (varying some by spring tension and/or landing). Nord non-hammer Electro/Stage and C-series organs, that Roland VR730, all the waterfall Hammonds of this century (except for their highest end models), Crumar, Viscount, Numa, Dexibell, Mag, all use Fatar TP-8O, I believe. Older Rolands (VK8, VR-700, maybe VR-760) were unique to Roland, AFAIK. And that Yamaha YC61 is their own. I don't know the source for Korg's Vox Continental action, but they used the Fatar in the final iteration of the CX3.

 

[EricBarker]

So why are Diving Boards so common? I’ve ALWAYS associated them with toys and low quality boards, considering I grew up with Casiotone and the like during the 80s. I always figured they were a cost cutting measure, but now that I think about it, they were used on some of the priciest synths of 70s. Is it an effort to keep the weight down? My concern is that it seems more likely for dirt and debris to get in

[nadroj]

There is something very, very subtle about the feeling of fingers slipping off a key with a lip. I notice it but don’t think about it when playing piano on a weighted action, but certainly notice the lack of it when trying to play sensitive, expressive piano on a SW action. 
 

And vice versa…except the torn finger hanging by a single tendon after glissing on a lipped leg isn’t quite as subtle feeling. 

[EricBarker]

I always thought the term “semi-weighted” was misleading. It either has weights or it doesn’t! “Organ weighting”… doesn’t have physical weights, why would it? Organs don’t need hammers. There are different variants of hammer action weights, but typically when they say “semi-weighted” they mean tight springs.

[CyberGene]

Not sure how big your hands are but I often find myself not being able to cleanly play 10ths from above the keys which is why I often play them with my fingers in front (and slightly below) the key surface with my pinky or thumb barely hanging on the key lip. If it was a waterfall action, I wouldn’t be able to press such a wide interval (for my hands). 

[ElmerJFudd]

6 minutes ago, CyberGene said:

Not sure how big your hands are but I often find myself not being able to cleanly play 10ths from above the keys which is why I often play them with my fingers in front (and slightly below) the key surface with my pinky or thumb barely hanging on the key lip. If it was a waterfall action, I wouldn’t be able to press such a wide interval (for my hands). 

That’s my issue with needing the lip.  For white key 10ths . I grab the lip and it helps with clearing the neighboring keys. Db to F, D to F#.  Not possible - it requires the classic buh-ching motion.  

[CyberGene]

Yep, here are some pictures I just did. Playing C-E or C-G-E from above is impossible without pressing neighboring keys:

 

However using the lips and moving my wrist in front and it’s an easy task:

[AnotherScott]

1 hour ago, EricBarker said:

I always thought the term “semi-weighted” was misleading. It either has weights or it doesn’t! ... typically when they say “semi-weighted” they mean tight springs.

Unweighted has no weight added. Semi-weighted has a physical weight added to give the board more "heft," but no hammer. "Fully" weighted has a hammer mechanism, which gives the key, not just a sense of weight, but also inertia. Semi-weighted boards may have light or heavy tension strings, they're still semi-weighted. There was also a bunch of discussion about this at https://forums.musicplayer.com/topic/168755-semi-weighted-keyboards/#comment-2669609

 

[MathOfInsects]

I too usually do the "grab the front and hold on for dear life" version of 10ths, but in fact I play almost all my gigs on a board with waterfall keys and have no trouble doing this with them.

I'm not sure if this would be true if the keys were as heavy as a piano, though. I guess there's really no way to test that either, by definition.