REVIEW - Kawai ES8 portable Digital Piano - RECOMMENDED - The new Kawai ES8 is a 2016 replacement of the very popular Kawai ES7 which was out for a number of years. Although the ES7 was a very successful product for the Kawai company, the ES8 ($1999US internet discount price - not including optional triple pedal lyre and furniture stand) has some noticeably upgraded changes while keeping many of the popular features of the previous model including it's cabinet design, intuitive control panel layout, internal speaker system, and many of the previous functions. So even though the ES8 has been improved and upgraded in some important ways, it has kept the same price as before on the ES7...so that's a good thing.
So exactly what are these improvements in the new ES8? When it comes down to what is truly important in a digital piano, it's all about the key action & piano sound authenticity along with good solid pedaling and control with a big beautiful tone. In other words, it's all about playing the piano, and when it comes to digital pianos, although some of them have very cool digital features with 100's of extra sounds, multitrack recording, rhythm, and so on, without the piano being able to play and sound like a real good natural acoustic piano, nothing else really matters. The ES8 first and foremost is, in my opinion, the best self contained portable digital piano on the market today. I don't say this lightly but after playing all of the name brand self-contained (with internal speakers) portable digital pianos out there, the new ES8 "checks all the boxes" with regard to an instrument which provides a realistic piano playing experience along with some usable and practical digital features without being overloaded with stuff that most people may not use. The big changes from the previous ES7 primarily has to do with the key action and piano sound chip.
When it comes to key action realism and movement, the prior ES7 model was very good compared to its competition and I did enjoy playing it. However there is always room for improvement and in the new ES8, Kawai has introduced its new counter-weight balanced RM3 key action. All the digital piano manufacturers try to make you believe their key actions are the best because after-all, they are trying to sell you their products. Because of this I have seen some exaggerated claims by these people saying how good their pianos are when if fact, some of them are not so good. But with the ES8 key action, the feel is noticeably more realistic as compared to a good acoustic piano and the difference that I believe is notable is the keys are a bit firmer to,press down, but without being too firm, and the key returns to resting position more quickly, without being too quick. What this translates to is a much more responsive natural key movement which allows for more precise key repetition, better technique, and ability to play complex music without key hesitation. It also gives the player a better connection to the music because the key moves and responds so much more accurately. The graded hammer weighted keys have a good balance to them up & down the keyboard and the synthetic ivory-feel matte finish keys really adds a nice touch and helps with absorbing sweat from the fingers. That matte finish also cuts down on the glare you would otherwise be getting from regular white plastic keys. If you are a piano player had years of experience playing real good acoustic pianos, then you would easily be able to feel the difference in this new key action and how accurately it moves compared to previous key actions.
Another thing worth mentioning about the key action is that Kawai has built into it called "let-off" or otherwise known as "escapement." The let-off feel is a feature of Grand pianos whereby you can feel a slight hesitation or "notch" as you press a key very softly and slowly on a real grand piano. This key action hesitation is a by-product of the way real key actions work and how the parts of a real key action move. It allows a person to have more control over sbtle and delicate passages of music. Since the ES8 has an all plastic key action without a lot of extra connected moving parts that would be in a real acoustic piano (most digital pianos are this way), Kawai has designed a recreation of the let-off feel that you would otherwise get in a real acoustic grand piano. Based on on my playing experience, Kawai did a very good job simulating this let-off feel without having it be clumsy or too light or too heavy. The other name brand digital pianos companies also have this let-off escapement simulation but they are not all the same and Kawai definitely has one of the best.
Ok...now let's talk about piano sound. Piano sound is a funny thing because what one person thinks sounds good to them, another person may think that same sound is not what they like. So in reality, piano sound realism is somewhat subjective. However, there are certain piano sound standards that you will find in a real acoustic piano and the piano sound gets better when that acoustic piano has better strings, a better soundboard, better tuning pins, a better scale design, better felt hammers, and so on. To achieve a realistic piano sound in a digital piano, that piano needs to have the sound start with quality real acoustic grand and upright pianos along with a professional recording process to capture the original piano sound one note a a time, along with capturing organic nuances of the piano itself, and then finally being able to put that sound out through a high quality internal speaker system so that the piano is full and resonate with enough bass to satisfy the player/listener.
The ES8 has an upgraded piano sound chip with more piano processing power and memory than did the previous ES7 have with an improvement dynamic range. Beyond the increased level of overall piano sound realism along with Kawai sampling all 88 keys one at a time of real acoustic pianos, the 4 main piano voices on the ES8 are actual piano "samples" that originate from 4 distinct well known Kawai acoustic grand and upright pianos. Kawai recorded brand new piano sounds from their 9' EX concert grand piano, 9' SX concert grand piano, 6'7" SK5 grand piano, and their 53" tall K-series full upright piano. Along with those specific piano tones built into the ES8, Kawai included 6 acoustic piano variations including jazz piano, pop piano, warm piano, etc. The EX grand piano sound is definitely the brightest and boldest piano stereo tone with huge resonance and lots of string vibration, something that would mix well with an orchestra or band, or pop music. The SX is noticeably more mellow but still can be plenty loud, resonate, and powerful and would be great for classical music, jazz, and ballads and it was personally my favorite piano sound. The SK5 piano reproduction seems to be a little more personal and not as full but still quite nice, and then the upright piano sound reproduction gives the player an up close piano tone listening experience that you would normally get from a real upright piano because those piano strings & hammers are so much closer in distance to the player. I can honestly say that if you don't find an acoustic piano sound on the ES8 that you like, then you just aren't trying. The piano volume sensitivity and tonal changes as you play across the keyboard softly to very hard really are quite smooth and balanced with incremental changes that transition very much like a real grand piano with no jumpiness or volume/tonal gaps like I have heard on other piano brands. When you couple those things with Kawai's 256-note polyphony chip for excellent piano processing power, it's hard to go wrong regardless of your playing skill level or the type of music you choose to play. The ES9 does it all very well considering it's lower price for what you are getting. In fact, I had a difficult time taking a break from playing the piano sounds on the new ES8 along with the responsive key action because I was enjoying myself too much. If all the ES8 could do was play acoustic piano sounds, then that would be enough...but it does so much more.
Pedaling is always an important part of playing music on a piano and if you don't know how to use the pedals, especially the right damper/sustain pedal, then you are really missing out. The Kawai triple pedal unit is an optional purchase as is the furniture stand. You would need to have that optional furniture stand ($259 discount price) in order to use the triple pedal lyre ($169 discount price) which is designed to look like a little grand piano. A heavy duty piano style single sustain damper pedal is included with the purchase of the piano alone and is fine when playing most music. In fact that single damper pedal can also trigger the half-damper effect when using the piano alone, and that is a feature not usually found on portable digital pianos. But if you want the piano to look and act more authentic, then I recommend you purchase the furniture stand and triple pedal lyre, especially if the piano will remain in one spot in the home, church, school, or studio most of the time. The piano pedals do work well and the damper pedal triggers natural piano resonance across the keyboard and especially in the upper octaves where it's needed. Also, the middle and left pedal can be set up as "trigger pedals" for quick triggering of special effects or functions on the piano that you otherwise would need to select with buttons or menus...and I find that to be a useful thing to have. In fact, the left pedal can trigger a digital rotary speed control for pop & jazz organ sounds from slow to fast or fast to slow and it works well. Finally, the piano decay time and volume when sustaining piano sound with the damper pedal is very good and better than most digital pianos I have played and this aspect of playing piano is very important.
As for the other instrument sounds in the ES8, there are 34 tones all together including the acoustic piano sounds and the other instruments are equally good in there own way. The electric piano sounds including reproductions of vintage Fender Rhodes, Wurlitzer electric pianos, Yamaha digital DX7 keyboards, and other famous electric piano sounds are really outstanding. When you couple those sounds with the built-in pro quality special effects including chorus, phasers, tremelo, delays, brilliance, EQ, and other effects, the realism of those electric piano sounds are amazing and noticeably better than any other brand I have played in a self-contained portable digital piano. The other nice thing is that you can combine a digital piano tone with any effects you wish and layer that electric piano with an acoustic piano sound, string sound, choir sound, or any other instrument sound and not loose any of the effects you selected for the electric piano. In other words, when you combine two sounds together in many cases the effects don't work. But on the ES8, you can have them on the instrument sound you need when layered with another sound where you don't want the effects. Very few digital pianos can do this and it's great for people (like me) who can appreciate having this kind of control over layering 2 instruments together and having that layered sound be perfect and then saving it in user memories for later recall without having to recreate that setup all over again. If you want to balance the volume between the two layered instrument sounds so that the relative volume is where it needs to be, there is a quick layer volume adjustment that is easily accessible and allow for fast adjustments which is important when combining any two sound together. On many other digital pianos I have played this can be a tedious process and not intuitive at all. So I was impressed with how easy the control panel buttons and menu was to operate given all the features this piano has jammed into it.
There are 28 digital memory slots in the ES8 that allows you to save your favorite setups so you don't have to recreate them all over again and lets use access them quickly so you do need to search for the specific sound, effect, and other functions you would need to make that favorite setup. You just recall that setup you made in the "registration memory." There's even a dedicated button on the control panel to select the registration memory you want to save or to recall.Speaking of control panel, the Kawai ES8 control panel is above the keys with 26 big, round, easy to see and easy to press panel buttons going across from left to right. I love it when manufacturers give the user/player intuitive and easy to press (light-up) buttons because it takes away at least some of the guesswork when it comes to accessing the popular features in the piano. The ES8 control panel also has a built-in LCD display screen and although it's a bit small, it's still large enough to tell you what's going on when selecting functions. The dedicated buttons give you access to some of the most requested functions including metronome, key transpose in real time, rhythms, registration memories, USB flash drive recording & playback features, reverb & special effects, split keyboard, and the 7 instrument sound groups. Within those instrument sound groups include some exceptionally realistic string symphonies, choirs, synth-bells, harpsichords, marimbas, church and pop (B3) organs, basses, and other tones.
As far as the digital LCD menu goes, it allows access for a huge number of cool features including the following: keyboard Touch (curve) Sensitivity Controls such as Light+, Light, Normal, Heavy, Heavy+, Off (Constant), User 1, User 2, Voicing which means being able to further customize the piano sounds to your liking having Normal, Mellow 1, Mellow 2 , Dynamic, Bright 1, Bright 2, or User 1 - 4. There's also further piano custom editing with Resonance, Noise & Effects which include String Resonance, Damper Resonance, Damper Noise, Fall-back Noise, Key-off Effect, Hammer Delay, Topboard, Decay Time, Soft Pedal Depth, The Reverb control includes a variety of impressive natural reverb/echo room sizes such as Room, Lounge, Small Hall, Concert Hall, Live Hall, Cathedral along with editing control of Reverb Depth & Reverb Time.Temperament & Tunings including Equal (Piano), Pure Major, Pure Minor, Pythagorean, Meantone, Werckmeister, Kirnberger, User Temerament, Key of Temperament, Stretch Tuning, Stretch Curve / User Tuning, User Key Volume, Half-Pedal Adjust and Minimum Touch. The "user key tuning and key volume" is worth noting because it allows individual notes to be adjusted to your particular tastes (and ears) so that you can make incremental adjustments rather than global overall adjustments. This is a pretty cool feature and a great thing to have.
A lot of people like to record and playback their music for a variety of purposes. This includes lesson practice, song writing, multitrack MIDI song play, and iTune playalong. But for this to happen a digital piano must be able to record and playback in all popular formats which includes MP3, audio wav file, and MIDI file, and the ES8 can do that. If you want to record and practice your piano music and play right & left hand separately and then playback while you record the other part and then play back both parts simultaneously, you can do that on the ES8 with 2-track MIDI recording with the ability to save 10 of your own songs into internal memory. Also, you can record 1-track audio wav/MP3 files for true/actual sound playback while using the ES8 overdub function to record multiple new parts on top of the original recording and then hear them play back as one complete song on any MP3/wav device. This is a very useful feature and great for songwriters and performers because when playing back your multi-track audio recording, you can play live over the top of it and sound like you have a complete orchestra or band all having been played by you:). The recorder system has a number of editing features as well being able to convert MIDI songs to audio songs instantly. Recording yourself can be a lot of fun and if you have never done it, it's not difficult and when you hear the results it can be helpful to your playing in many ways.
Speaking of fun, to me, if playing music isn't fun, enjoyable, and meaningful, then you might as well take up another hobby. To add to the enjoyment of playing piano, adding other sounds, and recording yourself, the ES8 has what I consider to be a "bonus section" called Rhythm accompaniment (aka: rhythm section). I will say even if the ES8 did not have this bonus section it would been fine without it. But having it really adds to a person's musical enjoyment if they take advantage of it. If you are the kind of person who enjoys playing or listening to pop music, Jazz, Latin, Country, Big band, Swing, Christmas, Gospel, Funk, Rock, Kids music, standards, alternative, dance, disco, light rock, Disney tunes, or any Rhythmic style of non-classical music, then you are like me. I love classical music but I also love and play all the other styles (most of them anyway). The ES8 has a one-man/woman band feature which allows you to play long with interactive accompaniment backgrounds that are professionally arranged by Kawai pro musicians. These interactive chord backgrounds are based on the right and left-hand chords that you play live and then these accompaniments will follow you on the keyboard. This system works best when playing right hand melody or right hand chords while playing full left hand chords. You select a style of music you want from the 100 rhythm (x 2 variations) 4-part accompaniment system and then you play the song you want to play and a full band including drums, bass player, guitar player, and other accompaniment players comes in and backs you up and makes you sound great! I happen to enjoy playing with this kind of system and it helps me play music I otherwise may not be able to play in a traditional way and it certainly makes me sound better than I am and helps me with my rhythm and timing while interacting with "the band." You can set your own tempo, decide if you want to play full right/left hand piano music over the top of the band, or if you want to really simplify things and play simple one-finger left hand chords on the root note and play a simple one finger melody on the right hand. The simplified one finger system is great for very young children who cannot play or for adults who don't want to take years of lessons but want to play and have fun. You can also play the drum patterns separately so you can use it to learn rhythm and timing instead of using just the digital internal metronome for that purpose.
Within the interactive auto-chord accompaniment section is also some rhythm editing functions such as being able to activate automatic drum fills to make your music sound more live, to be able to change rhythms in real time from one to another without interrupting the flow of the song your playing, and also be able to activate an "ad-lib" feature which is super cool. When you select the "ad-lib" feature while using the rhythm accompaniment chords, the last 17 keys on the piano turn into "ad-lib" riff makers and when you press any one of the last 17 keys, that particular key will "play" a short "riff or ad-lib" part that synchronizes with the chord you are playing with your left hand along with the style of rhythm that are playing. If you have ever seen a pro keyboard/piano player do a short riff or solo on the right hand melody keys while the rest of the band plays, then that is what the "ad-lib" feature will do for you only you just hold any of the last 17 keys and each key will trigger a different and impressive riff pattern created by Kawai pro musicians. Each of the 17 ad-lib patterns even change patterns/intervals depending on how many times you press the same key, so it makes it sound more live rather than "canned." However you need to time it so that you press on one of those 17 keys exactly on the down beat syncing up to the tempo you selected, so it will line up correctly with the beat...otherwise it doesn't sound good and will be off-beat. So it does take some ability to use use it correctly, but if you have pretty good rhythm and timing and you want to sound way better than you are, then when you use the rhythm accompaniment feature and the ad-lib feature together, you will definitely have loads of fun, sound great, and play music you have not been able to play before or at least have more fun doing it. I recommend to to everybody who loves music regardless of your piano playing skill level. One other thing about the accompaniment chord styles...many of them sound musically real and not fake or cheesy...although there are a few styles which could be better but I am not looking for perfection here. The bass lines are super cool, drum patterns sound good and full, and accompaniment instruments overall are satisfying. It's not the absolute best auto-accompaniment system I have ever used, but for this model and in this price range, it's much more than I expected and something that I believe adds a lot of value to the ES8...at least it does for me.
Another way to interact with the ES8 is through MIDI song files. I already mentioned this briefly but wanted to expand on it. Although the ES8 does play General MIDI song files which is a particular and popular multitrack MIDI format for song playback, the ES8 cannot always play those GM song files correctly. This because full GM format requires a minimum 128 instrument sounds including brass, woodwinds, stringed instruments including banjos, harps, acoustic guitars, etc to play back the songs correctly and the ES8 only has a total of 34 instrument sounds on board with no brass, woodwinds, reeds, and other non piano instruments. So if a popular MIDI song file that you download from the internet (from Mozart, Elton John, Billy Joel, Movie themes, Big band, etc) calls for a trumpet, saxophone, or banjo as an example, the ES8 will automatically substitute some other sound that it has in its 34 instrument (put accompaniment tones) sound bank instead. Sometimes this works really well, sometimes OK, and sometimes it does not sound so good. But...at least it can play back multi-track MIDI song files that are available on the internet and much of the time those songs sound great depending on the musical song style. When playing back regular "piano only" MIDI song files, then the ES8 sounds spectacular and better than any other piano model under $2000 I have heard. Regardless of which songs are playing back, you can slow down and speed up the tempo, you can independently transpose the song's key up or down for singing purposes or to play in a key that's more comfortable for you, you can remove (mute) the melody line or any other part of the song so that you can play-along without hearing that part in the song, and you can adjust song volume independently of the ES8 master volume so you can play along and balance your volume against the song's volume. There's obviously a lot you can do with this new ES8 besides just playing piano, and if you take advantage of at least some of these very cool additional functions and features, then I think you'll be amazed at how much more musical enjoyment you'll have.
I think the ES8 also looks very attractive for its size in its semi-gloss black or white metal cabinet along with its surprisingly powerful internal speaker system of 30 watts going through two speakers coming up through the top of the piano. The piano sound is resonate and full and I was impressed with how good the piano sound was coming through its own speakers. It can get very loud and much louder than I thought it could while keeping the piano sound under control and still very expressive whether at high volume or low volume. The ES8 cabinet has clean lines, nice styling, an easy to see & use set of light up buttons above the keys, and an easy to read LCD screen. It's compact and yet seems to be built well weighing in at just 49lbs and can be moved around for a variety of reasons such as moving it from one room to another, taking it to gigs, using it in a summer home, in a church where you need to set it up and take it down, at a school when space can be limited. Kawai also has an optional proprietary semi-hard carry-case for the ES8 which can be purchase for extra cost. The optional furniture stand and 3-pedal lyre assembly together add about $500 more to the price (they can be purchased separately) but they are nicely matched to the ES8 cabinet and they really look great when they are attached. The optional furniture stand and pedals (they work well) also add stability to the entire package so that the piano is more secure and plays with little movement and I liked it a lot. In fact it's the only portable piano I know of which looks somewhat elegant even for its compact size. If you just order the ES8 by itself, then it comes with a smaller standard metal music rack for sheet music. While this rack is OK, it would be better to have nicer looking and larger music rack. So when you order the optional furniture stand, Kawai includes a vastly upgraded plexiglas music rack mounted into a sturdy metal base at no charge. There is also more space on the bottom front of that rack to hold sheet music and books. The rack cannot be ordered separately so if you like it, you need to buy the stand to get it...but I definitely recommend doing that if you can.
As far as connectivity on the ES, Kawai did a very good job of including what most people are looking for which includes MIDI (in/out), USB to Host, USB to Device (for flashdrive input), Speaker system On/Off control switch, Line-in stereo audio input, Line-out (L/Mono, Right) Single damper Pedal Input (for F-10H), Optional Dual damper R/Soft Pedal (F-20), Triple Pedal Lyre (optional), and two headphone jacks...one on either side of the piano front. I really like how Kawai put in two headphone jacks on opposite ends of the front rather than both mounted underneath or on the piano on the left side only like many other brands do. This is helpful because when you select the "four-handed" play mode, two people can play the same octaves at the same time on the keyboard because that mode splits the keyboard electronically into two 44-note keyboards and turns the left hand into the same octaves as the right hand so that two people can play identical notes. This is useful when two people are practicing the same piece at the same time, and the ES8 headphone jack positions make it easier to do that. Also, when using a good set of stereo headphones, the Kawai piano samples sound outstanding through headphones with good stereo piano movement through the sound field along with excellent tone reproduction. Sometimes when playing through internal speakers and then through headphones, the quality of sound is not consistent on many digital pianos. But with the ES8, I found the sound reproduction to be very consistent both ways, and that's not easy to do. The ES8 also has the ability to turn off the internal speakers with a switch in back if the unit is connected to external speakers or have the internal speakers on for monitoring. There's also a stereo audio input mini jack for running iPad, iPhone, or computer stereo sound directly into the piano speaker system (or through headphones) which is very useful and not something always found on digital pianos.
In the final analysis, if you are looking for a high quality piano playing experience along with a good looking compact piano cabinet and design which can also be portable if necessary, then I would highly recommend the new Kawai ES8 as an exceptional value, especially as compared to other digital piano models near or under $2000. There are certainly some good digital piano alternatives out there so the ES8 is not the only choice. However it covers a lot of "musical bases" very well and I really enjoy playing this new model. The only problem I had playing on it was trying to get away from it:). I am also aware that this new model is in very big demand right now and will likely be difficult to get over the next couple of months since they just came out, so if you want one, you better get it while they are available...assuming you can find one. I always advise people to do their shopping homework and research and then contact me for more advice and info on getting even lower prices than internet, amazon, store sales, etc on brand new digital pianos.
If you want more info on new digital pianos and LOWER PRICES than internet discounts, please email me at tim@azpianowholesale.com or call direct at 602-571-1864.
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