Vintage Vibe Hits the Big Time

by Lou Di Falco

First and foremost, I am so glad that Vintage Vibe exists and that they exist in the next town over in northern New Jersey. To know that their version of an electro-mechanical tine piano is in production makes the musical world a much better place. Harold Rhodes changed the landscape of popular music, rock, and jazz with his invention whose first iteration began in the late 1940s. The world lost something when the Rhodes piano, aka Fender Rhodes piano went out of production in the mid-80s as the digital age took hold.

I am a keyboard player and a composer and owned two Rhodes during my life and I regret the fact I didn’t keep at least one of them. During the mid-80s, the Yamaha DX7, with its FM technology, was all the rage. Doing multiple gigs per week, carrying around the DX sure beat schlepping the Rhodes and hand truck from place to place. Why I did not keep my Mark II flat top in my studio escapes me to this day.

Of course the original Rhodes lives on through EBay. Some cash and elbow grease and you can have a Mark I, II or even a Mark V in working order. Many already come that way, some mint, some falling apart. During the 2000s a brand new Rhodes Corporation in southern California developed the Mark VII, the Rhodes was back, or was it. Their flawed business model forced them to shut down operation* and after only several hundred were built, once again a new Rhodes was only a pipe dream.

However, prior to the new Mark VII, quietly and in a suburban town of New Jersey called Rockaway, a company called Vintage Vibe (VV) went into business. During the 1990s they repaired, restored, and sold vintage electro-mechanical keyboards, most notably the Rhodes and Wurlitzer pianos as well as other vintage gear. Then one day, they came up with the idea of building their own tine piano. Last Monday evening, the fruit of their work could be seen on national TV as Stevie Wonder sat behind a VV Deluxe 73 with a Vibanet (VV’s recreation of the Clavinet) mounted on top. The sound emanating from the keyboards controlled by Stevie’s huge hands was not a digital recreation but electro-mechanically produced. And the instruments sounded awesome.

I got to play a VV piano at their old site in Rockaway NJ, a few years ago (they have since moved to a larger facility in town). I was very impressed although I found that playing at pianissimo, some of the notes did not sound. Not sure if that is still true or that particular piano needed further adjustment. One of the techs said "well you need to dig in more". That made me cringe a bit. However, I was quite impressed with their pianos. Make no mistake that under the hood there’s a much improved Rhodes in there, improved hammers, improved tines, real wood keys, and improved electric pickups in a lighter more durable frame. (Ironically the VV piano cosmetically resembles a Wurley more than a Rhodes.)

But is analog truly better than digital? I have read a lot of recent comments that were posted on the Vintage Vibe website. The argument being put forward by the tine piano guys (not just the VV staff but all tine aficionados) is that when playing a "real" instrument, you are creating pure music versus pushing a keyboard that triggers a processor that recreates the sound one hears, either through sampled or modeled technology. But here’s the thing, both electro-mechanical and digital keyboards have one thing in common—electricity. Cut the power and neither makes sound. Okay, in fairness, the tine piano will make sound but you have to put your ears really close to the harp and try playing that along with an acoustic guitar player during a black out. The point is if we are going to say that digital keyboards are not real instruments then why can’t we say that about an electro-mechanical piano that relies on electricity as well? An acoustic piano relies on nothing but our hands and the atmosphere to convey sound waves from the vibrating strings and sound board to our ears, no power supply required. But I guess in the vacuum of space, even a piano is not a legitimate instrument. It’s a slippery slope when discussing the legitimacy of any instrument.

Ultimately and I think this is the most important point, an instrument, regardless of the technology behind it, is a tool. Its use is to help an artist create music. Is Chic Corea less of a musician because he plays a Yamaha Motif with a sampled version of his old Mark V Rhodes piano stored on a computer chip? Should his chops get less notoriety because they are not powering a mechanical action where hammers strike tines?

Regarding a keyboard’s action, it is becoming more difficult in many cases to tell the difference between a simulated piano action and the real thing. I challenge any pianist to find something negative about the latest action used in the Roland RD-800 digital piano. It includes escapement and that’s something you only get with expensive acoustic grand pianos.

Graded hammer actions have been used with many digital pianos for years and many feel great. In my studio at home I use a Yamaha CP-33 with the sound off, triggering Synthogy’s Ivory II Fazioli emulation on my Mac. With the largest memory setting (over 1 gig), the sound is phenomenal. For a Rhodes I use a Nord Electro 3’s Rhodes samples or Logic’s EVP88. Yes, under the covers they are pure digital but again, it’s what I do with them that prove whether the music is good or not. I would love to have a real ten foot grand in my studio but a) don’t have the cash for that, and b) don’t have the time to mic it and record it when I need to get my cues out to TV shows as fast as possible. So in my world, working entirely in the digital domain is more efficient and sonically I am sacrificing nothing.

But don’t think for a minute that I would not love to have a Vintage Vibe tine piano sitting in my studio. I would absolutely want one and when I win the lottery and don’t have to worry about paying off my daughter’s college education or for those new windows I needed in my drafty old house (VV pianos start at $3200.00), I’m going to get one.

There is room in this keyboard world for the truly analog, electro-mechanical, and the digital. If you think about it, all these choices make our music better, not worse. But most importantly it’s what we do with these instruments that count. The end result is always the same. The instruments are simply part of the process chain. It’s ultimately all about the air pressure that reaches our ear drums in the form of sound waves. The two most important facets in the stream of music creation are the speakers and your ears. All that comes before the speakers in the chain is almost irrelevant anymore when considering the high quality of analog, electro-mechanical, or digital instruments.

I have to laugh at even the most purists of artists. The great jazz pianist Keith Jarrett often rails against anything electric and cringes when his Rhodes playing with Miles Davis comes up in interviews. I am a huge fan of Keith but I would love to point out to him that all of his recordings over the past thirty years have been digital. His acoustic piano playing was recorded then converted to 41 kHz per second then converted back just before the analog electric signal triggers the speaker cones to move back and forth, pushing those sound waves via air pressure into our ears.

Get it?

Ultimately, it’s all analog, it really is.

*Regarding the Rhodes Corporation - I am making an assumption their business model failed. You can still go to their website but it has not been updated in years. I have searched the Internet high and low and except for speculation among some bloggers, there really is no clear information as to what happened to the rekindled company and their Mark VII that did receive great reviews since debuting at NAMM several years ago. Perhaps litigation is going on. Often when that is the case, lips are sealed. Hopefully we will find out someday. Mark VIIs can now be found on EBay with a plethora of original Rhodes pianos. However, if you really want a new electro-mechanical tine based piano, you likely should consider Vintage Vibe. They have positioned themselves to be around for the long haul and clearly their product is hailed as a great improvement over the Rhodes piano many of us remember and love dearly.

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