In case you didn’t realize, there is such a thing as an online virtual piano and its only recently that I found out that such a thing even existed! Basically they are a piano keyboard that when you click or press on a touch screen, on a particular note, you will hear a reasonably authentic piano note.
These online virtual pianos would be great for other instrumentalists to work out a melody or ‘play’ another instrument part. They could also be useful for people who are learning music theory that don’t have access to a piano or keyboard, so that they can play what they are working on.
Online virtual pianos could also be used by people who are having a bit of fun, mucking around with various notes and tunes – basically someone who isn’t a musician.
I would not recommend an online virtual piano to someone who wanted to learn to play the piano. This is because of whatever skills you develop, they are not immediately transferable to the piano. You would not be learning any good technique – posture, hand positioning, how to strike the notes in varying ways to give different effects. None of these skills could you develop using an online virtual piano.
It is important to remember that with these online virtual pianos you would never be able to play two notes at the same time, which is clearly very limiting as to what you can play as pianos were designed to play multiple notes at exactly the same time. My personal record was 11 notes at the one time – my left thumb had to play two adjacent white notes while all other fingers only had to play one note each.
Apart from the limitations of an online virtual piano where it is not possible to play more than one note at a time, there are a few more drawbacks. The first is that it is a smaller keyboard, even though some claim to have as many notes as a piano, of the ones I have looked at, none of them have as many notes as a piano. Just as important as not having as many keys as a real piano, the keys are not full sized and even if you had a touch screen, you would have difficulty with accuracy because the ‘keys’ are so small.
When the online virtual pianos are used by non musicians, they may find them to be a bit of fun. I personally think they are annoying because with a piano or a keyboard I can play so much more than I would be able to compared to any online virtual piano. Not that I care about impressing anyone, but I think it is so much more impressive to play the actual instrument rather than reproducing the sound electronically. For instance, you would be so much more impressed with someone playing a saxophone than someone using an authentic saxophone sound on a virtual piano, even if they are playing exactly the same notes.
As a piano player, I do not like these online virtual pianos, I think the real thing is infinitely better!