MusicRadar

The sound selection area is nicely laid out and you'll find you rarely need to use the screen during live performance.

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Nords are popping up all over the place these days and Clavia seem to have struck upon a good balance of sounds, features and playability that appeals to live performers and studio bods alike. Above all, many dig Clavia's no-nonsense or little menu diving approach.

The Nord Piano is weighty and solid, yet it's just light enough to be carried by one person out of the box or in a soft case, or by two people in a hard case.

All the controls are housed centrally and are easily accessible with either hand and the positioning of the control panel also leaves plenty of space either side on which to sit smaller keyboards, or a laptop.

"The V5 samples are what we consider to be the most authentic, playable and musical currently available."

Now onto the 88-note, fully-weighted keybed; we found this to be very playable indeed. It's not too heavy, nor does it suffer from any of the sponginess that we've found in several other weighted stage piano actions recently.

Fast note repeats are easy, while it's great to play for long periods of time without being fatiguing on the hands or wrists. Also, though it's never ideal playing Clavinet sounds from a weighted keyboard, the keybed is pretty playable for this duty.

Overall build quality is first class, with an all-metal case construction and wooden end cheeks, while the switchgear and dials instil confidence, giving the feel of a premium instrument.

The Nord Piano also ships with a quality three-pedal unit, offering sustain, a soft pedal and sostenuto, which allows one note to remain sustained while the others play as normal around it (much like many grand pianos). This further enhances the Nords authentic piano-like feel.

Feature filled

Feature-wise it's pretty familiar territory for those that have used the Nord Electro or Stage series products. The sound selection area is simply laid out around an informative screen and thankfully you'll seldom have to look at it while performing, just for deeper utility functions and MIDI setups etc.

There are a total of 120 program slots in 24 banks, housed in 500MB of RAM, while the five 'live' program locations continually scan and store all panel settings for quick recall.