Yamaha’s EZ-300 is a light-up electronic keyboard that helps beginners learn to play

Arriving just in time for the holiday season, Yamaha’s EZ-300 is an electronic keyboard with a difference. Yes, it has the usual built-in accompaniments and lets you trigger chords with a single finger, but its big USP is a light-up keyboard that promises to make it easy to learn to play.

Select one of 140 songs and you can then play along just by following the lights on the 61 touch-sensitive keys. Further help is at hand with the Keys To Success feature, which divides songs up into shorter phrases known as Steps. So, you can literally practise sections a Step at a time, with the option to slow down the tempo to make learning even easier.

If you want more songs, you can download MIDI files from the Yamaha online shop and then import them via USB from a Mac or PC.

Built-in sounds include pianos, organs, strings, brass, percussion, guitars and synths, and there are also SuperArticulation Light Voices that add gestures - pizzicato plucks on a violin, for example - for even greater realism. 

The EZ-300 will be available in late November or early Decemnber priced at $400. Find out more on the Yamaha website.

Ben Rogerson

I’m the Deputy Editor of MusicRadar, having worked on the site since its launch in 2007. I previously spent eight years working on our sister magazine, Computer Music. I’ve been playing the piano, gigging in bands and failing to finish tracks at home for more than 30 years, 24 of which I’ve also spent writing about music and the ever-changing technology used to make it.