Introduction
Can a Clavinova be even better than it already is? Yes, much better. In July 2008, Yamaha introduced the brand new CLP 300 series to the European, Asian, Canadian, Brazilian, and Oceania markets. This article is the second in a series of four which will review these amazing CLP 300 series digital pianos.
Overview
At YamahaMusician.com, we were excited to review the Clavinova CLP 330. The CLP 330 improves upon the CLP 320 with more voices, a better feeling keyboard, more song memory, and two USB (HOST and DEVICE) ports for exporting your music for storage or to an external music editor.
The CLP 330's front panel is laid out with the volume slider, recording, playback, stop and tempo buttons to the left while voice selection, effects, and touch buttons are on the right. This is a much nicer and easier to navigate layout compared to the CLP 320's layout. Everything is in front of you where you need it.
Voices
The CLP 330 comes loaded with 14 voices from the factory each selectable from the front panel buttons. These voices range from pianos, harpsichords, vibraphone to organs, strings, and choir. What's great about some of these voices is that Yamaha incorporated using dynamic and key-off samples which adds a whole lot more realism to the instrument which will add a whole lot more creativity to your music. Examples of voices on the CLP 330 that sound great and expressive are the GRANDPIANO 1, E.PIANO 1, and VIBRAPHONE voices.
The GRANDPIANO1 voice uses the 3-level AWM dynamic stereo piano samples and is fantastic!
Recording
Recording is very easy and convenient on the Clavinova CLP 330. You can record up to two tracks and save up to three songs in the CLP 330's internal memory. To record, press the REC button, set your metronome, play, and press REC to stop recording. You can also free up song memory by saving your songs to a USB thumb drive and export to a song editor.
Other Features
The Clavinova CLP 330 comes with an effects processor containing 4 different types of reverbs, 5 types of brilliance and chorus. It can also operate in dual and split modes—handy for playing, say, the piano with the right hand and bass with the left.
The CLP 330 also has the GH3 (Graded Hammer) keyboard which is an improvement over the original GH keyboard, can playback SMF (standard MIDI format) 0 and 1 types (records only in type 0), has two headphone jacks, MIDI IN/OUT ports, and AUX IN/OUT ports useful for recording audio to a hard disk recorder or cassette deck.
Conclusion
The Clavinova CLP 330 is a very capable digital piano—128 note of polyphony, half pedal damper effect, GH3 keyboard, superb sounding piano, electric piano and vibraphone voices, and a 2-track recorder all in a beautiful wood console cabinet. This is a great dependable piano to have in the home for the whole family to learn and play on for many years!