When did she decide her YouTube name was going to be Bat-Tail?
About two seconds before I hit play to record her review of the Casio LK-265 keyboard.
She is, in fact, wearing batwings and a tail which, for the uninitiated, isn’t all that unusual for 3:30 on a Tuesday afternoon ’round these parts. So, without further ado:
I would add that I’m a big fan of the LK-265’s size: it’s large enough to prep budding musicians for the reach they’ll have to use to play an actual piano while not taking up nearly as much space as an upright. Which means the Casio fits in my house. Which is small and cluttered and would never, in my wildest imagination or redecorating schemes, have space for even the worlds tiniest piano (or, for that matter, its cousin, the world’s smallest violin). We’ll buy a stand at some point to make sure the keyboard stays safe from small folks who don’t have a good sense of relative body position and cats who like to be jerks but it stands up nicely, and unobtrusively, against the wall in a corner should additional space need to be cleared for indoor bowling or shipbuilding as well.
In case you’re wondering, yes, the unit has a headphone jack so you’re kids can get funky with those fresh beats while you enjoy some blissful silence. It’s also where you plug in your iOS or Android device to synch the keyboard with the Chordana Play app, a repository of additional songs which both displays the sheet music for those able to read it and teaches via the sequential light-up key method you saw in Bat-Tail’s video. I like the compromise the app provides because, while I definitely want my kids to learn to read music at some point, getting them involved by a simpler method now will give them the impetus to learn by the more labor intensive route later. Chordana Play also features a piano-style keyboard (though it’s obviously much smaller than that of either a piano or the LK-265) which means travel is no longer an excuse to skip practice (sort of glad this bit wasn’t around when I was a kid).
If you’re looking for an intro keyboard for the kids, or for yourself, or an instrument that will allow family members at varying levels of musical proficiency to tailor the programming to meet their needs, the Casio LK-265 is practical and sound investment. The Chordana Play app is free so… really no downside to that one.
Enjoy!
