Most musicians know that digital pianos tend to come with several different “voices.” Obviously the exact number depends on the make and model.

But it’s not uncommon to find a digital piano with a hundred or more voices. The question is whether you really need that many. Admittedly, one of the major advantages of the digital piano lies in the variety of its sounds. An acoustic piano can sound like an acoustic piano. And that’s about it.

A digital piano can take on the sound of an electric piano, a grand piano and even a completely different instrument like a guitar. But the truth is that the majority of users don’t branch out that much.

Which is why it can seem unnecessary to have a hundreds voices or more. Take the Yamaha P95, for example. It comes with 10 voices. Compared to other digital pianos, that’s not a lot. But surely it’s about the quality not the quantity.

Any sensible musician would surely rather have 10 fantastic voices than 100 mediocre ones. Moreover, as mentioned, hardly anybody actually plays every single voice. In fact many people confine themselves to just the grand piano voice.