Help!! Where To Begin, where do I start and what do I need Options

[dtyler]

Hello all

This is my first post and I need some help. I have always loved music, but have mostly been a listener. I play a little guitar, but have always wanted to play the piano. After watching Steve's keynote last week I have decided that the time is now for me to finely learn. I am looking in to getting a nice 88 key midi keyboard that will interface with a DP 500 G4 with 768 mb of ram and OS 10.3.2. I honesty do not know where to begin. I think that I am going to start taking some private lessons for the piano, but was also interested in some software that may compliment the private instruction. They keyboard that I have been looking @ is the Fatar SL880 pro. I have founf this online for about $600. As far as connecting it to my mac, I really have no idea. I was just thinking that I would get one of those simple boxes that connects to usb and gives you a couple midi inputs, do I need something better? As far as software, I was thinking that I would start with garage band. Again I am just getting started and am on a budget. please give me feedback as to weather his sounds like a solution that may work. Is this the correct way of connecting a midi keyboard to my mac? Will it sound ok? How about latency, USB should suffice right? Any and all suggestions are welcome.

Thank you all so much in advance and have a wonderful day!

[rickenbacker]

USB is fine for Midi work and latency is pretty minimal in OS X. There are plenty of Midi keyboards around, ranging from $100 to $1,000+, so it's up to you how much you want to spend. They should all work at a fundamental level, ie transmitting Midi data.

Some have a direct connection to your Mac via USB, so there'd be no need for an extra interface. Having an interface with more than one port does allows for future expansion (and thus more Midi channels - 16 per keyboard), but maybe you don't need that just yet. You can always add it later.

As for software, Garageband would be a great start - it's part of iLife 04, so you get all the cool iApps on one go. In terms of learning the piano, I can recommend eMedia's Piano and Keyboard Method. I bought it for my wife (OK, and me) to learn and it's very helpful. Pretty cheap, loads of on-screen help and feedback, lots of popular tunes to learn and tutoring from a well-respected professional. Works on OS X 10.2 upwards.

Enjoy your music.

[dtyler]

thank you so much for the recommendations. As far as the keyboard, I was looking at that model in particular because it is supposed to feel like a real piano. Do you, or does anybody have any experience with this midi keyboard, or any others that they would recommend for a traditional piano feel within the given price range?

again thank you so very much.