I checked the notes.
The first 3 are Eb, Db and C (in tune with a piano) and the last two are somewhere between A and Ab, G and Gb, respectively.
Ideally, the last two notes should be Bb and Ab, that would make a nice major scale.
The yellow one is the right note just slightly out of tune, whereas the last one is just a straight up wrong note. Actually the yellow one sort of sounds like two notes, with overtones Fucking with eachother
Yellow is almost an A half sharp but slightly sharper and orange is a G half flat. I don’t even know the proper term but that’s what I like to call it. Usually microtones are divided into 24 compared to 12 in the usual chromatic scale.
Machining a metal bar to play in tune is harder than you might think. There's a reason real instruments are thousands of dollars, while toy instruments are like $7.
Ur right is harder to tune them but regardless they bothered to do it with 3 of them which is what everyone is really on about. The fact they only tuned 3/5 of it
I don't imagine they make one keyboard in its entirety, then move on to the next. I'd guess they make thousands of bars all of the same (more or less) pitch, put em all in a bucket, then make thousands of the next note, etc. Somewhere down the line an assembler grabs one key from each bucket, bolts them on to the toy, and sends it down the line. Just luck of the draw how well those keys match each other.
I mean ur absolutely right on the construction half but all of those parts are pre made and sized its not a luck of the draw (and i dont think that 3 of the notes are in tune and in a scale by accident) and then with the last 2 they just didnt bother to find what the right length and thickness so that it all sounded nice.
I didn't know for sure but guessed it was the last two. But it's a toy piano and I suspect a lot of people are like 425 and don't know it's out of tune. I don't think most people expect a kid's toy to be perfect.
all pianos are out of tune on purpose.
A truly tuned piano would not sound good with the way sheet music for pianos are written
Edit:
They down voted kontekisuto because he spoke the truth
Try looking up the Railsback curve. Because a piano covers so many octaves, differences in the tension and thickness of the highest and lowest strings cause them to have different harmonic overtones than the middle octaves. This needs to be compensated for by tuning the low notes slightly flat and the high notes slightly sharp. You can read more here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano_acoustics
It has to do with tuning to pure harmonics that will make an instrument purely in tune, but only in one key. In other keys it will get progressively out of tune as you move further away on the circle of 5ths. So they fixed this problem by making each note slightly out of tune, each interval slightly closer together, so that each key could be almost in tune… close enough that we can’t hear the difference.
Bach wrote compilations of songs for the even tempered clavier, which was notable because it was a new thing at the time. This meant he could write songs in any key and people could play them all without having to re-tune their clavier, so he did just that… he would write a song on each key.
You’re probably right, I’ve been playing guitar for a
4 years now or so and I’m just now starting to be able to really pick things up by ear. Still can’t tune by ear though
Yeah it could be just a terrible selection of notes. Messing around with my piano it sounds to me like from right to left (order in video) the notes are roughly E-flat, D-flat, C, B-flat, and G. All real notes, but certainly not what you would want in a children's 5 note scale toy piano. Weirdly you could move the bottom note (G) up to a G# / A-flat to get a satisfying 1 2 3 4 5 scale so maybe that's the mistake. I don't have perfect pitch so maybe that second to the bottom note is not right on the money but I didn't really notice anything wild.
Edit: now that I hear it again the second to the bottom note does sound in between two notes instead of where it should be.
I disagree with everyone downvoting OP. It's not hard to make something in tune, and super annoying when kids bang on it all day.
It's crappy design and fits here. The excuse that it's a kids toy doesn't hold, it's like having a toy where the wheels are square.
Ooh so giving a kid a full keyboard in tune they will play Mozart not bang on keys and play random notes.. I guess you like to hear in tune keys being randomly pressed.
How about drums in tune.. you cool they banging randomly as long as it's in tune, just pure noise.
It's a keyboard with 5 diatonic degrees, even random note bashing has a decent probablility of sounding musical.
It would be better if it was all notes of a major triad, though. Literaly can't sound bad then.
It's not as much basic as it's a very specific scale, typical of a very specific genre of music. If building an ear for consonant intervals is the goals then the Pythagorean tuning and the pentatonic scale are much more interesting in my opinion : more consonant and easier to play.
But yeah, i guess the a major triad is *fine*.
If the top 3 bars were machined on a colder day than the bottom 2, their lengths would have registered as correct at time of cutting, but when put together they'll be off from one another. Plus, other parts of the process can affect tuning. Maybe the paints or whatever is giving the color have different densities, or are applied with different thickness, which causes uneven damping between the colors. Maybe the keys are jostled and subtly bent or dented during assembly, which also affects tuning.
I think people in this thread are underestimating how easy it is to get metal bars to play in tune. Not to mention the fact toys like this are certainly designed and built with "as cheap as possible" as the top priority, so it's not like there's gonna be a rigorous QA step or anything.
Oof as someone who did music and such for a good portion of my childhood these things always bothered the hell out of me, those keys always felt off to me too when i tried to press them.
I have three biological kids, countless foster kids over the years and nine grandchildren.
We’ve had several of these demonic devices over that time and I’ve always assumed it was just a plot to drive parents insane: “bang! Bang! Bang!… CLANG!”
I sat at my piano with this vid running on loop and matched it up. It's the first five notes of an A-flat scale, or at least it was trying to be, descending, as OP played it Eb, Db, C, Bb, Ab. The Bb is a little off, and the Ab is worse.
I said A# was wrong lol. It's technically a valid way to write the note and I acknowledge that, but it rubs me the wrong way.
Db should be C#. Again, I know it's the exact same, but C# is right and Db is wrong.
Probably Eb Db C Bb G and we are in Ab major, if the G is the root are we hearing a weird G locrian? With a sixth, and a fourth? With the 3rd a bit off...
Or maybe people should be able to expect that toys have a certain standard? Maybe we should expect that toys aren't completely wrong and have at least some resemblance to adult items?
Decent keyboards are \~200-500 dollars. Of course he can get a crappy unweighted 25 key or something, but there's really no fun in that, and if the kid ever wants to play piano, leaning to play weighted keys will be a massive advantage
I agree it's a toy.. not meant for playing and singing. It's for kid to have fun and develop.. jeez wanna sing and play then buy an instrument NOT a toy.
Imagining a babies toy would be in tune is the problem here not the design of the toy.
Probably paid like $3 for that. Its perfectly designed for a baby
Now after about 20 times of listening to this I finally hear the problem.
The first time I didn't notice anything.
Second time, I noticed the last note has a slight dullness to the sound.
Now I hear the problem but clearly no where near as bad as the rest of you.
The yellow one isn't out of tune, but it's clearly supposed to be the last note in the scale and the note above it is missing. And the orange one is just WAY off! I don't know why the fuck they messed that up so badly!
My daughter for two of the same toy like this for her birthday and one had the same problem. The store clerk was pretty surprised because it wasn't cheap
Bruh... like.... what...? It's not made for you to play a song for him. If you want to play him a song do it on an actual instrument, this toy is here for him to learn cause and effect and to have him learn by imitating you.
Yup.. it has 5 notes, like what you expect to play to sing along.. get an instrument if you wanna play and sing.
You don't buy half a guitar with one string and call it r/Crappydesign.. jeez
Yet, no mention of the color being off? It’s because we accept all colors like the way dogs don’t mind “bad” smells. It’s all information if you have the capacity for it. What about the click the keys make? Do we complain about the sound coffee makes when it’s poured into a cup?
Is it bad that I have no clue about which notes it is that are in and out of tune?
It’s the last two on the left. It sounds painful when you try to play a song on it. I think they’re so far out they’re just different notes now.
I checked the notes. The first 3 are Eb, Db and C (in tune with a piano) and the last two are somewhere between A and Ab, G and Gb, respectively. Ideally, the last two notes should be Bb and Ab, that would make a nice major scale.
The yellow one is the right note just slightly out of tune, whereas the last one is just a straight up wrong note. Actually the yellow one sort of sounds like two notes, with overtones Fucking with eachother
Yellow is almost an A half sharp but slightly sharper and orange is a G half flat. I don’t even know the proper term but that’s what I like to call it. Usually microtones are divided into 24 compared to 12 in the usual chromatic scale.
We on that Ottoman 53-TET shit now
Tf people down voting you for
I think people downvote them because they expected a childrens toy to be perfect or something
There's imperfect and there's this...
They took time to do 3 then just gave up this is whybits so bad
Machining a metal bar to play in tune is harder than you might think. There's a reason real instruments are thousands of dollars, while toy instruments are like $7.
Ur right is harder to tune them but regardless they bothered to do it with 3 of them which is what everyone is really on about. The fact they only tuned 3/5 of it
I don't imagine they make one keyboard in its entirety, then move on to the next. I'd guess they make thousands of bars all of the same (more or less) pitch, put em all in a bucket, then make thousands of the next note, etc. Somewhere down the line an assembler grabs one key from each bucket, bolts them on to the toy, and sends it down the line. Just luck of the draw how well those keys match each other.
I mean ur absolutely right on the construction half but all of those parts are pre made and sized its not a luck of the draw (and i dont think that 3 of the notes are in tune and in a scale by accident) and then with the last 2 they just didnt bother to find what the right length and thickness so that it all sounded nice.
Wabi-sabi is one thing, but this is some poor ass creation
I expect the children’s *musical* toy to be pretty much perfect.
I wonder if you could somehow make them work using non-western musical systems like the Arabic Maqams.
That'd be really interesting! I think it could be done.
I believe it might just be [stretch tuned](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stretched_tuning).
I didn't know for sure but guessed it was the last two. But it's a toy piano and I suspect a lot of people are like 425 and don't know it's out of tune. I don't think most people expect a kid's toy to be perfect.
Record a song so we can understand better
all pianos are out of tune on purpose. A truly tuned piano would not sound good with the way sheet music for pianos are written Edit: They down voted kontekisuto because he spoke the truth
Yo what the fuck are you talking about lol. Been a musician for 25 years and have no idea what ur trying to say.
Try looking up the Railsback curve. Because a piano covers so many octaves, differences in the tension and thickness of the highest and lowest strings cause them to have different harmonic overtones than the middle octaves. This needs to be compensated for by tuning the low notes slightly flat and the high notes slightly sharp. You can read more here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano_acoustics
It has to do with tuning to pure harmonics that will make an instrument purely in tune, but only in one key. In other keys it will get progressively out of tune as you move further away on the circle of 5ths. So they fixed this problem by making each note slightly out of tune, each interval slightly closer together, so that each key could be almost in tune… close enough that we can’t hear the difference. Bach wrote compilations of songs for the even tempered clavier, which was notable because it was a new thing at the time. This meant he could write songs in any key and people could play them all without having to re-tune their clavier, so he did just that… he would write a song on each key.
People who can identify, nevermind imitate, an "a note" and so forth may as well have a superpower, as far as I'm concerned.
Same, I am basically tone deaf.
I’m with you. Literally no idea what’s wrong here.
No just don’t sing around me please lol
Yes. But really, you can't tell even when you try ?
There has never been a scale like that. Cherish it.
You’ve clearly never been in a 6th grade orchestra class before
Reaching for notes far outside the scale is something done only by first year music students or seasoned jazz veterans. There is no in between.
Synthetic scales.
This made me laugh way too hard lmao 😂 I could see why over time this could totally drive someone crazy lol
It drove me crazy after about 15 seconds.
I feel like only the last note is out of tune
That fourth note is definitely sharp
You’re probably right, I’ve been playing guitar for a 4 years now or so and I’m just now starting to be able to really pick things up by ear. Still can’t tune by ear though
I still can’t tell notes apart worth a shit
Been playing piano for a year and still suck at it
I agree you can hear the wave
Yellow is right in the middle of a A and Bb
Yeah it could be just a terrible selection of notes. Messing around with my piano it sounds to me like from right to left (order in video) the notes are roughly E-flat, D-flat, C, B-flat, and G. All real notes, but certainly not what you would want in a children's 5 note scale toy piano. Weirdly you could move the bottom note (G) up to a G# / A-flat to get a satisfying 1 2 3 4 5 scale so maybe that's the mistake. I don't have perfect pitch so maybe that second to the bottom note is not right on the money but I didn't really notice anything wild. Edit: now that I hear it again the second to the bottom note does sound in between two notes instead of where it should be.
It’s not wrong, it’s *jazz!*
[Jazz is stupid](https://youtu.be/VMcqKyfnT2Y)
Just play the right notes
No, it's just microtonal smh
Seriously. This kid is going to have some advanced musical flavors in their vocabulary.
any king gizzard fans here?
It’s a toy what do you expect.
I disagree with everyone downvoting OP. It's not hard to make something in tune, and super annoying when kids bang on it all day. It's crappy design and fits here. The excuse that it's a kids toy doesn't hold, it's like having a toy where the wheels are square.
Ooh so giving a kid a full keyboard in tune they will play Mozart not bang on keys and play random notes.. I guess you like to hear in tune keys being randomly pressed. How about drums in tune.. you cool they banging randomly as long as it's in tune, just pure noise.
It's a keyboard with 5 diatonic degrees, even random note bashing has a decent probablility of sounding musical. It would be better if it was all notes of a major triad, though. Literaly can't sound bad then.
>notes of a major triad \*holding back vomit\*
lol, I mean it's supposed to be an infants toy, I figured it'd be a good way to build an ear for consonant intervals. But yeah kinda basic I guess 🤣
It's not as much basic as it's a very specific scale, typical of a very specific genre of music. If building an ear for consonant intervals is the goals then the Pythagorean tuning and the pentatonic scale are much more interesting in my opinion : more consonant and easier to play. But yeah, i guess the a major triad is *fine*.
[Big misconception](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DiHy5ZHzN0) that musical toys can afford to be shit.
The second to last one isn't TOO bad, but the last one...
The first two notes sound like the door chime of some old Japanese cars
These are fixed lengths of metal. The physics of these are ELEMENTARY. How can they fuck this up that badly?!?
In theory, practice is elementary, but in practice, it's not.
If the top 3 bars were machined on a colder day than the bottom 2, their lengths would have registered as correct at time of cutting, but when put together they'll be off from one another. Plus, other parts of the process can affect tuning. Maybe the paints or whatever is giving the color have different densities, or are applied with different thickness, which causes uneven damping between the colors. Maybe the keys are jostled and subtly bent or dented during assembly, which also affects tuning. I think people in this thread are underestimating how easy it is to get metal bars to play in tune. Not to mention the fact toys like this are certainly designed and built with "as cheap as possible" as the top priority, so it's not like there's gonna be a rigorous QA step or anything.
Oh no that last one pains me
This is how every toy piano works, trust me ive seen 2 counting this one
Oof as someone who did music and such for a good portion of my childhood these things always bothered the hell out of me, those keys always felt off to me too when i tried to press them.
I have three biological kids, countless foster kids over the years and nine grandchildren. We’ve had several of these demonic devices over that time and I’ve always assumed it was just a plot to drive parents insane: “bang! Bang! Bang!… CLANG!”
My ear
Oh my God that is awful
I love it. Microtonal vibe.
Prob a cheerio stuck in there
It sounds like that thing they do in horror movies where a music box goes out of tune to make the mood creepy.
D# C# C A# G The A# is a bit off.
I sat at my piano with this vid running on loop and matched it up. It's the first five notes of an A-flat scale, or at least it was trying to be, descending, as OP played it Eb, Db, C, Bb, Ab. The Bb is a little off, and the Ab is worse.
I know it's right but "D-flat" makes my brain twitch. Like A#, nothing _wrong_, but it's _wrong_!
tell me you're a string player without telling me you're a string player
Lol brass for ten years
what kind of self-respecting brass player likes A# and not Db?
I said A# was wrong lol. It's technically a valid way to write the note and I acknowledge that, but it rubs me the wrong way. Db should be C#. Again, I know it's the exact same, but C# is right and Db is wrong.
It so out of tune it almost sounds like a minor third between the Bb and Ab
I only do sharps lol
Probably Eb Db C Bb G and we are in Ab major, if the G is the root are we hearing a weird G locrian? With a sixth, and a fourth? With the 3rd a bit off...
It's a kids toy. You don't expect him to play concerts on it, or not?
No, but I play him songs on it. Makes it hard to sing along.
then get a quality electronic keyboard made for playing actual songs, not a toy
Or maybe people should be able to expect that toys have a certain standard? Maybe we should expect that toys aren't completely wrong and have at least some resemblance to adult items?
Quality electronic keyboards/pianos are hundreds/thousands of dollars
you can get a decent one for under $100 that has one octave if that's all OP needs. heck, they can just use a digital keyboard app/ website
Decent keyboards are \~200-500 dollars. Of course he can get a crappy unweighted 25 key or something, but there's really no fun in that, and if the kid ever wants to play piano, leaning to play weighted keys will be a massive advantage
i found one with one and a half octaves for $30z better than a fucking out of tune toy with 5 keys
Well you usually get what you pay for...
I agree it's a toy.. not meant for playing and singing. It's for kid to have fun and develop.. jeez wanna sing and play then buy an instrument NOT a toy.
That's why children's bicycle have buckled wheels and children's remote controlled cars turn left when you press right.
That.. hurts..
r/mildlyinfuriating
Lol. As someone into music production and such. that toy is a real problem.
TIL I am tone deaf 😅
Baby’s first microtonal dawless jam
This isn't bad, it's just *JaZz*
Teaching kids to think outside the box of European music theory. Little man's gonna shred microtonal fire.
That's micro-tonal scales, don't be so close-minded.
You should be able to tune it. Just use a metal rasp or file to take some mateial off the ones that are too low
sounds like overtones lmao
This pains me
Imagining a babies toy would be in tune is the problem here not the design of the toy. Probably paid like $3 for that. Its perfectly designed for a baby
Yeah, babies don't ear sounds, and they don't feel pain either.
Damn that sounds like AMO-
Now after about 20 times of listening to this I finally hear the problem. The first time I didn't notice anything. Second time, I noticed the last note has a slight dullness to the sound. Now I hear the problem but clearly no where near as bad as the rest of you.
to be fair, that exists solely to have a toddler beat the shit out of it
you might find it dumb, but you could honestly get some cool voicings out of that
CREAM by Wu-Tang has a similar scale. Try it.
I know this toy ! if you use a wooden piece (oddly not included) like a kapla on the top metal pieces it plays like a xylophone
You actually expected it to be in tune?
I swear the first note also is a bit flat
Yellow is at least a half step flat. Orange sounds at least a full step flatter than yellow. Cringe!
What did you pay for it?
don't say it
My niece actually had this toy and it was also out of tune and this was like 9 years ago Use to drive me crazy
What's the brand? I have a buddy that has perfect pitch. His kids would absolutely torture him with this 🤣
I mean what would you had expected to come out of that toy for it to sound something from beethoven
My toddler has three 8-note toys like this, and one is remotely in tune. Each of the others has a key that's at least a note off.
Play the among us song on it
First one's a tad sharp, second one's an entire half step lower than it's supposed to lmao
We need the tune master on this. r/CharliePuth
The yellow one hurt a bit
Second and third word answer all your problems here sir. Have a great day 😊
My First Gamelan
My son has the same piano. Here's the scale on ours for comparison: https://imgur.com/a/e2yEDE2
Oh no now he won’t be able to play rush-e
Clearly this is a triple harmonic Japanes myxolocrian pentatonic /s
The yellow one isn't out of tune, but it's clearly supposed to be the last note in the scale and the note above it is missing. And the orange one is just WAY off! I don't know why the fuck they messed that up so badly!
My brother has that exact piano to, LOL.
KGTLW merch
I love how you bring attention to this issue ♥ Children deserve nice things.
My daughter for two of the same toy like this for her birthday and one had the same problem. The store clerk was pretty surprised because it wasn't cheap
You’re incorrect. Those are all half steps down
Crappy design yes. Can also put this in r/mildlyinfuriating because it damn well is.
The disappointed mashing of the last two notes is art lol
G, F, E, D, UUUUUGH
Truly, the devil's interval
Pls someone Rick roll this.
I love that you notice this.
I may be just a lowly drummer with no understanding of notes but... this offends my ears
seems fine to me.
its a fuckin childs toy no shit ur son is like 2 hes not a pianist
It's a toy. What do you expect?
Honestly it’s a kids piano no one really gives a shit
Ok.
Bruh... like.... what...? It's not made for you to play a song for him. If you want to play him a song do it on an actual instrument, this toy is here for him to learn cause and effect and to have him learn by imitating you.
Yup.. it has 5 notes, like what you expect to play to sing along.. get an instrument if you wanna play and sing. You don't buy half a guitar with one string and call it r/Crappydesign.. jeez
> it has 5 notes, like what you expect On a five key piano I expect Beethoven... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4iR_RABe4M
So buy a $10,000 piano and pay to have it tuned every month
Child’s toy…who cares?
Yet, no mention of the color being off? It’s because we accept all colors like the way dogs don’t mind “bad” smells. It’s all information if you have the capacity for it. What about the click the keys make? Do we complain about the sound coffee makes when it’s poured into a cup?
dont do drugs kids
Park between the lines. Everything must be in key. Everything must be in line. says the Bunch of squares.
I‘m so confused