Piano Marvel Tips for Practicing Piano Quietly at Home
Wondering how you can practice piano and not disturb anyone or be distracted by outside noise? We have some helpful tips for practicing piano quietly at home.
There are many reasons that one might prefer to practice piano silently. Sometimes, a piano student would prefer not to have an audience while they are learning or a listener would prefer not to hear the same piece repeated, ad nauseam. Maybe they keep irregular hours and want to feel free to practice when the time and or mood strikes, or perhaps they are learning in a group lesson and need to hear themselves play, but not everyone else. Regardless, most students want tips for practicing piano quietly at home.
Sometimes silent practice is just not feasible. For the majority of acoustic pianos, silent practice is not an option. There are some great models that have the capability, like the Yamaha SC3, but they are acoustic/electronic hybrids. There is also the option of adding a PNOScan to an acoustic piano. QRS does an amazing job and I love the convenience of having a QRS system on the grand piano. Both options provide the ability to have silent practice and acoustic sound on demand, so it really is the best of both worlds!
The simplest option for silent practice is to have a keyboard or electronic piano and plug headphones into it. Most pianos and keyboards have that option and it is straightforward. Check your piano and see if it has a headphone jack. It might be labeled phones, audio out, line out, or have a headphone icon.
Jacks come in two sizes, ¼ inch, and ⅛ (3.5 mm) inch. If your piano has one that does not match your headphones, you can get an adapter to fix it. If your headphones are ⅛ (3.5 mm) inch and your headphone jack is ¼ inch, use something like this ¼ inch to 3.5 mm adapter. If your headphones are ¼ inch and you need to adapt them down to 3.5 mm, here is that adapter. They are inexpensive and save you from having to have multiple sets of headphones.
If you are planning to interact simultaneously with your digital piano and Piano Marvel using headphones, you can access all of the amazing tools Piano Marvel offers while playing to your heart's content and not have to worry about disturbing a soul! For this option, you will connect a device such as a computer or a tablet with your electronic piano or keyboard and your headphones. Because there are many different configurations that keyboards and devices have, I will list some and the components you will need for each one.
- If your keyboard has an audio in/line in/aux in jack and your computer/phone/iPad/or tablet has a headphone jack, you will use an aux cord (like this) from the keyboard to the jack on the computer and then plug your headphones into the computer to hear all audio.
- If your piano does not have audio in/line in/aux in jack, you will have to use an aux cable like the above and a hub, like this one from Belkin, the Rockstar. Plug the hub into the piano and your headphones into the hub, then connect another auxiliary cable from the hub into the headphone jack on the computer or tablet.
- If your computer or tablet does not have a headphone jack, you will want a hub to add a headphone jack. If your computer or device has a USB C port, you will use this type of hub.
If your computer has a USB A port, you will need a hub like this.
- If you do not have any of the options listed above and are using piano-learning software such as Piano Marvel, you can use the software to make the piano sound for you and use a MIDI connection to your computer or tablet and enable the Virtual Piano in the Menu, Instrument Settings. Then you will plug your headphones into the tablet or computer and turn down the volume on your keyboard.
No matter your reason for wanting tips for practicing piano quietly at home, we’ve got you covered! You may need to use one or more of the above configurations with your piano and device, but if you have any questions, please email us at [email protected]!
