CES isn’t simply an opportunity for corporations to debut all of the devices and units they’ll be insisting shoppers purchase all through the approaching yr, it’s additionally an opportunity to debut idea designs offering a sneak peek at applied sciences arriving within the many years to come back. For Roland, that’s apparently a digital piano that surrounds the performer in a swarm of flying surround-sound speaker drones.

Roland’s been making digital pianos because the debut of the EP-10 again in 1973, however the Japanese firm’s really been round for 50 years. To commemorate the anniversary, it’s debuting this fiftieth Anniversary Concept Model Piano at CES 2023 this week, however don’t hassle reaching to your bank card as a result of as with most ideas: Roland has no plans to make this obtainable to shoppers.

The piano itself is a placing piece of design, with a “one-piece molded wooden body” created in collaboration with the Japanese furnishings maker, Karimoku, and constructed from Japanese oak. It’s a press release piece that merges the craftsmanship of conventional analog pianos, with the pliability and performance of an digital instrument.

On the tech aspect, there’s a big display revealed when the piano’s lid is opened, good for displaying sheet music, adjusting settings or altering the piano’s sound profile, and even for accessing classes for these simply beginning their musical careers, which is paired with a keyboard that feels extra such as you’re enjoying a piano with actual mechanical hammers inside.

What actually units the fiftieth Anniversary Concept Piano aside is Roland’s give attention to making it sound nearly as good as attainable with 14 built-in audio system that may be adjusted to ship sound in any course in a room or a efficiency house. It doesn’t matter the place the piano is positioned, the viewers will nonetheless have the most effective spot in the home to listen to a efficiency irrespective of the place they sit, however Roland didn’t cease there.

The fiftieth Anniversary Concept Piano can be designed to work alongside 4 drone audio system, with an identical wooden end, that actually float above and across the piano. The drones “operate on a low latency dedicated communication channel” so the sound they emit syncs up with the sounds the piano’s personal audio system are producing, and their place will be managed by the pianist throughout a efficiency.

It’s definitely an unique concept, however anybody who’s ever been inside 50 ft of a drone can be elevating an eyebrow at this idea, as a result of the sound of simply considered one of them will be deafening, and 4 of them circling a piano goes to be the one factor anybody close by hears. So whereas this idea is likely to be welcomed with open arms by amateurs keen to cover errors throughout their first piano recital, it’s in all probability going to finish up within the CES archives of ideas not lengthy for this world.