PA under £1,000 with best clarity for Piano

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Hi all

I’ve started a project with a singer/acoustic guitar player and will be playing my Juno DS. We are looking at a PA for under £1,000 that would provide the best clarity for the full scope of the piano. We might also add a bass player down the line but as the gigswill be small to medium gigs their bass amp should be adequate.

So in short, best PA under £1,000 for electric piano, acoustic guitar and vocals for small/medium venues.

A little off topic I suppose but because of the range of the piano your experiences of PAs are really valuable.

Thanks
 
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A pair of EV ZXA1-90B (£419 @), a small mixer (maybe the Mackie Mix8 at £69, though I'd be tempted to move up to the Allen & Heath ZED6 at £95 just to get the internal power supply), and a couple of tripod stands (start at about £30/pair, though I don't know about their quality). Add a couple of long mic cable to get from the mixer to the two speakers. That should do it just barely in budget, and will sound good, even for acoustic piano sounds, which are the toughest keyboard sounds to get right.

If you want to get the budget down, the Alto TS308 at £222 @ seemed surprisingly good.

QSC CP8 could be another possibility, at £359, but I haven't heard them myself.

I don't have any experience with the JBL model Biggles mentioned, but my experience in general has been that, while JBL makes some great sounding higher end speakers, once you start looking at lower priced stuff, JBLs don't sound as good as EV, QSC, or Alto.


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Depending upon where you live a visit to a well stocked Music Store may help in particular include a Yamaha Stagepas system in your short list as this is what I have heard a Korg keyboard demonstrator playing through and very impressive were the sounds. About £500 inc stands for the 400W 8 channel version.

Also a pub crawl may be called, those where there are live acts and you can see and hear what they have.
 
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Hi all

I’ve started a project with a singer/acoustic guitar player and will be playing my Juno DS. We are looking at a PA for under £1,000 that would provide the best clarity for the full scope of the piano. We might also add a bass player down the line but as the gigswill be small to medium gigs their bass amp should be adequate.

So in short, best PA under £1,000 for electric piano, acoustic guitar and vocals for small/medium venues.

A little off topic I suppose but because of the range of the piano your experiences of PAs are really valuable.

Thanks
I typically use a Yamaha EMX 85s 8 channel powered mixer with 2 JBL 18” mains and 12” monitors w/Xlr and 1/4” jacks.

This is more than good enough, (albeit a little bit heavy), for all of my acoustic and electric gigs

It’s 20 years old now, (still works great, with 0 maintenance), so I have no idea what it would cost, but I’m guessing the speakers alone are $1,000+.
 
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I've been using the Gemini BT300 PA with a small Alto Zephyr Series ZMX122FX mixer - 2 vocals, acoustic guitar, and Korg EK50 keyboard - medium venue (200 ppl) - fantastic sound.

 
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I have been using the QSC CP-12's for a couple of years now, and they are tremendous sounding. I am running background midi tracks along with playing a Roland AX Synth through them along with live vocals. They are right at the $1000 price point, 1000 watts per speaker, and they are crystal clear and lightweight to boot.
 
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Hi all

I’ve started a project with a singer/acoustic guitar player and will be playing my Juno DS. We are looking at a PA for under £1,000 that would provide the best clarity for the full scope of the piano. We might also add a bass player down the line but as the gigswill be small to medium gigs their bass amp should be adequate.

So in short, best PA under £1,000 for electric piano, acoustic guitar and vocals for small/medium venues.

A little off topic I suppose but because of the range of the piano your experiences of PAs are really valuable.

Thanks
Bose L1 second hand
 
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Hi all

I’ve started a project with a singer/acoustic guitar player and will be playing my Juno DS. We are looking at a PA for under £1,000 that would provide the best clarity for the full scope of the piano. We might also add a bass player down the line but as the gigswill be small to medium gigs their bass amp should be adequate.

So in short, best PA under £1,000 for electric piano, acoustic guitar and vocals for small/medium venues.

A little off topic I suppose but because of the range of the piano your experiences of PAs are really valuable.

Thanks
Just purchased a Yamaha STAGEPAS 1K amp/speaker system for my digital piano and very happy. Compact and portable with a weight near 50#. Tried several other brands at a Guitar Center to explore sound. The Yamaha just out performed anything else at that price range. It's great for small gigs under 100 people e.g., coffee house, parties, etc. It's got an onboard mixer, 1000W, portable PA system with 5 channel digital mixer, 12" subwoofer, 10 x 1.5" driver line array speaker, Bluetooth input, SPX digital reverbs, 1knob EQ and multi-band compressor for master output. Cost is just under $1200 US dollars or 1000 Euros.
Here are the stats:
1000W (HF:190W+LF:810W) Class-D power output
Best in class 12" subwoofer
10x 1.5" drivers for slim line array speaker
Digital mixer (3 mono mic/line + 1 stereo line)
Multi-band compressor "mode" for master output
1-knob EQ for per channel
High resolution SPX digital reverbs (4types, parameter control)
2x Hi-Z (high impedance) inputs
Link out and monitor out
Dedicated cover included
Optional reverb foot switch
Optional dolly for more portability

Vertical line arrays and column speakers tend to provide good control of the vertical and horizontal coverage. So, under 1000 Euros, the JBL had battery issues, the Bose tended to have a very unstable tower plus no mixer, several others at lower costs greatly under-preformed and some actually fell over rather easily if bumped or with a little wind, like the Makie's.
 

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