If you play keyboards, organ, or piano in worship, or serve with someone who does, check out this preview of the latest RD Stage Piano from Roland. The new RD-700GX is quite possibly the ultimate keyboard for worship applications.

The RD-700 has been a staple for ministries big and small, traditional and contemporary for years. Taking the next step in the progression of legendary RD stage pianos is the new “GX” line. These new GX pianos start with the best of what the RD has – great piano action, superb piano sound, simple operation, easy layering and mixing of sounds with onboard faders, all the essential “best of” sounds like pads, strings, organ, electric pianos – and takes it to a completely new level.

The RD-700GX has a new “Ivory Feel” which not only gives you the most authentic piano action available on a digital piano, but also the actual tactile “feel” of ivory on the keys themselves. This makes the playing experience all the more realistic and gratifying to any keyboardist, but especially those of us who grew up on an acoustic. The keys also absorb moisture which ensures a secure feel in the warmest conditions.

Going beyond the key texture and hammer action though, the GX has a brand new piano sound that is simply the most expressive and dynamic I’ve ever played on a digital piano. Writing about a piano sound is somewhat futile, but when you hear it, you just know. Each note is individually sampled in stereo at multiple dynamic levels, which is to say, there are over 500 waveforms in the new acoustic grand piano sound alone.

If that weren’t enough, it also has a new Piano Designer feature which allows you to personalize your piano sound down to the smallest details such as Hammer Noise, Damper Resonance, Duplex Scale and more. Electric pianos? Well, this is where the story gets even better. The RD-700GX is host to a new Roland technology called “SuperNATURAL” which offers that same level of control to all the parameters related to electric pianos.

Having great feel and sounds is something the RDs are known for, but to be the “ultimate keyboard for worship”, it has to be able to work with audio files. Using tracks, loops, audio phrases, etc. is something that is becoming increasing common in modern worship but normally requires a sampler, computer, or keyboard workstation to accomplish. Not anymore.

The RD-700GX has a USB port which hosts standard flash memory drives. Put any .WAV, AIFF or .MP3 file on a USB drive and the RD-700GX will play it…and adjust the tempo and the pitch if you want! It also has a feature called Audio Keys that is ideal for worship leaders who need to be able manipulate the road map of a song in real time. Using Audio Keys, you can assign different sections of a song (intro, verse, chorus, bridge, etc.) to keys in the lowest octave of the keyboard. So, if you want to do the chorus again, no problem. This is a great rehearsal feature as well and allows you to focus on the other musicians and not be buried in the keys.

There’s even more about the new RD-700GX that sets it apart from other digital pianos and makes it ideal for worship applications, but with all these great new capabilities, the RD is still easy to use. Check out the RD-700GX video to see it in action.