A battle has come down upon us! Our "friends" at OnlinePianist.com came up with 15 reasons why the piano is better than the guitar. And we couldn't take that sitting down; so here's a list of our own (which, by the way, is better). But judge for yourselves! Or chuckle at what we've come up with.
1. You can play the guitar sitting down.
Or you can play it standing up. You can play it behind your head, between your legs, even while lying flat on your back.
2. Have guitar, will travel.
The guitar is portable. You can play it just about anywhere—in a cemetery, an elevator, on the dock of some bay. You can play from atop an elephant or from the rooftop of a skyscraper. The possibilities are endless.
3. String attack vs. keystroke.
You can hit a piano key hard, soft, or somewhere in-between. That's it. But a guitar string can be plucked, strummed, tapped, played near the bridge, near the sound hole, or up on the fretboard. Options are a good thing.
4. Efficient chord changes.
With the exception of the open chords, guitar chords can be moved up and down the fretboard without changing the finger shape, allowing for easy key shifts. On the piano, the same chord takes different shapes in different roots.
5. The coolness factor.
Jimmy Page, Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, David Gilmour, Keith Richards, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Eddie Van Halen.
6. Multiply the number of notes you can play. *
Once you hit a piano key, there's nothing you can do to change the sound. But a guitar string can be bent up and down, giving you the ability to play between the notes.
7. Broken guitar strings are a hot commodity.
Broken guitar strings are being recycled and made into jewelry these days. With all proceeds donated to charity, broken strings are no longer the bane of a guitarist they once were.
8. The guitar is more expressive.
Techniques like bends, hammer-ons, pull-offs, harmonics, vibrato, slides, and trills can really make the guitar "talk." The piano pales in comparison.
9. You can keep a stable of guitars.
Acoustic, electric, acoustic-electric, classical, twelve-string, seven-string, six-string, five-string, hollow body, semi-hollow body, solid body, double neck—there's a guitar for every taste and style.
10. The guitar is sexy.
The guitar is the indisputable queen of today's popular music. She makes anyone who plays her sexy.
11. Showmanship.
The Windmill, The Duckwalk, The Shoulder Ride, The Scissor-Kick, The Bow. Smashing the guitar to smithereens, setting it on fire, playing the strings with your teeth. How cool is that?
12. Tuning is a breeze.
Tuning a guitar can be done in mere minutes using only your ears and the tuning pegs. The same can't be said for tuning a piano.
13. Guitars are cheaper.
Even the more decorative models, complete with all the bells and whistles, cost less than a no-frills upright piano.
14. The guitar has a larger audience.
While you're unlikely to strum Beethoven, almost every song you've ever heard on the radio has its roots in guitar.
15. It's far easier to kill a zombie with a guitar.
Everyone knows that to take out a zombie, you have to destroy its brain. One whack of an "axe" to a zombie's forehead is more efficient that rigging up ropes and a pulley to hoist a piano.
About OnlinePianist
OnlinePianist is a piano tutorial website and application that enables users to learn piano as they would from a professional piano teacher, all from the comfort of their own home. Our massive song collection features both modern and classic songs alike. We cover genres ranging from Pop, Rock, R&B, Classical Pieces, Christmas Songs, New Age, Films & TV, Games, International Songs and more. Our product features a one of the kind animated keyboard that allows pianists to physically view their favorite songs being played in accompaniment with the relevant notes. Alongside this keyboard visualization, our piano software includes an array of features designed to allow the user full personalization of their learning experience.
