This Holiday Season, Give the Gift of Music

The holidays are here! There’s no better way to get into the spirit of the season than by giving the gift of music.

Here are some suggestions from Yamaha that are sure to please the musician or music lover in your life.

True X Bar 50A Sound Bar and True X Speaker 1A Portable Speaker

Movie buffs appreciate great audio, which is why a quality sound bar like the Dolby Atmos^®-compatible True X Bar 50A makes the ideal holiday gift, especially when paired with wireless True X Speaker 1A portable speakers.

Equipped with both dual built-in subwoofers and a separate wireless sub for extra deep bass, the True X Bar 50A incorporates upward-firing drivers that are designed to bounce sound off the ceiling for a fully immersive sound experience when listening to Dolby Atmos mixes. Alexa Built-In enables full voice control of your sound bar, including volume level, playing music, setting alarms and timers, controlling smart home devices and more, and Clear Voice technology provides enhanced dialogue clarity. The True X Bar 50A is wall-mountable with built-in keyholes and offers simple setup with HDMI or optical connections. When paired with True X Speaker 1As, surround speakers can be placed anywhere in the room. Instant home theater!

DTX402 Electronic Drum Kit

If you’ve got a burgeoning drummer in your family, an electronic drum kit such as the Yamaha DTX402K makes for a great gift. A major benefit of an electronic drum kit is that it provides a volume control, allowing your child to play and practice while wearing headphones, so as not to disturb other family members or neighbors.

But that’s not the only advantage. Electronic drums are versatile, portable and easy to store, plus they come with a wide range of sounds, making them great for both live performance and recording. The DTX402K includes four drum pads (snare and three toms), three cymbal pads (ride, crash, hi-hat), two silent pedals (kick, hi-hat), a trigger module (the central “brain” of the kit) and all required mounting hardware. It comes loaded with 287 drum and percussion sounds, 128 additional sounds (including special effects), and there’s an onboard metronome too. Ideal for beginners and intermediate players, the kit provides 10 onboard training functions that make practicing fun and help the user quickly develop drumming skills for various genres of music; also included is a free three-month subscription to Melodics lessons. And, when using the DTX402K in conjunction with the free Yamaha Rec’n’Share app, aspiring drummers can practice and perform with their favorite music — even with video — and share their progress with friends and family on social media.

FSC-TA TransAcoustic Guitar in Ruby Red

Yamaha TransAcoustic guitars like the FSC-TA are ideal for both beginning and advanced guitarists. They offer an extraordinary combination of classic craftsmanship with revolutionary technology, transporting the player to new, creative spaces via immersive, built-in reverb and chorus effects that actually resonate within the body of the instrument itself. What better way to celebrate the holidays than to give the gift of an FSC-TA in a beautiful Ruby Red finish?

Its lightweight concert body (similar in size and shape to a standard classical guitar) makes it easy to play the FSC-TA for extended periods, and its cutaway design enables easy access to every note on the fretboard. Constructed from quality tonewoods — with a solid spruce top, mahogany back and sides, a nato neck and rosewood fretboard — this award-winning instrument delivers rich, warm tone, and its scalloped bracing provides enhanced projection, making it ideal for live performance in venues of every size. This is one guitar that sounds as good as it looks!

reface CP Electric Piano

Yamaha reface mobile-mini keyboards provide big sound in a compact size. These keyboards present reimagined interfaces of classic Yamaha instruments, making them a great gift for the synthesist who is looking to hone in on one particular family of sounds instead of taking a “one size fits all” approach. The reface CP model offers a variety of electric piano and keyboard tones with retro analog-type knob controls in a portable package, making it the perfect go-anywhere songwriting partner.

reface CP offers six detailed vintage keyboard types and five stomp box-style effects, along with 128-note polyphony. The high quality mini-keyboard allows fast, natural performance with premium feel and response, and there’s a built-in stereo speaker system with enhanced bass response for full, rich sound. For increased portability, reface CP is battery powered too, using six standard AAs with five hours of battery life. A USB TO HOST port allows MIDI connectivity to any USB-equipped computer or iOS device, and an aux line input lets you connect and hear mobile devices, tablets and more through the instrument. There are even dual 1/4″ line outputs for connection to mixers, audio interfaces, DI boxes and other devices.

DGX-670 Digital Piano

The DGX-670 Portable Grand digital piano is ideal for beginners and accomplished pianists alike. It has an 88-note weighted keyboard with a graded action that gives the low keys a heavier response and the high keys a lighter response … just as in an acoustic piano.

It’s got great sounds, too, including high-quality samples of the flagship Yamaha 9-foot CFX concert grand piano, as well as over 600 other Voices, including non-keyboard instruments and drums, plus 250 accompaniment Styles. There’s a microphone input with high-quality effects that allows the player to sing along and record their performances directly to a thumb drive, and Bluetooth^® compatibility enables wireless streaming of the player’s favorite music to the keyboard’s onboard dual speaker system, making practice easy and fun. Weighing in at less than 50 pounds and offering a streamlined workflow via a full-color touchscreen and dedicated backlit buttons, the DGX-670 is perfect for live performance, but it’s also a great home keyboard. The optional L-300 stand enables an LP-1 three-pedal unit to be added, providing a playing experience similar to that of an acoustic piano.

YEV-104/YEV-105 Electric Violin

Not all violinists are traditionalists. An electric violin like the Yamaha YEV-104 (or the five-string YEV-105) gives violin players the opportunity to explore new creative and sonic possibilities, and allows them to experiment with new genres and perform in environments where the sound from their traditional violin doesn’t project sufficiently.

These innovative instruments are visually stunning, yet play the same way as their acoustic counterparts. They deliver a warm, smooth organic tone, and can be connected to any standard amplifier or P.A. system. Unlike “clip-on” violin pickups, they amplify directly and cleanly, with no feedback issues, making them ideal for both indoor and outdoor performances. And with an electric violin, it’s easy to add effects like reverb or distortion with the use of any standard effects pedal or signal processor.

SILENT Brass™ System

Kids love playing brass instruments like trumpet and trombone, which is why they are among the most popular instruments in school music programs. But, as every parent knows (or eventually finds out), brass instruments can be very loud when you get up and close and personal

Yes, the sound can be reduced somewhat by using a mute, but the problem is that mutes dramatically alter tone as well as volume. Yamaha provides the perfect solution with its revolutionary SILENT Brass system, which turns the sound and feel of a muted instrument into an unmuted one. The system consists of a specially designed mute fitted with a pickup that connects to a small electronic “personal studio” unit that clips onto the player’s belt. That little box contains exclusive circuitry that simulates a standard acoustic tone, making the instrument sound as though there’s no mute being used. Versions are available for trumpet, cornet, Flugelhorn, trombone, French horn, euphonium and tuba, and the SILENT Brass mutes for the latter two have extra adaptability in that the position of the mute head can be adjusted to match different bell sizes and personal preferences — which also means that the same mute can be used on B♭, C, E♭, and F horns. A great gift for kids as well as parents!

GB1K Baby Grand Piano

A piano is more than a gift. It’s a gathering place where the spirit of the season comes to life, and where memories are made that will last for years to come.

Grand pianos vary in size from “Baby grand” models that can be as little as 4 1/2 feet in length, all the way up to “Concert grand” models, which can be 9 feet in length or more. The compact size of the 5-foot Yamaha GB1K baby grand model makes it perfect for any room — even rooms with limited space — yet it offers a full, resonant tone comparable to that of many substantially larger models. Available in six different colors and finishes, including Polished Ebony, Polished American Walnut, Polished White, Polished Mahogany, French Provincial Cherry and Georgian Mahogany, the GB1K can fit into any décor … and it looks every bit as beautiful as it sounds.

HS3/HS4 Powered Studio Monitor Speakers

HS Series speakers have become the standard in studio monitors, trusted for many years by the world’s top audio engineers, producers and artists. Now Yamaha has redefined their essence in a compact housing. The HS3 and HS4 are powerful tools to help create a wide range of audio content — from music production to video editing — that meets the expectations of creators who have limited space and need to keep the volume down but do not want to compromise on quality.

These two-way bass-reflex nearfield monitors offer 26 watts of power, with solid bass and crisp highs, plus there are onboard controls that allow the response to be tailored to the acoustics of the room. They’re self-powered — no external amplifier needed — and offer multiple inputs so you can connect a wide range of devices, and a stereo 1/8″-to-phono cable is included too. HS Series monitors have become an industry standard for a reason: their accuracy. The HS3 and HS4 continue that tradition, delivering clean, clear sound that will bring your creations to life.

For more information about these and other Yamaha music products, click here.