User Guide

Chapter 24 EVP88 387
Emulated Electric Piano Models
This section provides some background information on the instruments emulated by
the EVP88.
Rhodes
Harold Rhodes (born 1910) constructed arguably the most commonly known and
widely used electric piano. Designed in 1946 as a piano surrogate for practice,
education, and army entertainment, guitar manufacturer Fender successfully marketed
the Rhodes piano beginning in1956. The Fender Rhodes has become one of the most
popular musical instruments in jazz, especially electric jazz. Once CBS took over
production of the Rhodes in 1965, its popularity in pop and rock music grew. Despite
further changes in ownership throughout Rhodes’s history, the instrument remains
ingrained in the mind of the public as the Fender Rhodes. There are also a number of
Rhodes synthesizers (which were developed by the now-defunct synthesizer
manufacturer ARP). Japanese synth and music technology manufacturer Roland owned
the Rhodes name for a while, and released several digital pianos under the Rhodes
moniker. From 1997, until his death in december 2000, Harold Rhodes again owned the
name.
The Rhodes piano bases its method of sound generation on metal reeds which
function much like a tuning fork. These are hit by a hammer action that works in a
similar fashion to that of a grand piano action. The asymmetrically designed tuning fork
consists of a thin tine and a massive tone bar, which are bolted together. Due to
construction considerations, some of the tone bars are rotated by 90 degrees. The
piano is kept in tune by the mass of a spring which can be moved along the tine. The
tine oscillates in front of an electric pickup, similar to that of an electric guitar. This
functions along inductive principles, with permanent magnets placed around the tine
having a damping effect on its movement, thereby affecting the sound.
Like the output signal of an electric guitar, the Rhodes output signal is rather weak and
needs quite a bit of pre-amplification. The Rhodes sound is not harmonically-rich. This
is why so many performers used a treble boost or an overdrive effect when playing the
Rhodes. As mentioned earlier, the Rhodes sounds its best when played through tube
amplifiers.