Powering a Synthesizer

Video Transcript

"Hi, I'm Ben Anderson with Expert Village and I'm here today to talk to you about your power setup with your keyboard. The power setup is a really important thing. Most other musicians don't have to worry about this aside from keyboardists because they're many different things we need to have powered unlike a guitarist. Most guitarists will only need their amp or any of their rack units that they might be using, but a keyboardist will need a power unit for every keyboard they're using or any different synthesizer box and including their amplifier as well. So an important thing that I always carry with me is a power strip. One of these. I always carry two in fact because you never know, especially when playing in a live club, you never know where your power is going to be available from, in what parts of the stage. So I always carry a couple on me as well as extension cords. Extension cords are very important 'cause you never know how much room you're going to have to work with on stage. Most keyboards will come with a power pack, a power supply. Looks like one of these. The only unfortunate thing about these power supplies is the fact that A, they're very big and take up a lot of room and they're also very specific. A lot of keyboards need very specific type of power and you can't just go out and randomly buy one. At one time I had trouble where I played the live show and I couldn't find my power supply for my keyboard, so I had to try to go to Radio Shack to try to find a specific one that I needed, because I tried using other ones on my keyboard and my keyboard wasn't getting the necessary power that it needed. So your power set up will be very important to how you're going to be able to play on stage or in the comfort of your own home. So one thing you might want to do is you might want to go out and have an extra power supply set up for all of your gear, just in case for any reason you happen to lose it at any point, of or if for any reason a cord or cable might not be working anymore, it might not be frayed, it's always good to have extras on hand, so you know you're always prepared for any situation that might come your way. And unlike a drummer or a guitarist where if you forget something like a pick or some strings or drumsticks or a certain drum, and you can go and borrow that from another player that might be playing that night, as a keyboardist you can't necessarily depend on others having the necessary power supply that you need since they are so specific. So another reason why having an extra power supply on hand is very, very important."