Keyboardist

Since the mid-1960s, a plethora of new musical instruments with keyboards have come into common usage, such as synthesizers and digital piano, requiring a more general term for a person who plays them.

In the 2010s, professional keyboardists in popular music often play a variety of different keyboard instruments, including piano, tonewheel organ, synthesizer, and clavinet.

The use of electronic keyboards grew in popularity throughout the 1960s, with many bands using the Hammond organ, Mellotron, and electric pianos such as the Fender Rhodes.

Other bands, including the Moody Blues, the Rolling Stones and the Beatles, would go on to add it to their records, both to provide sound effects and as a musical instrument in its own right.

In 1966, Billy Ritchie became the first keyboard player to take a lead role in a rock band, replacing guitar, and thereby preparing the ground for others such as Ray Manzarek, Keith Emerson and Rick Wakeman.