Why not the piano as a reference for bass

@toddalin 

A synthesizer can play basically any waveform all the way down to subharmonic.  A subharmonic square wave with an instantaneous rise time is harder on the speakers that have to make the transition more quickly

An infrasonic square wave, and in fact any square wave, theoretically contains every higher harmonic right up to infinity.  As such every driver in a conventional dynamic speaker will contribute, and the tweeter in principle will be fed infinite power.  Fortunately, the slew rate of any real-world amplifier is not infinitely fast.

My favourite digital format, Direct Stream Digital, cannot even represent a square wave, any more than a vinyl groove can.  I cannot think of any natural phenomenon that produces a true square wave.

@timstella

Even Yamaha only claims that their Clavinovas approach the sound quality of the best concert grand pianos.

let me know when you get to see a Clavinova at any one of the best concert halls in the world?? I will confidently say NOT IN MY LIFETIME!!

On the other hand, they have all the benefits of digital including being affordable enough and small enough for home use

A Clavinova is a clavinova and Yamaha does not market it as a concert instrument.  It's a wonderful home oriented piece of technology.

It's not limited to square waves.  A sawtooth wave also has an instantaneous rise or fall time, as the case may be.

In the real world of music, a square wave would most sound like a clarinet, a sawtooth wave like a string, with bow spikes, a sine wave like a flute, and a triangular wave "flute-like" though none of these instruments are "pure of wave".

So, what's Joni playing (make and model)?

https://youtu.be/_kyQEa-QUd8