What’s the latest piano library worth getting?

[johngrant]

Thank you very much. Glad you also liked the instrument (my interpretation was quite rushed and imprecise to be honest). I wanted to see if the instrument can handle a big load of voices within a short time without becoming stressed / busy. So far I didn´t realize any problems or glitches.

Impressive piece btw. I also have listened to your interpretation of the D Minor Fugue. Very sophisticated and emotional. I am not sure if it hasn´t too much sustain pedal for the baroque era. But really very beautiful

Actually.... having heard YOUR interpretation, I'm in the throes of overhauling my own at SC. Yours is MUCH BETTER. And you are absolutely right (objective truth is for science, absolute truth is appropriate to aesthetic judgment): too much pedal. Way too much. And the entries of the subject are completely lost. No articulation. So... yeah.... I'm changing that as I write. And you'll hear something pretty different in the next few minutes.

 

[johngrant]

Wow that does sound like a piano. Are you saying it took a lot of tweaking to get it there?

Such a joyful interpretation too. Really compelling.

It's a piano roll, MIDIfied by who knows. I had to alter the tempo and pull up pretty much everything north of C5 (C above middle C). The Roll is attributed to Rachmaninoff, but who knows how true that is. Anyhow, the tempo is erratic, and for my money the interpretation is a little off. But the VST sounds pretty good, as in, like a "not bad" recording.

Unfortunately for all of us, the same VST can sound GREAT as a recording, but be quite bad to play. That Embertone Steinway seems to me to do both pretty well. That's unusual.

Then again, playing a VST (usually at home with the earphones) is NEVER as good as playing even the worst REAL piano. (At least for me.) OK.... I admit .... there ARE exceptions: there are some pretty bad pianos out there.

 

[keepitsimple]

Revisited Ivory II ACD today. Here's the video.

 

[pavolbrezina]

PianoteQ 6 + Steinway B unbeatable right now. But SoundMagic Neopiano has most realistic samples I ever heard, sadly they did not managed the playability yet.

 

[Ashermusic]

Then again, playing a VST (usually at home with the earphones) is NEVER as good as playing even the worst REAL piano. (At least for me.) OK.... I admit .... there ARE exceptions: there are some pretty bad pianos out there.

Could not disagree more. Playing my Dexibell Vivo S7 with this terrific piano sounds (and Rhodes, Wurlitzer, B3, etc,) or playing a really good piano sample library in Logic with it, is way more pleasurable that the Wurlitzer spinets I practiced on for hours and hours in the practice rooms at the Boston Conservatory Of Music. And back in the day on gigs I played pianos with chipped keys that hurt my fingers, out of tune pianos, and pianos where the sustain pedal didn’t work.

 

[Buz]

Yeah I think it depends what each of us is looking for vs what is accessible.

Midi gives everyone what they're looking for with complete autonomy. Using the same thing for real is better (of course), but using real versions of something we don't like has little to no value.

 

[creativeforge]

Haven't figured out how to get rid of that "Here more on SoundCloud" thingy. Anyhow, I guess ALL of the recent crop of piano VSTs are pretty good. A lot depends on what you're looking for.

Personally, I'm not interested in playability, particularly. I want a vst which, when recorded and tweaked, sounds like a modern, well-recorded Hamburg Steinway.

Not that German Steinways are necessarily great pianos..... it's just that this is what my ears are accustomed to hearing! Ears tend to accommodate to certain "sounds."

Hi John,

This used to bother me too! Here is what I found out.

When you see this:



Look for the X in the top right corner. If you click it, you'll get this:



Click the PLAY icon and it will revert to the first player's state:



Hope this helps!

Andre

 

[CatOrchestra]

+1 for Noire

I have this but it's something I am thinking of selling. Switched to pianoteq instead

 

[johngrant]

Where do you sell stuff (like Ivory American, assuming it can even be sold)?

 

[johngrant]

Just downloaded Sam's Steinway? I assume. Cheap, btw. Pretty amazing little piano. Not sure I'm even using all the layers, because I'm not sure I properly installed the unzipped files.

How many great little piano vsts like this one (which I've never heard of) are out there, I wonder?