Topic by Olivier W

  • Avatar
  • Olivier W
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 18-09-2021
  • Posts: 92

Topic: Prepping A NEW Steinway Grand Piano!

Here is the best playlist covering every aspect of proper, serious regulation of a piano — even a brand-new one — that many sampled piano developers seem to ignore. So many pianos in libraries, even Steinways, are horribly out of tune. I find that, for example, VI Labs’ Modern D is one of the best-regulated pianos on the market, whereas even Garritan’s CFX is poorly regulated and out of tune. VI Labs’ Modern D comes close to perfection, and it easily surpasses all Pianoteq 8 models of the Steinway and other pianos, even the Shigeru. I hope Pianoteq 9 will finally surpass the VI Labs Modern D Steinway, which is currently the best library on the market. Here’s a playlist covering every aspect of proper piano regulation:

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLB7X...ure=shared

Regards,

Olivier F.

Reply by sigasa

  • Avatar
  • sigasa
  • Member
  • Offline
  • From: UK
  • Registered: 09-01-2008
  • Posts: 2,017

Re: Prepping A NEW Steinway Grand Piano!

Olivier W wrote:

Here is the best playlist covering every aspect of proper, serious regulation of a piano — even a brand-new one — that many sampled piano developers seem to ignore. So many pianos in libraries, even Steinways, are horribly out of tune. I find that, for example, VI Labs’ Modern D is one of the best-regulated pianos on the market, whereas even Garritan’s CFX is poorly regulated and out of tune. VI Labs’ Modern D comes close to perfection, and it easily surpasses all Pianoteq 8 models of the Steinway and other pianos, even the Shigeru. I hope Pianoteq 9 will finally surpass the VI Labs Modern D Steinway, which is currently the best library on the market. Here’s a playlist covering every aspect of proper piano regulation:

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLB7X...ure=shared

Regards,

Olivier F.

Thank you for sharing. I trained as a piano tuner / technician years ago but was unable to pursue it as a career. But this training has meant that I hear any idiosyncrasy in a pianos tuning and when I play any digital piano either through a VST (Pianoteq in my case) or standalone, I appreciate when I am playing a well engineered action and when I am not. Maybe I'm too fussy, but I like to hear a well tuned piano and to play through a well designed and engineered action / keybed. It's important to me. And there are other piano players, technicians and otherwise, who appreciate the same.

Thanks again Olivier,

Warmest regards,

Chris

Reply by Pianistically

  • Avatar
  • Pianistically
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 12-07-2023
  • Posts: 185

Re: Prepping A NEW Steinway Grand Piano!

Olivier W wrote:

Here is the best playlist covering every aspect of proper, serious regulation of a piano — even a brand-new one — that many sampled piano developers seem to ignore. So many pianos in libraries, even Steinways, are horribly out of tune. I find that, for example, VI Labs’ Modern D is one of the best-regulated pianos on the market, whereas even Garritan’s CFX is poorly regulated and out of tune. VI Labs’ Modern D comes close to perfection, and it easily surpasses all Pianoteq 8 models of the Steinway and other pianos, even the Shigeru. I hope Pianoteq 9 will finally surpass the VI Labs Modern D Steinway, which is currently the best library on the market. Here’s a playlist covering every aspect of proper piano regulation:

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLB7X...ure=shared

Regards,

Olivier F.

Modern D is quite nice, but Pianoteq resonance , pedalling and tuning capabilities are unsurpassed. I haven't come across a single sample VST which allows advanced pedal technique such as efficient vibrato, fluttering and even the best sampled pianos such as Modern U and Modern D don't come close to Pianoteq in that particular aspect of piano playing for  classical musicians. 
Best regards.
P.

Reply by Jochen

  • Avatar
  • Jochen
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 17-11-2022
  • Posts: 3

Re: Prepping A NEW Steinway Grand Piano!

Modern D is quite nice, but Pianoteq resonance , pedalling and tuning capabilities are unsurpassed. I haven't come across a single sample VST which allows advanced pedal technique such as efficient vibrato, fluttering and even the best sampled pianos such as Modern U and Modern D don't come close to Pianoteq in that particular aspect of piano playing for  classical musicians. 
Best regards.
P.

I have never heard of "advanced pedal technique such as efficient vibrato, fluttering". Has anyone here audio or video examples of that?

Last edited by Jochen (30-06-2025 07:58)

Reply by dikrek

  • Avatar
  • dikrek
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 06-02-2023
  • Posts: 152

Re: Prepping A NEW Steinway Grand Piano!

Pianistically wrote:
Olivier W wrote:

Here is the best playlist covering every aspect of proper, serious regulation of a piano — even a brand-new one — that many sampled piano developers seem to ignore. So many pianos in libraries, even Steinways, are horribly out of tune. I find that, for example, VI Labs’ Modern D is one of the best-regulated pianos on the market, whereas even Garritan’s CFX is poorly regulated and out of tune. VI Labs’ Modern D comes close to perfection, and it easily surpasses all Pianoteq 8 models of the Steinway and other pianos, even the Shigeru. I hope Pianoteq 9 will finally surpass the VI Labs Modern D Steinway, which is currently the best library on the market. Here’s a playlist covering every aspect of proper piano regulation:

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLB7X...ure=shared

Regards,

Olivier F.

Modern D is quite nice, but Pianoteq resonance , pedalling and tuning capabilities are unsurpassed. I haven't come across a single sample VST which allows advanced pedal technique such as efficient vibrato, fluttering and even the best sampled pianos such as Modern U and Modern D don't come close to Pianoteq in that particular aspect of piano playing for  classical musicians. 
Best regards.
P.

Some samples here. Modern D plus various Pianoteq models (Steinway, Blüthner, Bösendorfer, Kawai).

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/jof7u5y0...l&dl=0

I think Modern D has some edge in the lower register maybe?

Let me know what you all think.

Reply by Pianistically

  • Avatar
  • Pianistically
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 12-07-2023
  • Posts: 185

Re: Prepping A NEW Steinway Grand Piano!

Jochen wrote:

Modern D is quite nice, but Pianoteq resonance , pedalling and tuning capabilities are unsurpassed. I haven't come across a single sample VST which allows advanced pedal technique such as efficient vibrato, fluttering and even the best sampled pianos such as Modern U and Modern D don't come close to Pianoteq in that particular aspect of piano playing for  classical musicians. 
Best regards.
P.

I have never heard of "advanced pedal technique such as efficient vibrato, fluttering". Has anyone here audio or video examples of that?

Here is a video explaining pedal fluttering .  In pedal fluttering , the pedal quickly oscillate between 20-90 % or similar and is never fully depressed nor fully lift off. Pedal fluttering works very well with scales, chromatic scales , and some staccato passages where a slight blur is required for tone colour.

In pedal vibrato , you start depressing the pedal fully and then create pedal oscillations progressively reducing the range of depression without lifting the pedal completely  , for instance if pedal value range is expressed with 0,127  this is how vibrato  works :  [oscillation 1 : 127, 15 ]   [oscillation 2 : 75-15]  [oscillation 3 : 50-15] etc… Pedal vibrato is principally used when you want to create a rapid diminuendo . Beethoven used this technique with chords.  These two techniques are fundamental when you play music from the impressionism period such as Ravel , Debussy , Albeniz. I have tried many virtual piano libraries and pianoteq is the only virtual instrument that allows full use of these techniques, the reason being that sampled libraries don't have enough detail samples for all intermediate damper positions and even if some sampled libraries add some modelling artefacts to complement the lack of precision this is not satisfying enough . This is really an area where Pianoteq shines.  Hope it helps.  Best . P.

https://youtu.be/3jLIU4WJMBE?si=dVeBeSpInQhFvBl1

Reply by Jochen

  • Avatar
  • Jochen
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 17-11-2022
  • Posts: 3

Re: Prepping A NEW Steinway Grand Piano!

Pianistically wrote:

In pedal vibrato , you start depressing the pedal fully and then create pedal oscillations progressively reducing the range of depression without lifting the pedal completely  , for instance if pedal value range is expressed with 0,127  this is how vibrato  works :  [oscillation 1 : 127, 15 ]   [oscillation 2 : 75-15]  [oscillation 3 : 50-15] etc… Pedal vibrato is principally used when you want to create a rapid diminuendo . Beethoven used this technique with chords.  These two techniques are fundamental when you play music from the impressionism period such as Ravel , Debussy , Albeniz. I have tried many virtual piano libraries and pianoteq is the only virtual instrument that allows full use of these techniques, the reason being that sampled libraries don't have enough detail samples for all intermediate damper positions and even if some sampled libraries add some modelling artefacts to complement the lack of precision this is not satisfying enough . This is really an area where Pianoteq shines.  Hope it helps.  Best . P.

https://youtu.be/3jLIU4WJMBE?si=dVeBeSpInQhFvBl1

Thank you very mich for your explaination and the link. I've learned a lot.

Reply by Pianistically

  • Avatar
  • Pianistically
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 12-07-2023
  • Posts: 185

Re: Prepping A NEW Steinway Grand Piano!

Jochen wrote:
Pianistically wrote:

In pedal vibrato , you start depressing the pedal fully and then create pedal oscillations progressively reducing the range of depression without lifting the pedal completely  , for instance if pedal value range is expressed with 0,127  this is how vibrato  works :  [oscillation 1 : 127, 15 ]   [oscillation 2 : 75-15]  [oscillation 3 : 50-15] etc… Pedal vibrato is principally used when you want to create a rapid diminuendo . Beethoven used this technique with chords.  These two techniques are fundamental when you play music from the impressionism period such as Ravel , Debussy , Albeniz. I have tried many virtual piano libraries and pianoteq is the only virtual instrument that allows full use of these techniques, the reason being that sampled libraries don't have enough detail samples for all intermediate damper positions and even if some sampled libraries add some modelling artefacts to complement the lack of precision this is not satisfying enough . This is really an area where Pianoteq shines.  Hope it helps.  Best . P.

https://youtu.be/3jLIU4WJMBE?si=dVeBeSpInQhFvBl1

Thank you very mich for your explaination and the link. I've learned a lot.

Glad it helps.Happy practising . P.

Reply by JohnnyRayJr

  • Avatar
  • JohnnyRayJr
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 27-02-2025
  • Posts: 9

Re: Prepping A NEW Steinway Grand Piano!

Hello Olivier,

that is exsactly my impression, i just could not deal with the out of tune notes or warbly oscilating chords of most of the sampled libraries.

It took less than 1 minuete till Modern D was on top of all, what a lovely Steinway. Yes i hope so too that Pianoteq will surpass it one day, but up untill then, i cant even come back to Pianoteq for now, the Modern D is just too good, especialy with Altiverb as Reverb Send...oh my lord.

First of all the Library tone in generel, but also for fun times like last sunday, i tuned the Modern D down like -32cent and put the Kings Chamber of the Gize Pyramid as Reverb on it from Altiverb, as the Chamber naturaly resonates in 432hz.

Man that was super cool, what an ambience, totally different flavour, very relaxing, cinematic etc what you wanna call it.....

All the Best
Johnny