Topic: Something obvious: Changing the Pedal curve

A new discovery for me, although it may be a common practice: I've been experimenting with changing the Pedal curve by creating a fairly large dip to the right for low pressures, much like a velocity curve for a keyboard with a fast action.

Apparently my (newish) Yamaha FC3 continuous sustain pedal was responding too easily. Not just a matter of starting too early, for which PT already compensates by having the lowest value set to around 25. My FC3 has instead just been sending too much "pedal down" for each stage of the pedal push, to my ears. Setting a deep curve keeps PT instruments "dryer" in a sense for longer, and seems to give me a wider variation in the degrees of dry to wet (no sustain to full sustain.) Huge difference in the sound of each instrument using this curve. (Which may mean, too, that I ride the pedal too much...)

Using the curve on the new Pleyel, for example, has really opened up new possibilities for the already great sound. But well worth trying on the C3, the M3, and all of the others.

Last edited by Jake Johnson (15-12-2010 19:54)

Re: Something obvious: Changing the Pedal curve

You're right, getting the curve right makes a huge difference in pedaling with a continuous pedal.

Something else I've done with my GPP3 is put a shim under the right pedal to reduce its overall travel. Two reasons: there was a fair bit of lost movement (CC reached 128) at the bottom of its travel and the travel was rather long anyway.

Between the shim and the curve, my pedal is now very like the pedal on my real piano.

Re: Something obvious: Changing the Pedal curve

I've just ordered a CME GPP-3 Doug. I'll let you know how I get on with it! I'm initially going to use the midi out to midi in of my CP33. Looking forward to '3' pedals instead of being limited by Yamaha to '2'!

Re: Something obvious: Changing the Pedal curve

(I edited the original post to read "FC3 pedal." For some reason I had written the model number as "F3.")

Re: Something obvious: Changing the Pedal curve

sigasa wrote:

I've just ordered a CME GPP-3 Doug. I'll let you know how I get on with it! I'm initially going to use the midi out to midi in of my CP33. Looking forward to '3' pedals instead of being limited by Yamaha to '2'!

With luck you'll get a good one. If it isn't, return instantly; CME's support will not help you.