Topic by Simon Eskildsen

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  • Simon Eskildsen
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Topic: Pedal question

Hello!

I recently got into pianoteq, and am really loving it. I use my old Nord Stage 88 (1st edition) for midi, and have managed to hook up a second pedal as soft pedal. Basically it's all great! I tend to play this instead of my yamaha upright these days!

However, I am having the issue, that the pedal sound is only on/off, which makes it quite loud for quiet playing. I have turned down the pedal sound slider of course, but would love to have a pedal with some more range, instead of all or nothing, and also love to have some of the pedal sound there...

So, i have been looking around on the forum and elsewhere, but have trouble finding out if the Nord would support more levels in a pedal.. Anyone here knows what to look for? And which pedals send more than on/off signals?

Or any other suggestions?

Much appreciated!

Reply by Key Fumbler

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Re: Pedal question

I suggest you find out from Nord if your keyboard is compatible with half pedalling. Perhaps it will be in a manual?
Otherwise email them.

Sustain pedals compatible with half pedalling are price wise typically a bit of a rip-off because the market is small. 
This is a typical pedal compatible with half pedalling:
https://www.roland.com/uk/products/dp-10/

Perhaps you will want three or four variable pedals?

Reply by Simon Eskildsen

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Re: Pedal question

Thank you for your reply!

I have checked the manual, and there is no mention of half pedaling (its getting quite old.. probably 18 years or something)
I will have to write them.

Is it possible to hook up a half-pedal enabled pedal directly to my laptop some way?

I only really need one for sustain. The soft pedal can be just on/off.
The rest of the pedals i never use, not even on grands for concerts.

Reply by Key Fumbler

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Re: Pedal question

Simon Eskildsen wrote:

Thank you for your reply!

I have checked the manual, and there is no mention of half pedaling (its getting quite old.. probably 18 years or something)
I will have to write them.

Is it possible to hook up a half-pedal enabled pedal directly to my laptop some way?

I only really need one for sustain. The soft pedal can be just on/off.
The rest of the pedals i never use, not even on grands for concerts.

https://youtu.be/Ysh_iK1hP5s
Tec Control and other firms also produce programmable USB MIDI pedal adaptors to connect directly to your PC.

Google USB MIDI pedal adaptors. They typically have controllable curves (and you will want to adjust this to your pedal) They often work by auto detecting the pedal that is connected, switching to expression pedal, on-off sustain pedal, half peddling pedal and other types.
I have one simply called Midi Expression. I use that one with an expression pedal:

https://www.audiofront.net/MIDIExpression.php

There are also Chinese products labelled Doremidi and Beatbars. I have seen them advertised on eBay and Amazon.

Some of the adaptors take two or three pedals.

Last edited by Key Fumbler (06-02-2023 14:20)

Reply by Simon Eskildsen

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Re: Pedal question

Hey! Thanks again for your replies!

I figured it out today. I went and got the dp10 from the store and hooked it up with the nord. The sustain input won't work, since it's just binary, but the expression and organ swell inputs both take the signal, and then I just mapped the sustain to this instead in the software. Works well now, if anyone else stumbles over this in a similar situation.

Only weird thing is that the lowest midi level I get is not 0, but 25.. Perhaps since it's such an old thing.. But again, mapped out the range in pianoteq, and everything works smoothly.

Yay!

Reply by Key Fumbler

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Re: Pedal question

Simon Eskildsen wrote:

Hey! Thanks again for your replies!

I figured it out today. I went and got the dp10 from the store and hooked it up with the nord. The sustain input won't work, since it's just binary, but the expression and organ swell inputs both take the signal, and then I just mapped the sustain to this instead in the software. Works well now, if anyone else stumbles over this in a similar situation.

Only weird thing is that the lowest midi level I get is not 0, but 25.. Perhaps since it's such an old thing.. But again, mapped out the range in pianoteq, and everything works smoothly.

Yay!

Glad it helped and well done on figuring out the workaround. Pianoteq is nice and flexible that way.

Reply by NathanShirley

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Re: Pedal question

Simon Eskildsen wrote:

I went and got the dp10 from the store and hooked it up with the nord. The sustain input won't work, since it's just binary, but the expression and organ swell inputs both take the signal, and then I just mapped the sustain to this instead in the software. Works well now, if anyone else stumbles over this in a similar situation.

Only weird thing is that the lowest midi level I get is not 0, but 25.. Perhaps since it's such an old thing..

That sounds about right for the DP-10. Most MIDI sustain pedals don't send a full range of messages. It's about the same as Kawai's pedals. I could be wrong, but I believe that's about as good as you're likely to find in a single pedal. Supposedly Roland's RPU-3 has better resolution, but that's a 3-pedal unit (I haven't tested it). And good expression pedals have a lot more resolution too, but of course their mechanics aren't suited to being used as sustain pedals.

Last edited by NathanShirley (07-02-2023 02:43)
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Reply by brundlefly

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Re: Pedal question

Simon Eskildsen wrote:

Only weird thing is that the lowest midi level I get is not 0, but 25..

Pianoteq maps everything below 26 to 0 (pedal up) and everything above 94 to 127 (pedal down) by default. I suspect this is intended to simulate the "dead" zones of a real sustain pedal that will have some movement before the dampers start to move and after they are fully released.

See the "Velocity" curve for the pedal in the UI to change this if needed.

Last edited by brundlefly (08-03-2023 17:51)