Topic by thyman

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Topic: Questions from a soon-to-be buyer

I'm looking to get back into regular piano practice after a few years of letting my skills...wither away. I do a combination of solo piano and accompanying my own singing, but want to play more improvisational stuff like blues and jazz soon. I've used the Ravenscroft 275 in the past and been happy, but trying the Pianoteq 8 demo was mind-blowing. It felt more alive than any non-acoustic piano I've ever played. I was convinced after a few minutes of fiddling. Before I make the leap and buy Standard*, I wanted to reach out with some questions.

For the instruments, I'm fairly set on the Steinway D and the new Bösendorfer, but I'm undecided on the third. Before the Bösendorfer came out today, I was leaning toward the Petrof, but I'm also curious about the Yamaha. I don't care much for it solo, but it might be good for accompaniment (tough to tell since I'm singing at the same time). What is everyone's favorite piano for accompanying voice or voice+guitar?

Last, I see there's usually a summer sale in August--does anyone recall how much the discount was on Pianoteq Standard* last year? Trying to decide if it's worth it to wait the extra couple months.

By the way, if anyone has a Standard license they're looking to part with, feel free to send me a message

Edit: Changed "Stage" to "Standard", which is what I meant (3 pianos). Sorry for the confusion.

Thanks!

Last edited by thyman (13-06-2024 12:09)

Reply by Qexl

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Re: Questions from a soon-to-be buyer

Waiting for sales will depend if the extra few months of using the product are worth it for you I guess.. but if you would not feel too much longing for it, maybe you could make the demo last.. but it would prob. drag on me to wait that long for some percent off - but IDK, we all value time differently.. I wouldn't want to lose 'inspiration'.. that pays for itself in my book.

I can't say any future sale would be the same as previous ones - but there's probably an expectation that Modartt sales are probably not huge bullhorn screeching price slashes (iirc, was it 20% usually?). But for sure, if there's no hurry and other things do take precedent, for many there's no skin off to wait.

About the third piano choice..

imho absolutely depends on your goals/genre and your own developed style really but, here are some things I feel can be important for anyone at a point where they're leveraging their considerable skills as a pianist and thinking of getting to a kind of next level place with their performance/recordings, just hoping to help..

Considering your scope (blues/jazz), I'd really like to recommend considering the U4 Upright piano. A lot of jazz and blues are performed/recorded using grand pianos for sure but a rather large body of works are recorded with upright pianos, and the U4 (in my exp.) can be made to fit into an amazing array of musical modes.

Over the years, it's truly become a respectably neat unit yet can be pretty impressively edited to sound highly characterful in various ways and maybe, it's one of the most easy to record pianos (when putting it through and beyond typical studio equipment emulation setups). Somehow, it has its own vibe but can be really easily tweaked to make it work in a wide range of music.

I'd say, that U4 may cover all your acoustic piano options but maybe you could enjoy the D and Bos with an electric piano for the 3rd? But that takes it back to the top, your tastes/goals/desires etc. would be the most important element - and all these other instruments will await you if/when ready to add their flavor to your music. Wishing you the best - I don't think you can go too far wrong with any of the pianos really

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Reply by tmyoung

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Re: Questions from a soon-to-be buyer

An important consideration if you wait on the sale is that sometimes the sale is only a selection of Modartt products.  For example, it might only be on instrument packs or upgrades or certain tiers of Pianoteq.  Generally each sale is slightly different and focuses on a subset of products.  (It's possible that with the Boesendorfer it will be an instrument pack-focused sale, or because of the Boesendorfer it will be everything but an instrument pack sale.)  There have been times that Pro or Studio aren't included, and there have been times where it's only on Pro and Studio, etc., etc., etc.  Everything is at Modartt's discretion, which means there's no ability to predict anything about the sale with certainty (or if there won't be a sale at all--though that's very unlikely).  Whether or not you want to wait is entirely up to you.  Personally, I've gotten along fine with the trial/demos as needed for weeks at a time if all I need is five minutes of playing or listening here-or-there, but once I start any project that is "serious" I need the full version.  Modartt is very generous with how their demos work, and I've always appreciated that!

The YC5, in my opinion, is nowhere near as good as the Petrof, as it's a much older library that hasn't been heavily revised in some time (it's one of the oldest instrument packs going back to 2.0 or 3.0 if memory serves).  It also isn't an officially authorized pack by Yamaha (though maybe that could change in future as Boesendorfer is a subsidiary of Yamaha), so it's possible that at some point, it will be overhauled, updated, and rebranded.  It does have a nice sound (if you like Yamaha which I don't as much), but only get it if you're sure you want exactly the sound it currently gives you.  I'd opt for the Petrof as it comes with two different Concert Grands (like the Steinway D features as well), which means that you're getting the value of five acoustic grand pianos from only three instrument packs.

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Reply by Key Fumbler

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Re: Questions from a soon-to-be buyer

agree with the OP.
Pianoteq feels more like an instrument than most sampled instruments. To me it seems it must be really hard to make a coherent believable instrument out of velocity layers without considerable effort. Many are failing, and gobbling up drive space in the process.

The sales seem to vary. I must admit when I pressed the button on the 280vc order yesterday a possible summer sale came to mind. Then again I wasn't going to save much, if there's a summer sale at all. I'm glad I didn't wait. With a bit of tweaking in Standard I really like the 280vc.

I would recommend stretching to Standard if you can over buying more packs these days. The extra features are worth the additional outlay - especially tweaking the sound to taste and layers of instruments combined.

I think if I was buying fresh today with Stage I would get D pack, the Petrof pack and electric pianos pack. 

The free Kivir instruments add really nice variety in Pianoteq. With a little tweaking the CP80 is a favourite. Errard and Pleyel also nice models, but you can't try those until you own a copy of any version of Pianoteq.

Reply by thyman

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Re: Questions from a soon-to-be buyer

Key Fumbler wrote:

I would recommend stretching to Standard if you can over buying more packs these days. The extra features are worth the additional outlay - especially tweaking the sound to taste and layers of instruments combined.

Sorry, sorry I meant to say Standard this whole time. I'm too much of a tinkerer to not be able to play around with the piano and mic parameters, haha. That's what I get for being on forums too late at night.

Last edited by thyman (13-06-2024 12:21)

Reply by thyman

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Re: Questions from a soon-to-be buyer

Qexl wrote:

Waiting for sales will depend if the extra few months of using the product are worth it for you I guess.. but if you would not feel too much longing for it, maybe you could make the demo last.. but it would prob. drag on me to wait that long for some percent off - but IDK, we all value time differently.. I wouldn't want to lose 'inspiration'.. that pays for itself in my book.

I can't say any future sale would be the same as previous ones - but there's probably an expectation that Modartt sales are probably not huge bullhorn screeching price slashes (iirc, was it 20% usually?). But for sure, if there's no hurry and other things do take precedent, for many there's no skin off to wait.

About the third piano choice..

imho absolutely depends on your goals/genre and your own developed style really but, here are some things I feel can be important for anyone at a point where they're leveraging their considerable skills as a pianist and thinking of getting to a kind of next level place with their performance/recordings, just hoping to help..

Considering your scope (blues/jazz), I'd really like to recommend considering the U4 Upright piano. A lot of jazz and blues are performed/recorded using grand pianos for sure but a rather large body of works are recorded with upright pianos, and the U4 (in my exp.) can be made to fit into an amazing array of musical modes.

Over the years, it's truly become a respectably neat unit yet can be pretty impressively edited to sound highly characterful in various ways and maybe, it's one of the most easy to record pianos (when putting it through and beyond typical studio equipment emulation setups). Somehow, it has its own vibe but can be really easily tweaked to make it work in a wide range of music.

I'd say, that U4 may cover all your acoustic piano options but maybe you could enjoy the D and Bos with an electric piano for the 3rd? But that takes it back to the top, your tastes/goals/desires etc. would be the most important element - and all these other instruments will await you if/when ready to add their flavor to your music. Wishing you the best - I don't think you can go too far wrong with any of the pianos really

Thanks, that's good stuff to think about. I'll play around more with the U4 on the demo.

I had thought about the electrics, since they're so fun for Jazz and blues, but I figured I could always add them later if things work out and I play more of those this year. Do the Pianoteq models sound/feel better than, say, the ones built into a DAW? I haven't played much EP, so I don't have the ear for the differences like with acoustic piano.

Reply by Key Fumbler

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Re: Questions from a soon-to-be buyer

thyman wrote:

.. I'll play around more with the U4 on the demo.

I had thought about the electrics, since they're so fun for Jazz and blues, but I figured I could always add them later if things work out and I play more of those this year. Do the Pianoteq models sound/feel better than, say, the ones built into a DAW? I haven't played much EP, so I don't have the ear for the differences like with acoustic piano.

I see you've now updated your original post.

The electrics are excellent but can still be improved to be more realistic - put it this way if I didn't have them I would still buy them again, despite having a favourite Rhodes from another software company - and I would still use the Modartt Rhodes.
Most of the alternative sampled electrics I find either too uneven, or rough samples, the samples are say not to my taste (generally you cannot tweak samples as much as  a Pianoteq model) not enough variety in tone in attack and so on.

Most of the giveaway ones or DAW ones will have clunky jumps in velocity layers, or frustratingly seemingly little change in tone at all. They can sound wrong with a staccato attack and so on. How samples start and stop can really make them sound totally fake - some get this right. Don't expect the free ones with a DAW to be anything other than pleasant yet very crude approximations that fail completely when played dynamically .

Reply by thyman

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Re: Questions from a soon-to-be buyer

Key Fumbler wrote:

I see you've now updated your original post.

The electrics are excellent but can still be improved to be more realistic - put it this way if I didn't have them I would still buy them again, despite having a favourite Rhodes from another software company - and I would still use the Modartt Rhodes.
Most of the alternative sampled electrics I find either too uneven, or rough samples, the samples are say not to my taste (generally you cannot tweak samples as much as  a Pianoteq model) not enough variety in tone in attack and so on.

Most of the giveaway ones or DAW ones will have clunky jumps in velocity layers, or frustratingly seemingly little change in tone at all. They can sound wrong with a staccato attack and so on. How samples start and stop can really make them sound totally fake - some get this right. Don't expect the free ones with a DAW to be anything other than pleasant yet very crude approximations that fail completely when played dynamically .

Ugh, I'm used to "stage" being "best". Curse you, Nord.

That is one thing I've noticed on samples, especially with Rhodes. There's a pretty all-or-nothing difference between clean from soft presses and bark from hard hits. Like a sharp velocity cutoff where it becomes distorted. I didn't know if that's true to the original instrument, but I imagine there's probably more nuance in good virtual instruments.

Reply by Key Fumbler

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Re: Questions from a soon-to-be buyer

thyman wrote:
Key Fumbler wrote:

I see you've now updated your original post.

The electrics are excellent but can still be improved to be more realistic - put it this way if I didn't have them I would still buy them again, despite having a favourite Rhodes from another software company - and I would still use the Modartt Rhodes.
Most of the alternative sampled electrics I find either too uneven, or rough samples, the samples are say not to my taste (generally you cannot tweak samples as much as  a Pianoteq model) not enough variety in tone in attack and so on.

Most of the giveaway ones or DAW ones will have clunky jumps in velocity layers, or frustratingly seemingly little change in tone at all. They can sound wrong with a staccato attack and so on. How samples start and stop can really make them sound totally fake - some get this right. Don't expect the free ones with a DAW to be anything other than pleasant yet very crude approximations that fail completely when played dynamically .

Ugh, I'm used to "stage" being "best". Curse you, Nord.

That is one thing I've noticed on samples, especially with Rhodes. There's a pretty all-or-nothing difference between clean from soft presses and bark from hard hits. Like a sharp velocity cutoff where it becomes distorted. I didn't know if that's true to the original instrument, but I imagine there's probably more nuance in good virtual instruments.

Modelling should (and usually does) make that transition far smoother than most of the crude step changes with not enough velocity layers in sample instruments; That said tonal differences also have to be accounted for in a model too, the sound change lifting the finger off the keys and so on. Perhaps midi 2.0 is going to bring even more subtle benefits eventually. I still don't believe we genuinely need more than 127 levels of velocity sensitivity - either for playing expression or tonal realism. Nice to have in the specs and you really won't have to worry about losses in extreme velocity curves.

I suggest there is probably a higher magnitude of difficulty in achieving this smooth transition between steps in velocity with sampling acoustic pianos rather than the electric ones. Acoustic pianos don't have a cool barking sound though. If that jarringly cuts in within crude layering of velocity that can sound very false.

The Pianoteq electric models have seen some improvements in recent times

Reply by Qexl

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Re: Questions from a soon-to-be buyer

thyman wrote:

about the electrics, since they're so fun for Jazz and blues, but I figured I could always add them later if things work out and I play more of those this year. Do the Pianoteq models sound/feel better than, say, the ones built into a DAW? I haven't played much EP, so I don't have the ear for the differences like with acoustic piano.

Excellent question - hope this helps - I've used various physical EPs, live/recording etc. since before digital times - but since relatively recent years, Pianoteq EPs have been the ones I like to use. There are some good ones, but I haven't felt a free DAW included instrument really getting close in any way.

The electrics have a vast number of presets and flavors (some resembling reality, others adding some elements of production values, more appropriate to electrical instruments than pianos.. so not all might suit your tastes - but I love that extent to possibilities there.. very inspiring at very least). A lot of choice I guess, compared to most pianos in the collection, and some wonderful presets for sure.. probably most worth getting (instead of another piano) IF you do know with certainty that you will compose/record with them though perhaps.

But, if you do.. there's I think more of a wide spread of use-cases possible with the Pianoteq electrics (due just to their editability, since you're a person who values that).. so.. wow, maybe I'd possibly consider 1 grand, 1 upright and the electrics - but like a lot of us here, we love these instruments and the people who make them - at some point you kind of get how they can be edited and blam, you're kind of rarely interested in other offerings due to them being so static by comparison (but everyone loves what they love and that's truly OK).

Some of the electrics sound startlingly like real ones I've used (some of the 'in the room' sounding presets really remind me of actual practice rooms, thru to stage/recordings).. so they can be used in a very old-school supportive way in a mix, or really pushed and edited for any kind of 'beyond' scenarios. With other products, they tend to remain in pretty ordinary realms for my tastes.. but if you only want one sound from your MKII for example, maybe another software version of that might hit right on your mark. I feel though with Pianoteq ones, like a broken record maybe I'm of course going to say.. it's possible to edit it right to where I want it to be (for a lot of music with the electronic instruments, there's possibly a lot of extra production values applied across a mix/song etc.. but there's maybe a point to consider.. maybe sticking with acoustic piano might be more beneficial until you get to decide maybe just 'how electronic' your music might lead you in time

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Reply by Coises

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Re: Questions from a soon-to-be buyer

thyman wrote:

I had thought about the electrics, since they're so fun for Jazz and blues, but I figured I could always add them later if things work out and I play more of those this year. Do the Pianoteq models sound/feel better than, say, the ones built into a DAW? I haven't played much EP, so I don't have the ear for the differences like with acoustic piano.

If you’re interested in electric pianos, it is worth checking out Lounge Lizard.

Personally, I prefer Pianoteq Electric pianos because they have just some tiny, almost indescribably fine edge in responsiveness. Like the acoustic pianos, they just feel better than anything else. I will say, though, that the interface for Lounge Lizard and the organization of presets is much more accessible for electric pianos. Depending on your needs and preferences, that could be more significant.

Both of them sound good to me (but I’ve never owned a physical electric piano).

Reply by thyman

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Re: Questions from a soon-to-be buyer

You all are awesome! I love that there's an active, helpful community for this product. Just another reason to buy.