|
Post by psionic11 on Jul 16, 2008 6:10:54 GMT
Preset 5 has some more of these vintage classics, but I'm left wondering how faithful these are to the originals. Several of them are really fun to play, esp after a few tweaks, but I have a sneaking suspicion that they just don't measure up to the memories of those who've actually played the original instruments.
What are some of the old classic rock songs that were excellent examples of each of these keyboard instruments? Supertramp, Led Zep, and the Doors come to mind, altho I confess to not knowing the unique differences between the various Clavs and Wurlis... I have vague memories of playing dusty, heavy, half-broken Rhodes keyboards. Seems to me, beyond the irregularities I recall, that the joy was in the soft sweet tines, the mid-range velocity singing, the bits of metal twanging, and the really hard "fuzz" sweetness you got in full aggressive mode. Half physical feel of key thwacks and ringing metal down your armbones, half the actual recorded/live part heard by everyone else other than the keyboardist.
Besides a unique color for each one, I'm guessing that what really makes a good vintage electric piano is the playability, the dynamic expressiveness of the patch, right? How much of this is based on a decent versus a superb original multisample?
Can enough dedicated programming take a stock sample, say any of those in the Fusion ROM, Preset 5, or even the HS samples, and turn out a really great approximation of the vintage classics?
Or do you live '70s/'80s gigging musicians instead rely on custom-made samplesets from commercial CDs or even laptop solutions?
|
|
|
Post by guydenruyter on Jul 16, 2008 7:57:25 GMT
Obligatore: try the Wurly200 sound in one of the Hollow Sun releases.... absolute topper! Although I never played an original Wurly, I cannot hear any difference with the sound on Supertramp records. But it is clear that theoretically, if you want to get extremely close to the real thing, samples will always fail. There is a company who created some very good VST plugins emulating the real thing very good in my opinion: check MrRay and MrTramp on www.soundfonts.it/. They have some free or demo versions I believe. You can specify mallet stiffness etc.
|
|
ray
Junior Member
Posts: 86
|
Post by ray on Jul 16, 2008 14:30:01 GMT
I have a real Wurlitzer 200A. The Hollow Sun patches (and ROM stuff) don't sound much like a raw Wurly... the HS patches are closer to the Supertramp sound, which is a heavily processed wurly (going through a chorus pedal i believe?). Dialing all the effects out of it gets closer, but still a fair way off... I believe they were going specifically for that "tramp" sound and designed the program with that in mind.
I don't think samples will always fail... i just dont think it was recorded/designed with the intention of imitating the raw sound. The raw sound, in my mind, is more like Ray Charles' "What'd I Say" (though thats a 100 series model).
Same with the Rhodes stuff... there are very different ideas to what an "ideal" one sounds like. Some people are all about the Dyno-Rhodes sound... a very exaggerated bell, little sustain, and hyped attack/hammer punch sound... this was popular in the 80s and what alot of the early digital keyboards imitated for their "EP" patches. This is very different to what the early Rhodes sound like, raw and unmodified - which would be much more like The Doors - "Riders on the Storm", or The Beatles - "Get Back".
To be honest, I'm still struggling to find a good sample set for EPs to use with my Fusion. As mentioned, most of the existing stuff are designed for a particular tone and unfortunately, not what I'm after. On the PC side, the Scarbee library is really authentic sounding, but ginormous bloatware and impossible to fit on hardware samplers. Shame because I'm sure the "authenticity" is only in the way the samples were recorded (and that the designers were catering for that audience who wanted the instrument sounding as raw as possible), and the extravagent number of layers and samples isn't entirely necessary to get that sound. I have the Real Rhodes Akai library imported but it lacks the programming to get smooth velocity and it's hard to play dynamically (their Wurly doesn't sound right to me either).
It'd be great to see some Fusion programming efforts go into replicating that original raw sound a bit more in these classic instruments, IMO.
|
|
|
Post by kpr on Jul 16, 2008 14:38:36 GMT
I´m reading this thread with major interest. Ray´s song examples are a great help, any more?
Cheers
Klaus
|
|
ray
Junior Member
Posts: 86
|
Post by ray on Jul 16, 2008 14:40:53 GMT
Oh and a good example of how it's possible to do these sounds using a combination of samples and programming, and without relying on bloatware-sampling-method, is the Nord Electro, which is often considered to be the benchmark for EP sounds in hardware these days. The sound libraries per instrument on that keyboard is around 2-3MB (admittedly in a compressed format, but it goes to show what's possible, even if you presume they might uncompress to 6-10MB). Demo of the Nord Electro Wurly (though it has some effects here.. I've played this board in person many times and its closer to the aforementioned sound when its dialed out): www.clavia.se/MP3s/MP3%20files/Keyboards/Wurl.mp3Demo of the Nord Electro Rhodes: www.clavia.se/MP3s/MP3%20files/Keyboards/Rhodes2.mp3Now for some serious stuff... the scarbee sounds deadly authentic. This is the Scarbee Rhodes: www.scarbee-downloads.com/demos/cep/shuffle_EP.mp3This is the Scarbee Wurly: www.scarbee-downloads.com/demos/eep/wurlicious.mp3(just noticed kpr's interest... real excited to see you pipe in!
|
|
ray
Junior Member
Posts: 86
|
Post by ray on Jul 16, 2008 14:55:45 GMT
I think there's a real art in trying to capture the subtleties of these electric pianos... with the massive revival of interest in them in recent years, they've become hugely important to many modern day musicians ... and yet the real thing is too heavy to gig with, and cumbersome to maintain (parts are scarce). A good simulation would be invaluable and is highly sought after ... the Nord Electro is a very popular board at the moment, and all it does is about 5 sounds!
|
|
|
Post by electrique on Jul 16, 2008 15:19:22 GMT
It would also be a great PM-feature to have hammered and plucked models, with different materials maybe...
|
|
|
Post by Hollow Sun on Jul 16, 2008 15:26:58 GMT
All the HS 'vintage keys' were recorded raw - line out into line in of my Akai S5000 ... analogue. No processing was involved in the recording process - literally a cable from instrument to sampler - and no digital post production was employed in the sample editing (which was trimming start/end, normalising and looping). No EQ or compression was added in the sample editing process. I strongly believe this to be the best approach as the sound can be treated exactly as the user wants afterwards. Although not directly related to the Wurli in question, when Nick Magnus reviewed my original S5000 library for 'Sound On Sound', he said of the CP70 " The CP70 must be an elusive sound to capture; the sampled renditions of this instrument that I've encountered so far seem to lack a certain je ne sais quoi, somehow failing to convey its unique character convincingly. It's notable then that Hollow Sun have rendered this amazingly accurate and instantly recognisable representation, which is a real pleasure to play." And of the Trons : " I found the overall character of these samples to be superb The '3-Violins' are perhaps a tad bright for my taste, but applying a soupçon of two-pole low-pass filtering soon had them sounding just right. In comparison to my extensive personal collection of Mellotron sounds garnered from numerous sources, this set beat mine hands down for sheer presence and clarity within a mix. Whilst some of the Mellotron sample material generally available has often been processed in some way, and hence removed from what you'd hear if you simply plug a 'tron straight into a mixing desk, these 'raw' samples, taken directly from the output socket of the real thing, demonstrate how magnificent this instrument can sound". In his conclusion, he wrote " Notably, no compressors, high-quality channel strips, noise reduction, pre-sample 'sweetening' or other 'corrective' measures were involved in the sampling process for these libraries, so you are free to treat the sounds just as if they were coming straight from the source instruments. And yet, the quality of these instruments shines through. The CP70 and Mellotron discs are arguably the flagships of the set, the CP70 largely due to the relative scarcity of comparably realistic sampled alternatives. Newtron Bomb, too, is a winner, notwithstanding the current glut of similar offerings available. It sounds as good as Mellotron samples are ever likely to." These same sounds are used in Zero-G's 'Nostalgia' to which SOS awarded the full 5 stars with the conclusion " Nostalgia is certainly worth five stars, and I'd probably give it more if I could!" They are also the same sounds I developed for Alesis for Fusion - the product reviews above are why Alesis contacted me in the first place. Granted, the versions in Fusion have been tarted up a bit with its on-board effects but I am afraid that that is a commercial necessity - no-one's gonna be impressed on the sales floor to hear raw, unprocessed sounds when competing products are lathered in massive multi-effects! Sad fact of life I'm afraid. But I'd like to think that there are enough variations that are close to the real thing without overt processing. So given that they are unprocessed samples of the raw outputs of the original instruments (all of which I have owned at one point or another), I am surprised to hear that some are finding them unrepresentative of the real thing (especially Ray's comment about the Wurli - my samples are from a 200A as well). Or is it perhaps they don't match peoples' ' impression' of how they should sound (especially electric piano sounds) as dictated - perhaps - by two decades of workstation samples (and many of the 'EP' samples in workstation keyboards are often of FM e.pianos, not necessarily 'the real thing'!)? It's certainly true (as Ray says) that the 'Dyno-my-piano' modification that the likes of Corea, Hancock, Hammer and others had done to their Rhodes gave everyone a taste for more 'chimey' Rhodes sounds .... and the FM abominations that followed in the 80s certainly skewed the perception of what an electric piano should sound like. So... I dunno. Not that I am bothered or feel the need to defend my stuff - just surprised to read those comments is all! Steve
|
|
christianrock
Junior Member
Banned at User's own request
Posts: 282
|
Post by christianrock on Jul 16, 2008 15:59:53 GMT
Steve, it could be that not everybody here is a sound programmer. I would bet that less than 10% of people (well I'd be surprised if it was more than 2%) actually take the raw waveforms and do something with them. To at least 95% of people, your presets is all they'll know about those samples. You could probably easily take your Wurly, CP70 and maybe even that "classic EP" samples and process them to sound like some of the aforementioned song recordings, and everybody would be none the wiser. People really mix up "samples" with "programs" (in Alesis-speak) "presets" (in Roland-speak) or "voices" (in Yamaha-speak). Clavia in particular has been after 60's and 70's recordings and how the EPs sounded back then and is being very successful with enthusiasts. Note: That Scarbee Wurly really sounds like "You're my best friend" from Queen, doesn't it?? Oh and the Scarbee and the Electro Wurlies don't sound anything alike... at least to my ears... the Electro is pleasant, yes, but very close to the real thing? I don't think so...
|
|
|
Post by Hollow Sun on Jul 16, 2008 16:25:39 GMT
Interestingly, Scarbee's are anything but 'true' and 'raw'.
Because the audio outputs of these old pianos can be noisy, they have some special way of recording them from 'the inside'. I don't know what (something like their own pick up or whatever - they refer to 'hot-rodded').
That's not to knock or criticise their products because they are fabulous and the guys there are great. I really felt sorry for them too when some bloody ambulance chaser went after them for using the Rhodes© name on their product claiming they were in violation of their copyright. Scarbee were responsible for almost single-handedly preserving the authentic sound of the Rhodes (and I bet the original copyright owner, Harold Rhodes, was turning in his grave as he was such a generous and benevolent person ... so much so that he told Wurlitzer how to make an electric piano!). It meant Scarbee had to withdraw their product, scrap all existing copies and run off new stock with new and re-designed packaging, etc..
Steve
|
|
|
Post by Hollow Sun on Jul 16, 2008 16:39:12 GMT
Maybe my ears are deceiving me but if I play along with those demos using the stock Fusion HS Rhodes and Wurli, I don't hear a HUGE difference - certainly not enough to claim "a fair way off" I wish I had the keyboard playing skills to reproduce the playing on those demos to make the point. Regarding both Wurlis, they don't appear to have the very, very hard and 'aggressive' high velocity timbre you get when you play a Wurli tine-breakingly hard (which my Fusion Wurli does).
|
|
|
Post by kpr on Jul 16, 2008 17:06:09 GMT
Again very interesting statements here, I have nothing to add at this moment. But surely later ;D
Cheers
Klaus
|
|
christianrock
Junior Member
Banned at User's own request
Posts: 282
|
Post by christianrock on Jul 16, 2008 17:11:40 GMT
Maybe it's the hard tines that are not to some people's taste? Taste can vary so much... I happen to like some FM EP sounds, especially that stuff that sounds like David Foster...
Plus you can have so much variation from one Rhodes to another, and from one Wurly to another... you'll never please everybody...
|
|
ray
Junior Member
Posts: 86
|
Post by ray on Jul 17, 2008 3:47:12 GMT
All good points above, and I agree wholeheartedly. Sorry, I didn't mean to sound like I was criticizing the HS samples. What I was trying to say, was that these instruments (Rhodes and Wurlies) are known for making vastly different sounds, and a handful of programs will never be suited to them all. What I'm suggesting is that at the moment, the programs on the Fusion address one side of the spectrum very well, but leave the other side of the spectrum wanting. Steve, it could be that not everybody here is a sound programmer. I would bet that less than 10% of people (well I'd be surprised if it was more than 2%) actually take the raw waveforms and do something with them. To at least 95% of people, your presets is all they'll know about those samples. Absolutely. I would never claim to be a sound programmer, and as Steve have often pointed out, it's something that takes alot of experience and understanding to do well, so I try not to fiddle with existing programs too much. What I've tried is simply dialing down (or turning off) the effects bus sends. And what I have noticed is that this change isn't enough: although the chorus effect is gone, the heavy handed bark is still dominant, and the midrange octave tend to have a phasey kinda sound which again, is likely to contribute to getting that "Supertramp" sound, but detrimental to a "Ray Charles" kinda sound. Additional programming changes may well get me closer to what I want, but I wouldn't have the slightest idea what to do. Clavia in particular has been after 60's and 70's recordings and how the EPs sounded back then and is being very successful with enthusiasts. Yes, and this is perhaps one characteristic that you can pin down to as opposed to using specific artist as reference of tastes. The 60s and early 70s use of electric pianos are very different to how they were used afterwards (late 70s and 80s). I lazily used the word "authentic" in my earlier post, and it's probably not the best word. What I meant by that was that these pianos were typically recorded and played "dry" and as such, it is often the sound you get, if you sat in front of the real thing, turned it on and started playing. Later day use (80s) often involve hooking the instrument up to effects, adding plenty of reverb, or in the case of the Dyno-Rhodes, actual mechanical modification to the instrument to achieve a different sound. In my mind, they are sonically totally different instruments, and just as I would not expect to get the sound of an acoustic guitar from samples/programs of an electric guitar, I think it needs very different programming to achieve the difference. On top of all that, Wurlys and Rhodes sound dramatically different when you play them at different velocities. Regarding both Wurlis, they don't appear to have the very, very hard and 'aggressive' high velocity timbre you get when you play a Wurli tine-breakingly hard (which my Fusion Wurli does). Exactly, I think we're on the same page here and hearing the same thing. Some people consider the hard, aggressive bark to be the signature of the Wurly "sound", and for those, the Fusion Wurli will happily satisfy. What I've been referring to as the "Supertramp" sound is exactly that - it characteristically relies on the "barking" sound achieved by hitting the keys hard, and fed through a heavy chorus effect. In fact, I have seen people sit down on real Wurlies and tell me that they can't get it to "sound right"! And that's because they were expecting the Supertramp sound on it and weren't playing hard enough, or using the chorus effect. So you're right in that it's an "impression" and "taste" thing. But the Wurly is also capable of a more dynamic range, and sonically, this can almost seem like a completely different instrument. At the other extreme, you have the gentle, acoustic-like sustain (Norah Jones recordings come to mind) with very rare use of the hard "bark". For those of us who play the instrument largely avoiding the "very hard" aggressive timbre, and playing more around the middle velocity range, it's very difficult (and/or missing) some of the sounds in between (which would be rarely used for someone who's more interested on the aggressive sound). Again, I wouldn't expect one magic solution that achieves all possible tonal differences, so I don't think of it as a deficiency or flaw in the existing sounds, but rather just an unaddressed tonal possibility. And also, it may well be that the possibility is in there, but the programming isn't appropriate for achieving that taste. I may take some time to play with the raw multisamples at some point, but I'd love to hear other people's (more experienced) attempts at this. And finally... Oh and the Scarbee and the Electro Wurlies don't sound anything alike... at least to my ears... the Electro is pleasant, yes, but very close to the real thing? I don't think so... Yes, those weren't particularly representative examples of the Electro. I believe it's the same deal with what Steve was saying about with commercial reality and effects. Playing the Electro raw sounds closer (relatively) to the Scarbee material. I'll try to find something more representative of the dry sound I'm talking about. They were just the quickest samples I could find to reference a sound that is different to what's available on the Fusion.
|
|
christianrock
Junior Member
Banned at User's own request
Posts: 282
|
Post by christianrock on Jul 17, 2008 15:23:41 GMT
KPR has three Rhodes, one Wurly and one Clavinet in his 3 "Samples" collections. Have you checked those out? What do you think of those? I find them very, very pleasing I also love the EPs that I hear in the KPR's preset demos, especially his FM pianos in the Fusion Synth and Ultrasynth preset libraries. I just got his sample collections, next month I'm planning on getting the presets (my goal is to learn to program well but you just can't go wrong with awesome presets like these). I don't think I'll be lacking in EP sounds! But like I said, I find FM EPs useful as well, I know a lot of people like Steve don't, which is great since that probably means he will keep on digging out good EP sounds for the rest of us
|
|