Pianos

Thanks William, much appreciated.

Ben

I fiddled around with the F bank #1 patch but being locked out of the sample level doesn't offer much chance of changing that patch significantly... I can get it to be more like a Jerry Lee Lewis piano, or a rhythm comp sound, if that would help... but getting it much beyond that just isn't going to happen.

Best of luck with your rig and stay tuned for new releases.

William

williamcoakley.com

Just a general note here

... someone mentioned 16 layered pianos may have 8 layers with pedal up and 8 with pedal down or 12 up and 4 down. Anything more than a layer or two at most of pedal down is just a waste of memory which of course, is the objective since maketing an MMP (Monster Memory Pianos) is based on the marketing illusion that size = quality.

There is more on this and why the bigger it is generally, the worse it sounds

williamcoakley.com

look for the article about bigger isn't better.

William

Mr.Wills,

Some experienced guyz who had purchased your piano, said that your pianos are thin and they preferred software pianos to yours. Some claim that the SRX is superior to yours. Another guy had a suggestion that he made your pianos sound a little better by tweaking it on his own.

Normally i wouldnt bother if its just a personal view (cos everyone's is subjective) but these guyz were well-respected folks who know what they're saying.

I even asked one member why he said your pianos were a waste of money. He mentioned that they sounded weak (some talked about the Perfect Piano V, some about the older ones) and thin. ???

There's a thread about it in the "other" forums.

Not pullin your leg, just curious about what your answers to these guyz will be.



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If at first you dont suceed, then skydiving is definitively not for you.

I've reached out to you in every way I could... to be nice to you and I've done nothing to cause you to so viciously strike at me. I've offered to personally help you with your sound and never mentioned that it might be difficult if you're not willing to spend more than 5 bucks for a pair of monitors. I can still make them sound better than they do now... but that doesn't seem to be enough of a goodwill offering to you.

I am still willing to help you but you've got to stop with the hate stuff and realize that you're trying to hurt someone who has done nothing to you to deserve that. So please stop the foolishness... I know exactly how well my product is doing and I don't need you hounding me with such dark and unforgiving force.

William

William, I've been following most of your posts with high interest and I've found them to be very informative. I would love to hear your expert opinion on Rhodes/EP samples, however I am aware of being 'off-topic' so I am not expecting an in-depth response.

For 'live' playing I am using the SRX 'Ultimate Keys', in-particular the patch 'Fusiontastic' (009)'. In my studio I use Logics EVP88. I had all the Motifs in the past but I prefer the Roland Rhodes.

I understand you are primarily a Piano expert, but do you have experiences with sampling Rhodes? In your opinion, what keyboard is the best for Rhodes? Do you offer Rhodes samples?

http://www.jostsauer.com
"We are like a piece of wood that needs carving every day. If we don't carve ourselves someone else will carve us." - Chinese Proverb

Yeah, I'll have to go ahead and back William up on this one. I read his posts here, which led me to his website. I spent two days reading the articles and listening to his mp3 samples from Voume 5. I've probably heard them all 20 times.

I made what I think was an informed decision, and bought Volume 5 for my Fantoms. The notion that they're thin is ridiculous. There are other piano sample packages out there that are also good, but if you read the threads and articles on William's site, you'd understand why bigger isn't always better. I have some software pianos (The Grand, Kontakt, the 152MB piano that ships with Sonik Synth 2, the piano add-on package for Sample Tank 2, etc), and none of them sound as good as Volume V. I've also owned two Motifs, 4 Tritons, Alesis QS synths, and more Roland gear than I can remember.

The piano sound is my #1 concern when I look at any new synth, and until the Fantom X came out, I never thought anything was nearly good enough. The Ultimate Grand sounds good in certain settings, but there are some inconsistencies that make it unusable for me in some situations (William has covered this already).

I've had Volume V less than a week, and so far William has spent almost an hour on the phone with me. I've called him once and he has called me 3 times to make sure I'm happy with the CD. Unfortunately, this is about the busiest time of the year for me and I am unable to take full advantage of his knowledge, but as soon as I can get a break from other projects, I know he'll be there to answer the phone and talk about EQ settings, the shape of my room, or some technique that will let me get the most inspiring performances out of his hard work.

Bill

I'll throw my support completely behind William as well. I purchased the Perfect Piano V and I find his Hamburg D to be clearly superior to the preset and SRX pianos available. I have both of the SRX piano boards, and I spend about 95% of my playing time on piano. Although there are several preset and SRX patches that work fine for particular pieces of music, and indeed some may have desirable qualities when mixed into tracks with other instruments/parts, I have not been able to get my Fantom piano sound (out-of-the-box, with tweaks, or layering) quite the way I would like it for everyday solo playing. I don't have personal experience with the PC software options out there and can't comment about that alternative, but I have been playing and composing on (primarily) "hardware" digital pianos for over 20 years now and Mr. Coakley's offerings will be sure to please a piano enthusiast. The sound is crystalline and clear across the entire keyboard, with no distracting character in particular octaves that I've been able to find, and the dynamics are extraordinarily smooth. I find myself experimenting with shifting my right hand parts an octave higher than usual because I'm so pleasantly surprised by the quality of the sound in the upper registers. I am no virtuoso but the Coakley pianos are, as advertised, taking me to another level of creativity. Every Fantom owner makes his or her own choice in these matters, and I'm very satisfied with mine. Disclaimer (shouldn't be necessary, but when reporting a glowing review ...) -- never met or spoke to William Coakley before sending in my order, and paid for it out of my own pocket.

Oh, and these pianos certainly don't sound thin or weak on a pair of Sennheiser headphones or my Mackie monitors

** ncsteff **
Fantom X8 and XR, and too many SRXs
Now if I only had the time ...

William Coakley is the nicest guy you could ever meet, he even phoned me from USA to my mobile phone (cellphone)

I have heard his Piano Samples and they are phenomenal, i own the Fantom X8 and am quite pleased with the "Ultimate Grand" piano sound, but NOT in every setting as stated in some of these posts already, im definately going to purchase his samples for my X8, but at the moment i`m totally broke so cannot affrod to do so at this time

i am disgusted by some peoples comments which are totally unjustified...
he is not only a talented piano player and a nice guy but the best in the business at what he does

enough said!

All for now



Wayne

Professional Keyboardist in UK`s Number 1 Tribute To Bon Jovi

www.wayneharris.co.uk

www.bongiovi.co.uk

Over the years I made a number of attempts at sampling a Rhodes and found it frustrating because of memory limitations at the time. I was never satisfied that what I had was really exceptional although I had 1/3 of one that was. One of the problems centers around finding a Rhodes that can be regulated for the desired result.

I've played samples in the Triton, Motif and Fantom and thought they were all pretty good but I don't recall finding one that velocity shifted smoothly but its possible that one slipped by me somewhere. If you have one you want me to look at, I'd be more than happy to see what might be done with it if you're looking at modifying it.

The Rhodes is a very therapeutic sound so I can see your interest in it. I had a suitcase model and if you ever sample one, you must short across the capacitor located at the high end of the tines... in order to get even a moderate amount of chime. That was always the problem with the suitcase 88... it just didn't chime like the stage 73 did. If you or anyone is interested in how to regulate a Rhodes for sampling... let me know because it's an easy thing to make a Rhodes into a Wurlitzer.

Now EPs... I had 'em all... Wurlitzer, RMI, Farfisa (first velocity controlled keyboard), Rhodes, various synths, my own E1 samples, CP70, Kurz 1000PX, Emu PROformance etc. I guess they all have their place and they all were cool but limited in their application. Probably the CP70 inspired the most... the Emu Proformance the least. Being frustrated at finding something to work with for all around piano, I spent everything I had and went into debt to get the E1 which I used to perform with (see pic on my site). Like many illusions in life... we think we see an oasis that will give us food, drink and rest in the turmoil of life. Although I'm far from sorry I bought it, the E1 with its two seconds of sampling in the lower two octaves and two in the upper, just wasn't going to do it for piano... although it did great Harley Davidsons, squeeky chairs that could be made into instruments, wine glasses, pot lids that made gorgeous bells ...and yes something children always do... the occasional commode flush. : )


William

williamcoakley.com

Hi William, thanks for posting here.

I have a couple of questions. I tried to find the answers here and on your site, but couldn't. I appreciate your response if you've already answered them.

1. Does your Fantom piano Volume V work with the Fantom-S/S88?

2. Will the piano(s) fit on a 128MB smartmedia card?


Thank you.

bb

OMG i dont believe this. MR.William, you misunderstood me.

Let me explain :

1). When did i EVER say your pianos were not gud? I heard the demos on your site and said they were some of the BEST i've heard. I thought they sounded very gud.

2). I was curious as to WHY the folks who had the piano would give negative comments. I asked them "WHY" because from what i heard, it was good. I only wanted an answer, i didnt intend to hurt you or something. Talk about misunderstanding. :-/

3). My room. I dont have the camera right now, or i would be first one to start a thread saying " Post your pics of your home studio"

4). I really want to have a friendship with someone who is both knowledgable and patient enough to explain things(like you). I'll admit when i started seeing a couple of threads just about a piano, i got a little worried that this site is changing.

5). When i saw your thread about your offering help, i was really glad.

So, my previous reply was intended only to quench my curiousity. Please re-read my post.

Thank You.

if i ever want a piano from you, you should give me a discount in turn for misunderstanding me.

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If at first you dont suceed, then skydiving is definitively not for you.

According to both Roland and a user; Fantom X format is backwards compatible to the S format. The degree of that compatibility has not been determined at this point other than my customer said it sounded great. He successfully loaded my X data into his S. Now, the limitations are these:

at this point I can't determine why the Hamburg D is not fitting on a 128 meg smart card for this customer... it should since I made sure the piano plus patches were less than 127 megs. But as we know, logic doesn't always rule with computers and gear. The alternative is to load USB. In my Fantom, I have 128 megs of RAM and the piano loads fine.

also note that on the S, the midi cables carry the midi signal not the USB cable.

I've put in a call to this customer to see what new information he has accumulated over the past few days and I will post as soon as I have something.

William

williamcoakley.com

I'd say the reason for the 128 MB problem is that when you format it, by default, the Fantom creates a couple of folders and for some reason it takes up 3.8M or something. Atleast, thats what happened when i formatted my 128MB card.



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If at first you dont suceed, then skydiving is definitively not for you.

One more question for Mr.William :

Why cant you/others make pianos for soft-samplers that are ALSO 128mb and sound as good as your hardware sampler ones.?

The reason i'm asking is for convenience. It would be easy to integrate in studio. Plus, the loading time would be much less on a computer.



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If at first you dont suceed, then skydiving is definitively not for you.