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Famous E-electric piano


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The Leeds "E" Fender Rhodes and its tech, Eddy Reynolds, has nearly its own mythology. Here's the site recently put up by the current owner, George Mamalakis:

 

The Legendary "E" Model Rhodes

 

 

Keyscape includes samples of another "sister" Rhodes they claim was also teched by Eddy Reynolds:

 

"LA" Custom E Rhodes

Legend '70s Compact, Jupiter-Xm, Studiologic Numa X 73

 

 

 

 

 

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Yes, it sounds great. It really "speaks" nicely at all velocities.

 

I was confused at first, until I re-read the Spectrasonics blurb on their "LA Custom E". I thought it was "the one". At any rate, they both sound great - what a wealth of choices we have these days. Really tempts me to add some virtual instruments to my live rig...

 

Jerry

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As a Rhodes player since 1978 who has been frustrated with sampled ones, that's the nicest sample playback set I've heard. Besides the tone of the coveted "E" piano, they captured the dynamic timbres between fusion "bark" and bell tone. Crossfading samples could never do justice to a Rhodes, until this set.

 

My Rhodes sounds pretty close to that "E" piano. Not kidding. It can go between fusion "bark" and bell tone with playing dynamics. It's a sparkletop "mutt" with a mix of components from different eras. Raymac tines with the square tone resonators. A previous owner had replaced the original felt hammerset with the later wood/plastic hammerset with neoprene tips. It's one of the few things that are interchangeable between sparkle tops and mark 1 pianos. The original electronics were missing, no big thing as it predated the Peterson, sounded like crap, and used germanium PNP transistors that were poor quality and have long been out of production. I take the output straight off the harp. The keys have the "bump" on the pedestal which gave the action a great feel but the "bump" was removed about 1968-69, and not brought back until about 1982. That sparkletop is the 4th Rhodes I've owned and I love it.

 

The pickup design changed over the years. Early pickups have that magic tone hiding under those crap preamps. I discovered it while experimenting with DI boxes. Rhodes pickups are extremely sensitive to loading which drastically changes the tone. Those sparkletop pianos were also noisy, one of the reasons the old preamps sound like crap is that they intentionally suppressed the high end to mask out the noise. I had read that a high impedance input makes the Rhodes sound better, the DI boxes I was experimenting showed incremental improvement in tone and noise with rising input impedance. Still not satisfied, I bought a Countryman Type 10 DI that has a really high 10Mohm input impedance. Not only did that DI box bring out that magic tone, it also eliminated the noise!

 

I could tell that the "E" is an early Rhodes suitcase because the preamp faceplate doesn't have the accessory jacks. That meant early pickups, no newer than 1972. When I acquired the sparkletop piano I had a '76 stage piano that had a dull tone. When I discovered the "magic audio chain" from the sparkletop piano, I tried the same chain on the '76 piano and it still sounded dull. It's the pickups. Sadly the harp assemblies are not interchangeable due to dimensional differences. We don't know the details of the modifications that Eddy Reynolds did to the "E" Peterson preamp, but it's a safe bet that he modified the front end with higher input impedance. It also sounds like he added a notch filter to cut out some midrange mud.

 

I'd like to know if the "E" piano has the "bump" on the key pedestals, because I have seen them on the occasional Rhodes when they weren't standard so that must had been an option back then.

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Bought.

 

I've wanted this sound and experience for 40 years.

 

Back in the early 80's I was a huge Al Jarreau fan, and tried to get my '76 Mark I Stage to sound as close to this as possible, but never got there. While I've liked the several Rhodes samples and models over the years, this was, to me, the most coveted of sounds. Never added a Rhodes sample to my VST arsenal, but this is the perfect addition.

 

Love the way it plays. I'm looking forward to making music with this!

.

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I saw this thread this morning and listened to the demos. I purchased the package after listening to all the demos. Fantastic sound...even better playing experience. After more than 40 years of searching for a Rhodes experience that really connects with me, I think I have found it.

 

The balance between the upper and lower registers is nearly perfect, allowing me to play aggressively without getting all muddied up in the mid/lower range. The sample layers are seamless to my ears (keep in mind I"ve only owned it for a few hours) and the dynamic range is really satisfying and responsive. Nuance and bark, all in the same sound. I can actually play a Rhodes in the way I play an acoustic piano.

 

It responds very well to a wide range of dynamics, and subtly changes tone color while sounding natural. After installing it, I played for nearly two hours non-stop, and composed three new tunes during that time. That is the response I want from a piece of software...it inspires me to play and create, and feel connected to it.

 

I am playing it from my RD-800, which is an action that works well for me, since I mostly just play acoustic and electric piano sounds (The Hammersmith has been my favorite piano app for the past few years) and had been using Scarbee Classic EP-88s, but that always left me a bit unfulfilled. Many of the Scarbee sounds were not to my liking, and I felt they often got muddy, had some weird overtones in places, and lacked a certain clarity that I was searching for in a virtual Rhodes. And I couldn"t quite connect with them when playing.

 

The Famous E electric piano satisfied me from the first few notes, and a few thousand notes later, I was really stoked. I have a very specific taste in Rhodes sounds, and I connected with almost every preset in this package. And the samples also responded well to my pedaling from the Roland RPU-3 pedal, allowing me to control the sustain and resonances of the sound. I didn"t have to mess with the velocity curve, as it seemed very good in the default configuration for my keyboard and touch.

 

I know I am not a well known contributor to the forum, and my opinion only really matters to me, but I am posting this because this piece of software may be a very important addition to my playing experience, based on my initial reaction and response to it. I wanted to share that with you all, as someone may be searching for the same experience.

 

When I created an account to purchase it, I was able to take a survey related to the improvements of their products, and received some 'orange slices' which are discount points, and saved 17% off the listed $159 purchase price (comes to $131.97, so you don"t have to do the math in your head). Easily the best $130 bucks I have spent on a Rhodes sound. Thanks to Steve Nathan for bringing it to my attention.

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I know I am not a well known contributor to the forum, and my opinion only really matters to me,

Well, you are known to me and I value your opinion. I also am glad you still drop by time to time. :thu:

Thanks for posting.

:nopity:
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locking it to Kontakt, and to Native Instruments (although the latter is not a "lock" per se) is a killer for me, no matter how good. Same as products with iLok. Not worth the grief for a minor step up in live playing quality. Neo-Soul Studio 2 floats my boat.

There is no luck - luck is simply the confluence of circumstance and co-incidence...

 

Time is the final arbiter for all things

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It seems interesting obviously but on the Jay Gradon demo it states that you need Kontact to have access to it.

 

I guess you didn't scroll down the page far enough:

 

"The Famous E Electric Piano licenses Native Instruments' Kontakt Player sampler software. Consequently, owning the full version of Kontakt is not necessary, and The Famous E Electric Piano operates without limitations within the free Kontakt Player application/plugin."

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I purchased it last week and it sounds really well and it is tweakable in many directions. But the problem is, that it gives many crackles and cutted notes if i play with the sustain pedal pressed, or play very fast lines or big chords. I have a Mac Book Pro with 4 GB Ram. Perhaps anybody can give me an advice?

Nord Stage 2 76, Nord Electro 5D 73, Rhodes Mk2 73, Sequential Prophet 10 Rev4, Akai Miniak Synth, Roland JC 120

 

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Goes off sale tonight. I thought my VTines from Acoustic Samples sounded pretty close to the demos of this one. Anybody have both now? Curious to hear your feedback.
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Goes off sale tonight. I thought my VTines from Acoustic Samples sounded pretty close to the demos of this one. Anybody have both now? Curious to hear your feedback.

 

I didn"t buy the Famous E but I have VTines. I"ve found VT is so editable that you can pretty much get whatever you want from it, so am curious if that"s what you"ve done, Steve, or if you"re referring to some of its presets that sound like FE? That"s got me thinking to do a side by side with the FE demos and do some more tweaking.

____________________________________
Rod

Here for the gear.

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Johan, that clip is great. What a gorgeous song. Those chords and the way they're voiced are built for the sound of this e-piano! Really nice playing, and Andreas sounds fantastic too. I have to confess that while I always appreciated Al Jarreau, I wasn't a big enough fan to know all his work â so I hadn't heard this song before; my loss. It was quite a kick to hear the original recording and realize that the piano I was listening to is probably the same one sampled for this VI â you can easily hear that the sound, even with the 1980s recording and mastering tech in-between, is identical! I wish I had some gigs so I could afford this. :cry: Someday!
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I don't think I have heard a better sounding sampled or live Rhodes!!! I know my old Mark I was muddy in the lower midrange. It makes me wonder how it would feel playing those samples on a modern controller. Part of the Rhodes experience was the mushy slow keyboard that made me play it differently from a piano.

 

On another subject I seem to remember an interview with Joe Sample where he said most players turned the Rhodes volume wide open, but he prefered half volume on the Rhodes and turning up the amp. I never had an amp powerful enough to do that back in the day!

Jimmy

 

Those are my principles, and if you don't like them... well, I have others. Groucho

NEW BAND CHECK THEM OUT

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The Leeds "E" Fender Rhodes and its tech, Eddy Reynolds, has nearly its own mythology. Here's the site recently put up by the current owner, George Mamalakis:

 

The Legendary "E" Model Rhodes

 

 

Keyscape includes samples of another "sister" Rhodes they claim was also teched by Eddy Reynolds:

 

"LA" Custom E Rhodes

Eddy did my Rhodes (stage) back in the late 70s and it was a total game changer. Turned a hand-mangling beast into a beautiful playing instrument. Really nice guy too. In those days, he was working out of his garage. Anyone know what ever happened to him? I couldn't find anything on Google.

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.

-Mark Twain

 

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