ksoper Posted April 12, 2012 Share Posted April 12, 2012 I don't play a lot of sessions outside of my own home anymore. In fact, I can't even remember the last time I did a outside session. But I got a call for one today and used it as an excuse to try True Pianos. I'm pretty happy with the purchase. I used the Emerald module exclusively today, as I only bought it two days ago and only had one night to find a handful of settings that would suit the material. There are plenty of usable things in the Diamond module. I want to spend more quality time with Atlantis but I think for today's project it would've been too much piano. The sucker's huge. So here's the rig of the day. Roland RD-700sx controlling True Pianos, Roland VK7/Korg NanoKontrol operating VB3, hosted by Cantabile Solo, and run through the Presonus AudioBox USB. It worked without as much as a hiccup. http://home.comcast.net/~mightyb3/rig1.jpg 9 Moog things, 3 Roland things, 2 Hammond things and a computer with stuff on it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Outkaster Posted April 12, 2012 Share Posted April 12, 2012 ? "Danny, ci manchi a tutti. La E-Street Band non e' la stessa senza di te. Riposa in pace, fratello" noblevibes.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Muscara Posted April 13, 2012 Share Posted April 13, 2012 ? What's the problem? Ken, it sounds like you had a cool session with some "soft" gear. :thu" "I'm so crazy, I don't know this is impossible! Hoo hoo!" - Daffy Duck "The good news is that once you start piano you never have to worry about getting laid again. More time to practice!" - MOI Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ksoper Posted April 13, 2012 Author Share Posted April 13, 2012 @Outkaster--I just thought I'd initiate a conversation about True Pianos, hoping to find users with more flight time than myself. Yeah, it was cool. I knew a couple of guys on the session and met some new ones. The engineer has carved himself a nice little niche doing songwriter demos. He uses good gear and gets a great mix. I took a real chance taking unproven software to a cash session, but everything worked and worked well. I hope to get more work from him. It was a good time. 9 Moog things, 3 Roland things, 2 Hammond things and a computer with stuff on it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tusker Posted April 13, 2012 Share Posted April 13, 2012 How does nanocontrol complement the VK7 drawbars? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ManInTheBox Posted April 13, 2012 Share Posted April 13, 2012 @Outkaster--I just thought I'd initiate a conversation about True Pianos, hoping to find users with more flight time than myself. Does it have to be about True Pianos? I've got another semi-related question. So here's the rig of the day. Roland RD-700sx controlling True Pianos, Roland VK7/Korg NanoKontrol operating VB3, hosted by Cantabile Solo, and run through the Presonus AudioBox USB. It worked without as much as a hiccup. It seems to me, & I may be missing something completely, you've traded an amp (maybe) for a laptop & peripherals. Unless you were using a real Leslie before, how does this set-up "improve" your rig? Sound quality wise, do you think TruePianos & VB3 are "big" upgrades to the RD-700 & VK-7, big enough to tell in a live situation? How much has your set-up time increased/decreased? There had to be at least one, "I wish I had done this different" moment, what was it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davinwv Posted April 13, 2012 Share Posted April 13, 2012 Sound quality wise, do you think TruePianos & VB3 are "big" upgrades to the RD-700 & VK-7, big enough to tell in a live situation? VB3 is a monumental upgrade to the VK-7. Especially sans Leslie. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JeffLearman Posted April 13, 2012 Share Posted April 13, 2012 I agree, and TP is a big upgrade from RD700. Of course, either, in the hands of a good player, does the job quite well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Nathan Posted April 13, 2012 Share Posted April 13, 2012 Ken, I've been doing some demos for a friend of mine at his studio, where all he has is a Motif for a controller and a PC with Ivory and B4. I've been taking my MBP in and using exactly what you are (TruePiano and VB3) plus a few other goodies, and I'm finding that his clients are impressed that the sounds I'm providing are noticeably better than what they are used to. Don't rush me. I'm playing as slowly as I can! http://www.stevenathanmusic.com/stevenathanmusic.com/HOME.html https://apple.co/2EGpYXK Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ksoper Posted April 14, 2012 Author Share Posted April 14, 2012 How does nanocontrol complement the VK7 drawbars? Extemely well. I've used the Nano as an additional controller for the VK7 since January. I was lucky that the VK sent drawbar data, as it's rather skimpy on midi implementation. You could use the Nano alone to control drawbars, but the sliders are a little too far apart, and there are buttons and knobs in between that would make creative drawbar manipulation difficult. That said, the Nano is a really good buy for $60, and it does so much with such a small footprint that I can't complain about its shortcomings. I have the knobs set up to control drive, edge, reverb, etc. I did try using the sliders as an alternative drawbar set, but ended up not using them for the reasons mentioned. What I did do, however, was set the sliders up to control parameters of Mr. Ray in a Cantabile preset that loads both VB3 and Ray. Sound quality wise, do you think TruePianos & VB3 are "big" upgrades to the RD-700 & VK-7, big enough to tell in a live situation? How much has your set-up time increased/decreased? There had to be at least one, "I wish I had done this different" moment, what was it? Yes, as others have noted, True Pianos and VB3 are light years beyond the RD-700sx and VK7. Light years. And yes, big enough to tell in a live situation. My set up time has increased by the time it takes to unfold a music stand, plug in the laptop and boot it, and plug the Presonus and Korg into it. Say, another five minutes. If I could do anything different with this rig it would be to shave the weight. My goal here was to use the gear I already owned and supplement it. As I said, I play most of my sessions in my own studio, so the gear doesn't leave the house often. I only play live about once a month, so I wasn't keen on spending a fortune on what is essentially an experiment. To date, I've earned back everything I've put into this project. I've been taking my MBP in and using exactly what you are (TruePiano and VB3) plus a few other goodies, and I'm finding that his clients are impressed that the sounds I'm providing are noticeably better than what they are used to. It was the strength of your recommendation in another post that convinced me to make the purchase of True Pianos. The Amber module came as a freebie in Sonar 8.5 and I wasn't blown away. But after reading your thoughts I downloaded the newest demo and was quite impressed. I don't know what they're used to at the studio I was in on Thursday, but I'm confident that I brought high-quality sounds. 9 Moog things, 3 Roland things, 2 Hammond things and a computer with stuff on it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VanDerGraaf Posted April 14, 2012 Share Posted April 14, 2012 ksoper, apologies if I have missed this, but what spec is your laptop? I try and find info on what specs work for particular applications but real-world data is always useful. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JeffLearman Posted April 14, 2012 Share Posted April 14, 2012 I don't think VB3 takes much horsepower. I'm still using NIB4, which is very lightweight. I used TP on a much weaker laptop, two generations ago (Thinkpad T41p), but the newer Atlantis piano module and my favorite by far takes more horsepower than the older ones. Still, it doesn't use up much on my Thinkpad W510. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VanDerGraaf Posted April 14, 2012 Share Posted April 14, 2012 VB3, I know, will run on a steam-powered laptop, it was more TruePianos I was thinking of. Thanks learjeff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ksoper Posted April 14, 2012 Author Share Posted April 14, 2012 ...What spec is your laptop? This is an off-the-shelf HP dv6, sporting an AMD quad-core, A8-3500M, with their Raedon HD graphics chip and 6 GB ram. I never intended this laptop to be used for music. This is my fun computer. And then I got curious... I had no trouble running the Emerald module at a usable latency setting (I don't remember off hand what it ended up being, though it wasn't 2.9 ms. Probably 5.7, but still very playable.) Atlantis wanted a little more buffer headroom, although it didn't appear to be any hungrier in the cpu meter than the Emerald module. Again, to be fair, I had to get True Pianos up and running in an evening and I haven't explored all the possible combinations of settings. K. 9 Moog things, 3 Roland things, 2 Hammond things and a computer with stuff on it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ashville.Guru Posted April 16, 2012 Share Posted April 16, 2012 VB3, I know, will run on a steam-powered laptop, it was more TruePianos I was thinking of. Thanks learjeff. But then, most VSTs will run on said steam-powered laptop (given enough RAM for samples, of course), at a high enough buffer setting. It's totally up to you whether the resultant latency is acceptable or not. Which raises the question - is it useful to ask "will my favorite VST run on this machine or not?" Food for thought, no? This is really what MIDI was originally about encouraging cooperation between companies that make the world a more creative place." - Dave Smith Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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