April 12th, 2010 – These days, almost everyone uses at least some sample kits for their productions. While some may use samples because it’s easier, I think most people would agree that cost is the biggest argument for using samples over recording the real thing. Hiring a great acoustic space, with great microphones, preamps, and outboard gear, is very expensive compared to buying a DVD full of samples recorded under those same conditions.
Of course, there is a trade off when using affordable sample kits; when instruments are played by themselves, it’s easier to tell that they aren’t recorded from a live acoustic performance. I’m not talking about insane libraries like the Vienna Symphonic library which cost several thousand dollars, but ones that the typical home studio owner/composer buys.
Recently, I was working on a song for an artist that called for a solo grand piano for most of the song. Of course, my tiny apartment doesn’t have room (nor do I have the money for) a grand piano, so I had to turn to my software instruments. The problem is that in the intimate setting of a solo piano and vocals, you really hear the difference between the inexpensive samples I was using and recording a live instrument.
When these software instruments are used in concert with each other to form a full production, the difference isn’t noticeable; but they don’t sound very good on their own. The thing I missed in the piano samples, was the sound of the pedal and hammers. In a full production, they’re considered noise that is usually filtered out, and so the software instrument was created with that in mind. These sample instruments are too sterile and clean.
Even if a listener doesn’t know that the hammer and pedals noises are part of a piano’s sound, they’ll know something is off when they hear a software instrument that doesn’t include them. Of course, it’s not always the developers fault. They know that most people will use their product in a full production and don’t necessarily have the engineering knowledge to take out “noise”. So to make sure that most of their users get a sampled instrument that will sit well in the mix with minimal engineering fuss, they clean up the samples to a ridiculous degree.
Being a classically trained pianist, I start with a piano when writing songs. Because I haven’t been happy with my piano sounds so far, I’m thinking about upgrading to something nicer. Native Instruments has released Alicia’s Keys, which is a piano kit sampled from Alicia Keys’ piano, in her studio, with her engineers. It uses the free Kontakt player, and retails for about $120. I haven’t bought it yet, but the samples on Native Instruments’ website sound pretty damn good; especially for the money. I can hear the mechanical noise of the piano pretty well, and it sounds like a versatile instrument.
Have any of you tried it out yet? I haven’t bought any Kontakt instruments except for the Steve Slate Drums (which are fantastic) that were on sale a month ago, so I’m interested to hear your personal experience with it.
10 Comments, Comment or Ping
Ian C. Anderson
I hear ya. I just used the Kontakt pianos for my recent EP, and they sound good enough in a mix, but when they’re bare, you can tell they’re not quite the real thing.
I’ve played around with the physically-modelled Pianoteq by Modartt, and I was extremely impressed by it. No velocity switching between samples (or you can think of it as have infinite layers of velocity levels).
http://www.pianoteq.com/
It’s a bit pricey, but I’ll probably upgrade to it someday.
Apr 13th, 2010
Sean
@Ian Anderson: Very cool…the modeling sounds pretty authentic.
Apr 13th, 2010
vinayk
I’m using truepianos currently – it’s partly sampled and part modelled. Sounds quite good -very playable. I’d love to know what alica’s keys sounds like solo!
Apr 13th, 2010
Sean
@Vinayk: Wow…listened to some of the samples. Sounds great!
Apr 13th, 2010
Rick
The other cool thing about the modeled pianos is they are much less taxing on the computer.
I haven’t bought the Alicia’s Keys, but the demos sound fantastic. I just wonder though… as I was listening to them I kept thinking “this totally sounds like something you would hear on an Alicia Keys record.” Not sure if that’s good or bad… maybe it’s too distinctive?
Apr 14th, 2010
Ian C. Anderson
@Rick
I agree that the sound is a bit too distinctive. I prefer more versatility. Probably another reason why I prefer modeled pianos. Though in my experience, they’re not necessarily less taxing on the computer. Less memory footprint, for sure, but the CPU stress can be pretty intense, depending on the settings.
Apr 14th, 2010
Rick
Thanks for the heads up on computer usage. I don’t have any modeled pianos (I have Ivory Grands) but it seemed like that was a selling point for them.
Apr 14th, 2010
Ian C. Anderson
@Rick
No problem. Yea, modeled pianos will take up wayyy less disk space (there’re no samples!). However, since there are no samples, all of the sound has to be generated in real time with pure math (which translates into relatively high CPU usage).
Nerdy computer scientists would say that modeled pianos are “CPU-bound,” while sampled instruments are “I/O bound.” I/O meaning input/output system (i.e. the disc).
Apr 14th, 2010
DIGITALLUSH
Hey there,
I struggled with finding a descent piano sound for a while. I’ll admit I was not very happy with what I got (for what I paid) with the extra instruments that came with Ableton, and kept finding myself going back to Logic or ProTools to use their.. slightly better presets.
With that said, I guess it can start to depend on your philosophy of using the digital instruments. At the end of the day you’re either going for an exact replication, or you’re using an entirely new instrument.
I found that for $12.. puremagnetiks grand met my needs for live improvisation (but I also found myself pushing more towards using delays and reverbs, as opposed to trying to replicate an authentic acoustic piano).. but with that said, I still reacted strongly to the warmness of their samples (and it does have a an adjustable volume control for the ‘release’ sound)… With all THAT said, if I had the extra money I’d buy Alicia’s Keys… but honestly, I’ve been hard pressed to find a really good sounding ‘authentic piano’.
Jul 29th, 2010
Sean
@DigitalLush: I’ll have to check out the Puremagnetiks piano…sounds like a good price!
Aug 7th, 2010
Reply to “The problem with sampled software instruments”