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Steve, as always I find your insights and comments to be quite fascinating!

Yep. Me too! (Respect)

Ha! Well all those around me for some reason fail to find my insights so fascinating. Their usual retort is "stop going about these pianos" or "are you still obsessed with those organ things?" or even "get a life".

I keep telling them they'll miss me when I'm gone!

Cheers,

Steve

Hey people, new to the forum, just received my v-piano. The thing doesn't stop amazing me fair play!
I have used some of your settings bennevis, they sound great! A lot more true to the actual pianos. Although I must confess I manually randomised the tuning/hardness/resonance of some keys to warm them up a little! Very impressed with the bechstein, my grandmother has one and it sounds very close to it!
I have replicated my challen upright and it sound almost exactly the same, it's quite funny really how close I got it, bit out of tune and a tad resonant. If anyone would like the settings and some pictures of individual tuning, let me know.

Keep them coming or let me know of any improvements!
James

I can't agree with those who said that all the V-Piano's sounds are the same - even comparing Vintage Piano 1 to V1 Concert say, there are similarities, but no matter how much you tweak them, you can't get them to sound like each other, which means that they already had inherent differences which justify their separate presets. I do agree that the V2 presets don't sound convincing until you tweak them (their mellowness are more akin to Blüthner than Bösendorfer, I have to say) but apparently Roland thinks V2 is good for late night jazz (which is of course way above my head, as I don't do late nights nor jazz....).

I haven't tried the equalization stuff, mainly because I'm not quite sure how to do it, but maybe those who can may be able to tweak the sounds to match the acoustic grands better than I can.

Unlike others, I like the fact that there are no EP/synthesizer sounds on the V-Piano: it's really meant for those who want a piano substitute, not something glitzy with lots of multicolored flashing lights and weird sounds. There're plenty of DPs that have those.

Yes, I think the presets are physically different, I.e weighted hammers, closer soundboard for the upright, glass sound board rather than just alterations. The only thing I miss, is being able to turn the hammer hardness that hard that it sounds like a tac piano. Now theres a suggestion!

I'd like to hear your settings, including that of your Challen upright (not heard of that make before) - why don't you post them here?

Didn't Ray Charles use a Challen Grand? British make and distinctively warm sounding.

When I have said all the V-Pianos sound the same, what I mean is that if you mentally strip out all the adjustable parameters, the DNA of the thing, the most basic tonal signature of each note across all presets is the same...I'm not talking about hammer hardness, resonance, tuning or anything, just the basic underlying tone. I offered this criticism to the UK Roland product specialist he agreed and said in creating the V-Piano they needed a sound and that sound, the building block or the DNA as I call it, is the same across all V-Piano voices.

Just my opinion.

Cheers,

Steve

Hmm, I still don't agree about that. Even single notes sound completely different with different factory presets, as well as those I've customized myself.

For example, in my Bosie setting, the bass notes have a completely different character to that of the Steinway - as deep and resonant, but in a different way (and to my ears that mirrors their respective acoustic concert grands). Maybe if you have access to your dealer's V-Piano (assuming he's not too annoyed with you for exchanging your DP...) try out those settings and hear for yourself. My settings magnify the differences between the orginal presets as well as making them sound more life-like (I hope).

I agree to a point. For gigging musicians, they probably need the extra voices, bells & whistles, and are better served using an RD-xxx/CP-yyy/MP-z type of stage piano.

I have a home studio, and my stuff doesn't leave the house. I also have a synth for those sounds and action. I've got an RD-700SX, which does fine for my needs now, but I'm considering upgrading depending on what's due out in the future.

My wish list for a V-Piano, version 2.0, would include EPs in there, as the weighted action is appropriate for those...they can leave out the GM set and extra tones, controller functions. Rhythm accompaniment might be nice, but not necessary. Lighter and cheaper would be nice, if unlikely.

You can sort of see a potential convergence of technologies...which might manifest itself in an RD-800/900 or V-Piano Lite in a year or two. Modeling meets SuperNatural?

The importance of attempting to get these things to sound like a Bose or a Stein or any piano is IMHO secondary to the basic goal of DP builders; and that is to get the most pleasing sound to the most people. After all, we are listening to paper not strings. The engineers built in a second set of outputs and spent time to get some sound re-enforcement hence more closely simulating a wood piano. Now, the sound comes from paper is never going to beat-out a soundboard and strings, we are left with pushing buttons, turning knobs and fiddling with speakers. When you think about it, a good sample from a concert grand should be the real deal because it is. But the model concept has flexibility where samples don't.

+1 for Pianoteq-style modelled EPs in the next V-Piano.

Cheers,
James
x

I will upload a few of my settings later, bennevis, do you apply eq to any of your patches? I find that with my speaker system (yamaha stagepas500) I have to give it a little boost around the 200hz at it sounds dry there, also a 4db boost around the 1600hz mark with a Q of 1.0. This brings the sound out a lot more and makes it cut through when I'm say playing with jazz backing tracks. I also shelve off the very highest hz which softens the sound of the resonant strings around the centre but that's probably because I'm not used to playing on concert tuned steinways and more basing my sound off jazz recordings.

I have made a great custom all round jazz/pop grand which I will upload the settings for, named the jazz club grand

Looking forward to it!

I've not tried to apply any equalizations - my knowledge of electronic and IT stuff is actually next to non-existent and I thought you needed to connect a special console with lots of sliding levers to the back of the V-Piano in order to do it properly , which is somewhat above my feeble mind....

But I will certainly try out your jazz grand setting, though probably minus the equalizations, unless I've worked out how to use them in the meantime.

V-Piano has onboard digital sweepable EQ - very easy to use if I remember correctly.

Steve

One of the most useful tools is the EQ. Just push the EQ button and everything is adjustable. You can't make a mistake; at least if you don't press write..

Thanks, I'll give it a try. After all, it's Christmas.....

Yes, treat yourself!

Jazz club grand

From the top of the tone menu

Original : triple power
SL 0
SP 0
SR + 20
DR + 16
SBR + 25
KOR +5
UT + 11
ST standard
HH -5
CR -35
DT 0
TC 0
DT +10

Now fine tune the tuning, lots of random scattered notes in + tuning, not to far as to drastically change the tuning

Hammer hardeness slightly softer down bottom end with scattered random hardness throughout

Resonance slightly dipped away from the c3-c5 area. Press rangeset, hold c3,4 and 5 then bring the value down a about -10, do the same but to the very bottom end. Then finally scatter a few + and - resonant notes around the entire keyboard

Let me know what you think, this sounds great playing along to my aebersold backing tracks