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Actually, I agree with you that the SN sound can be very nice sounding in a jazz tune. But the "usual" sound I hear in modern music is the bright one, and therefore SN sound used for such music could appear unexpectedley dull. Just because of what we become biased to by everydays noise exposure.
And I also agree with you that I have to accent the melody line over a bass line quite noticable. I thought this would be normal, I read about this in my method books as well, where they usually reference to acoustic pianos. Wasn´t aware that this on the ROLANDs is more evident than on other pianos - well, there is always something to learn.

I listen mostly to solo piano. So what I refered to as "jazz" (harmonically rich and rhytmically interesting modern piano pieces, no background "fog" of other instruments) can be only a small subset of what is commonly known as jazz. I played a few things for which I knew the "ground truth" - professional acoustic recording - and I really liked what I heard from the HP, especially in moments when bass lines needed to be emphasized.



I would say it's more evident on most DPs than on most acoustics, because of the short decay time of DPs. The melody simply fades too quickly. Apart from that, on the Roland HP I played, I had to EQ the hights very strongly to keep up with the bass, mainly when playing over speakers. The negative side effect is that EQing also amplifies high overtones in bass notes, rendering them less pleasant. On Kawai CA95 you can increase volume of individual keys (as opposed to frequency), which could do do trick on Roland HPs. Ironically it is not neccassary on CA95 because tones are very balanced volume-wise.

Come to think of it, I'm not sure what kind of sound that Roland was set to. It may have used some fancier setting to make it sound brighter than usual. At any rate, what I described was only my impression on the sound and me and the shop assistant actually agreed on that.



I don't dare judge this as I have never played a piano before but I consider these aspects very subjective and it seems that some people here beg to differ.

I said sound and action .... Yeah the MP10 has a better action .... VST'S have a better sound. Even the CP1 has a better all round vibe when your playing it.
But in my view the RD700NX has the best all round combination of sound and action. With the studio grand being the best voice on any shipping DP and the PHAIII being probably the 2nd most realistic action.

I'm not sure I follow you:



...but...



You're contradicting yourself, surely?

I believe Dr Popper means "sound and action" when evaluated together as a bundle, not separately. Other pianos may have better sound OR action but not both (my understanding of Dr's statement).

Ah, I see.

Yeah, well...[grumble]

James
x

If they could only marry the SuperNATURAL sound engine with a Kawai wooden action (like the new GF), I'd be in heaven....

K.

Interesting, I have quite a different experience - I used to play on upright (although I did not play for some years), but I do not seem to do anything differently with high melodic line, while the bass line I have to highlight more - the reason is that Roland's action is somewhat heavier than upright.
I do not like long notes dying before they need to die on digitals - but it is the way it is

As for the speaker system on Roland, I actually enjoy experience through the speakers on my HP-507 more than from headphones - the reason is that some functions like reverb, soundboard behavier, hammer noise, may be a few more, are not available through headphones - but they make playing experience richer and less 'digital'.
I like their Sound Projection system too

Get yourself a Integra - 7 and wait a few weeks

Your correct except that no DP has a better piano patch the Roland's SN Studio grand. It's technically perfect and its tonality is superb. You have to go to a VST to get anything that's a more complete patch and even then it's better then most VST's.

That'll work.

I actually suggested shooting some pics of the Integra-7 placed on top of the VPC - no takers.



Are we including Nords here too?

Yes James .... while a nord XL sample might have great tonality ( and many do ) the patches aren't technically good enough to compete with a SN patch.