Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Digital Pianos - Electronic Pianos - Synths & Keyboards Rondo Alla Turca - Eighteen Piano Comparison Movie by Propianist

If you\'re in a hurry, click here t...st" on YouTube and you\'ll find it.


A while ago I recorded myself playing “Rondo Alla Turca” by Mozart, with a video camera closeup...



I also simultaneously recorded the MIDI output to make a Standard MIDI File, so I could try rendering that performance with all the many different hardware and software piano sounds I’ve got, for a huge side by side comparison...

Here's my actual live MIDI file...


Rondo Alla Turca_propianist.mid


I then rendered it eighteen times over with eighteen different piano sources, and burned them all to CDR for lots of listening, and then I decided to assemble a side by side comparison, using the Mozart, split naturally into its 29 repetitive eight bar sections (that's the beauty of it!) for instant comparison, without interrupting the musical flow.




You can download complete WAV file ...anos - from page 2 of this forum thread!


After a few sleepless nights of audio and video editing, here’s what I’ve come up with!

Here's the rendered audio track...


Rondo Alla Turca__eighteen pianos__propianist__16bit 44kHz.wav


And here's the full DVD quality video / audio version, with animated graphics to tell you which piano you're hearing. It’s quite a big download, but I promise it’s worth watching – if you like software pianos, you’ll love this !!!


Rondo Alla Turca__eighteen pianos__propianist__movie.mpg

(above webpage download link is most reliable, working via the original host website)
or otherwise these alternate direct download links can be used...
download_mirror1 download_mirror2





Additionally...
In case you can't easily download the big 100MB full resolution DVD quality version (or you're having problems playing it! - some machines have different codecs installed?! It certainly works for me in Windows Media Player, or the excellent Media Player Classic , or VLC or any normal DVD movie playback software, since it's fully UK PAL DVD compatible. (720x576 pixels 25fps MPEG2, so you could author and burn it straight to DVD-Video without re-encoding anything.)

...anyway, if you just want a small low res version (similar to YouTube) and don't mind the very compressed picture quality, then here's a reduced Bink Video version, with embedded player host and codec, that runs as a simple standalone application, and will ALWAYS work okay on any Windows computer without issues - just click to play it!


Rondo Alla Turca__eighteen pianos__propianist__reduced Bink video.exe


...and finally, a similar low res screensaver version of this movie, (which stops if you nudge the mouse or press any key) that also should instantly playback in fullscreen with stereo sound, on any Windows machine.

Rondo Alla Turca__eighteen pianos__propianist__screensaver.scr


FYI, both these small 9.5 MB compressed films are 360 x 288 pixels, and have been reduced from the original 720 x 576 pixels, from 25 frames per second, down to just 9 frames per sec, so the motion looks a little bit choppy and skipping lots of frames, but you get a fair idea of the content.
The big DVD quality version however, plays completely fluidly at 25fps, and with quadruple the number of pixels has far more legible text in the software screenshots, etc. plus you can fully control its playback options, and switch between nineteen different 16 bit linear WAV piano soundtracks, as I'll explain later...!

Can't seem to get your big mpg to work on OSX Leopard (quicktime says it's not a movie).

Just as an FYI, there is no way that I would download an exe or scr and execute it on my windows computer. Not that I don't trust you personally, but it's just a good policy to have.

Sorry, please let me know what format do you want it in? Anyway, I hope you got the WAV file to play okay at least.

If you're trying to open it with QuickTime Movie Player, it won't work because it's not a Quicktime movie. I use Windows XP myself, and have no Mac to test things on...!

The 97.5 MB file is an industry standard MPEG-2, the same thing as everyday DVD video's format, which is the main reason I chose that - popular compatibility! There is a 100MB upload file size limit on the host MediaFire webpage, so I had to make everything (video plus audo) fit that, otherwise the DVD data rate could have been a lot higher.

Video = 720 x 576p pixels progressive (non-interlace) at 25 frames per second, for UK PAL, compressed to 3777kbps bitrate for size (not to be confused with American DVD's at 720 x 480 @ 30fps NTSC)

Audio = Mpeg2 standard 16 bit 48kHz for DVD, compressed to 384kbps bitrate

...or you can use the linear WAV file for audio obviously - it's exactly in sync with the video.

You should be able to open a compatible MPEG2 file with just about any software player that plays DVD movies. If you can watch "Oceans Eleven" DVD on your computer, you can almost certainly play this MPEG-2 file too.

You could even burn my MPEG-2 file straight onto DVD without re-encoding using nearly any universal DVDR authoring software. If you want to make a DVDR with 16 bit WAV soundtrack (replacing the compressed Mpeg2 audio) you'll need to use 48kHz sample rate, as DVD doesn't support 44.1kHz. The software would probably just Sample Rate Convert the 44.1kHz WAV to 48kHz for you, although you'd be hard pushed to hear the differences between them.

For anyone who wants it, here's a 16 bit 48 kHz WAV file, which I've audiophile sample rate converted at 32 bit DSP from the original 32 bit 44.1kHz master, before applying subsequent dither (with 48kHz noise shaping) and final wordlength reduction to 16 bit. This is the best WAV file to use for any DVD soundtrack of this movie.


Rondo Alla Turca__eighteen pianos__propianist__16 bit 48kHz.wav


I already burned a DVD-Video myself (AUDIO TS and VIDEO TS folders with VOBs and IFOs etc.) with linear WAV audio - it's great, but too big to upload! But you can easily do this for yourself using the MPEG2 video and this 48kHz WAV and some basic software like Dazzle DVD Complete or whatever...

Frankly, there's so many different video formats out there, it's hard to choose the best one to suit everybody. I want best possible quality, of course, but I don't like big uploads or downloads any more than anyone else. At home I've got Blu Ray 1080p, but on internet I watch YouTube.


I'd happily try to create and upload alternative video file formats if anyone requests them. Whaddaya want?

I can probably make...

AVI
DV
FLV
MOV
MPEG-1
MPEG-2
MPEG-4
VOB
DVD "Video TS" folder
WMV
DivX
H.264
Bink

(...but nothing works unless you have the correct players and codecs installed, apart from Bink Video with embedded Player and codec into an executable which always works!)

...or I suppose I could just upload five thousand raw frames as .bmp or .jpeg and let you compile it yourself, but there's 5.7GB of BMP files or uncompressed AVI and a 65MB 32 bit master audio WAV.

I can absolutely assure you that my reduced Bink Video is totally safe, and contains no malicious virus or spyware of anything like that! I have Sophos Anti-Virus on my internet computer anyway, but the .exe was compiled on my clean Quad Core machine which has no internet connection and was only built by me in June, so has nothing that I didn't put there, and I'm a very careful chap...
I would take a chance and try running the Bink.exe if you have access to any Windows machine, because it is bound to work straight away, even from a slow USB memory stick.

If you don't like .exe file, but you already have Bink's video application installed, you could just play my original Bink Video file instead. You can download Bink player and the whole video tools bundle free from manufacturer's website . Highly recommended - in my case "it saved the movie" (obvious pun) as they say in Hollywood!

Excellent work! Fantastic!


Peace,

/Richard

You enjoyed it then...?!

I will try and convert this movie and put onto YouTube.

YouTube video = 320 x 240 pixels at 30 frames per second, and typical 200kbps bitrate

YouTube audio = mono 16 bit 22.05kHz converted to MP3 at 64kbps bitrate

YouTube sound quality would be so bad, you couldn't really appreciate the subtle differences in piano timbres, so what's the point? But I'll do it anyway...

There are ways to get higher quality from YouTube. A good website is here , but I still think my reduced Bink Video would look and more importantly, sound far better than YouTube. It's stereo 44.1kHz audio, and 360 x 288 which is a much "neater" resize from the original PAL resolution (exact factor of 50% pixel dimensions.)

Most impressive! Thank you. Wonderful playing and a real techological feat!!

Bob

OK, quicktime for whatever reason just doesn't seem to like the file (under OSX anyway). VLC however is just fine with it.

Great job!

Just watched it through once (and was interrupted a few times in the process) and had a couple of quick observations.

First, I found myself wishing that I could hear the exact same passage side by side. For instance, putting each piano as a separate instrument track in garageband, allowing you to choose whichever one you wanted in linear time. There were times where I'd be thinking "interesting difference in that left hand chord between these two, but I wonder how X sounded". But as a way to sample (no pun intended) a large qty of different samples/software this was great.

Second, it is interesting to note how differently the various apps deal with stereo separation. Maybe this is just me, and I tried closing my eyes to not be manipulated by what I was seeing, but it seemed that some apps created an artificial sounding separation between bass and treble notes (i.e. treble had a bias towards the right and bass to the left). While this may work fine if you're actually playing in front of a keyboard, it's a bit unusual when you're a listener (not the player) and seems very obvious when you're listening through headphones. This affect seemed to differ a reasonable amount with the various packages. Very interesting. I'd be interested to know if A) others also hear this and B) if there is a way to render final output with this turned off or to adjust it?

I'll have to listen more later when I have more time (and fewer interruptions).

Thanks for your efforts.

Excellent work propianist!

I shall have to watch the video several times before offering my impressions of each piano source, however on first viewing/listing I did rather like the Bosendorf.

On a separate note, rather than uploading to YouTube, I would recommend www.vimeo.com as it offers higher resolution video/audio.

Once again, terrific job, many thanks!

James
x

Yes, that's exactly what I wanted too, and is at the very heart of the whole idea, and shows just how big a problem this attempt is!

There are eighteen pianos under serious study...

1. Galaxy II Bosendorfer
2. Galaxy II Steinway
3. Galaxy II Bluthner
4. Ivory Steinway
5. Ivory Bosendorfer
6. Ivory Yamaha
7. Ivory Fazioli Italian Grand
8. Garritan Steinway Under Lid
9. Garritan Steinway Player
10. Garritan Steinway Close
11. Garritan Steinway Classic
12. Garritan Steinway Stage Side
13. Pianoteq Grand C2 Concert
14. Pianoteq Erard add-on
15. Kawai MP8 concertgrand1
16. Kawai MP8 concertgrand2
17. GEM RealPiano Module
18. Kemble Upright Piano sample

For a three minute piece of music, that's 18 x 3 = 54 track minutes if you burn them all to CDR like I did, plus lots of time-consuming work rendering them all consistently in the first place to master 32 bit 44.1kHz files, plus you could easily render more than one variation from each piano library too, with all their tone parameters and options! It's a lot of material to prepare and listen to, and the differences are very subtle in some cases!

Listening carefully to the results is awkward too. It's hard to remember if you thought "track 4" was better than "track 9" and by the time you've got to "track 18" you've forgotten what "track 2" sounded like...!
Whether you're clicking WAV files on your computer, or the transport buttons on your CD player, it's a strenuous effort to really take in and absorb all these instrument characters, and concentrate for 54 minutes on the same aspects for each piano. You end up just flicking back and forth and hearing only the first few seconds of each track over and over - it's musically unsatisfying too. I used to LOVE this Mozart piece(!) but now I've heard it so many times...!

The best trick I came up with was using RANDOM play on CD player - it would pick a random track for me, so I didn't know what I was hearing - just "some piano" - do I like it or not?!
If no - try another track, and if yes - look up and see what it was. More often than not I liked the Galaxy Steinway and the Ivory Steinway and the GEM module, and my own Kemble multisample(!) and would find myself listening to that track all the way through. Some, like the dark, muffled Garritan, I can always spot, and others sound too fierce and I click "next" after a few seconds. After a lot of listening, I've discovered I can now guess which track's playing in a blind test (random track CD mode) and I'm correct 99% of the time. I know them all intimately now, but there's still not an overall winner...
It's like going into an art gallery and saying "which is the BEST painting?" Perhaps the one you look longest at and keep coming back to, but they're all unique.

I agree with you about comparing them side by side, opening all into a WAV editor software. I did this too, but you're still having to manually click your mouse for every track change to mute and un-mute different selections. Ideally, you need it to change for you automatically, without human interaction, so you get that surprise "ooh, that's sounds nice" effect.

It's a LOT of comparison listening to do - comparing every possible pairing in combination, side by side - that's any TWO pianos from a total of eighteen, yields a lot of possibilities!!!

Mathematically, you can work out there's 153 possible combinations to listen to...

Number of combinations = T! / ( N! ( T - N )! )

when N number of items (N=2) are chosen from
a total T number of Pianos (T=18) and "!" is the mathematical symbol for factorial function (eg. 6! = 6 x 5 x 4 x 3 x 2 x 1 = 720)

The way I conceived this comparison test was by splitting the Mozart into 29 sections, each eight bars in length, and I quickly realised that would be a LOT of audio editing - top 'n' tailing 29 edit points for 18 stereo tracks in a fast moving piano piece with overlapping bass notes, sustain pedal decay and so on...!
18 x 29 = 522 edited sections (each one top 'n' tailed) and yet I knew I wouldn't be using all of them in the final mixdown anyway, so I hatched a cunning plan.

By painstakingly dissecting the live MIDI file in sequencer step edit mode, I was able to split the Mozart into alternating "Alpha sections" and "Beta sections" and then I could just render each piano playing these two MIDI files - instantly creating the finished "edited" track in alternating 8 bar sections, far better / neater / quicker than I could have done with manual waveform audio editing, preserving all the note decay and continuous sustain pedal travel messages associated with each musical passage, separating it from its neighbours.

Rondo Alla Turca__propianist.mid ( entire Mozart piece, as recorded live )

RONDO__alpha sections.mid ( split into eight bar sections 1, 3, 5, 7, etc.)

RONDO__beta sections.mid ( split into eight bar sections 2, 4, 6, 8, etc.)

Now with these ALPHA and BETA sections rendered (and trimmed exactly in sync!!!!) into 32 bit 44.1kHz audio, I have eighteen Alpha section piano tracks and eighteen Beta section piano tracks, I can open all 36 WAV files into the DAW editor and listen to them.
So now, rather than having to manually click mouse every so often to perform one single switchover comparison, I can select any two pianos (any Alpha vs any Beta) and hear an instant full length comparison mix that "automatically" switches back and forth by magic 29 times while it plays, at musically appropriate points, without me even lifting a finger, and I can sit back and focus on listening...!

eg. choose "Ivory Steinway ALPHA" vs "Galaxy Steinway BETA" and it works brilliantly - they sound similar.

eg. choose "Garritan Player Alpha" vs "Kawai MP8 Beta", instantly perfect mixdown success!

eg. choose "Pianoteq Alpha" vs "Ivory Fazioli Beta" - wow! I couldn't have edited it better than that - all 29 sections are exactly in sync all the way through!

Furthermore, during the 6 seconds or so while ALPHA piano is playing, I could manually mute and un-mute various BETA sections and get an uninterrupted musical flow across many different pianos. You get plenty enough time to switch BETA pianos on the fly, in realtime without any audible glitches or stops and starts! It's fantastic for comparisons and the ultimate "Royal Rumble" between all the products.

BUt I find it best to listen to the comparisons two pianos at a time, and the Mozart's inherent repetions make this an ideal test piece. Obviously, there's still 153 combinations that could be made, so you could't realistically render all those as 24 bit mixdowns and post WAV files uploaded here, but you don't need 153 files at all, because you only need the basic Alpha and Beta set to have all bases covered.

For the internet forum, I decided to make a showcase track with all eighteen pianos included, but arranged in a logical order make as many relevant comparisons within each piano "family", eg. comparing all the Steinways or the Bosendorfers side by side. You need to switch back and forth and back again to get a good feel for it. I could only manage to edit one movie clip together and upload it here, so that's what I chose, but you get the idea. If I can upload all the alphas and betas (ideally as 24 bit WAVS, but more likely smaller files) then I will.

It would be great to add more pianos into this montage - if anybody owns EastWest Quantum Leap and could please render those Alpha and Beta MIDI files and upload 16 bit WAVs and post a link here, or maybe some other rival products like Native Akoustik, or BDMO, or Sampletekk Black Grand or PMI Old Lady. I'd like to have included the Roland RD700GX and Yamaha CP300 but I don't own them. I suppose I could go to my local music shop with my rackmount sequenecer, hard disk recorder, Apogee converters, bag of cables, headphones and ask if they'd mind...?!


I have got this movie uploaded and working on YouTube now, if you want a quick look before downloading the big DVD quality MPEG file above, and the uncompressed WAV file.
(Because obviously the YouTube sound quality isn't good enough to assess the piano timbre seriously.)
You can search YouTube for "propianist" and find it, or just click here...


Rondo Alla Turca__eighteen pianos__propianist__watch video on YouTube

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=1aE-x1vcJ2w

...which Bosendorfer?!!! - there were two - Ivory and Galaxy II
(Or three, if you count the GEM that does use some Bosendorfer samples.)

Nice to hear from you, James.

So when's the Kawai MP8 mkIII coming out then?
Please ask them to put AES/EBU digital output on it!!

Best regards,
propianist

propianist, you could potentially mux all of the audio tracks into a video file (avi, mvk, mp4, possibly even a vob), and switch between each piano source.

As for the next MP - sure, I'll let the R&D chaps know about your AES/EBU request.

Cheers,
James
x

Yes, I know I've already been doing this.
Like French/German/Italian/English/Japanese language soundtracks on a DVD.

It would be helpful for time windows being listed next to each instrument.

propianist - Let me congratulate you on your bold initiative. You have done an excellent and at the same time, laborious job. Bravo for that.
I have also read your posts very carefully and I admire your sense of objectivity. Very informative and clear. You seem to possess the reviewer's touch on subjective things as piano libraries are.

On the other hand, you may have engaged on a 'mission impossible' here. Trying to give a taste of piano libraries to non-owners or wanna-be owners. I too believe that unless you buy the damn things and test them for some time, then you cannot have a clear view of whether they are right for you or not. Demos cannot help much or may misguide someone. Everything is covered with generous doses of marketing hype and extremely subjective opinions in fora. At least that's what I have been against for some time now.

In my search for a decent piano library that could be used for practice during the difficult night hours, I started purchasing. I admit that this has been an eye opener as to what can be achieved by a sampled piano and also an interesting experience. I mean you can play on very expensive instruments which you could never imagine that you would be able to lay your hands on, albeit in a heavily compromised way. Nevertheless playing a concert grand or a vintage german baby would not be feasible without these libraries.

So, I would like to help.
I currently have the following piano libraries: TruePianos, PMI Boesendorfer, Akoustik Piano, ArtVista Grand 2, Galaxy II, Vienna Library (VSL) Imperial Boesendorfer, Bluethner Digital Model One, Garritan Steinway and of course the titanic EWQL Pianos. Your tests contain libraries that I do not have and libraries that I do have. But there are important contenders left out. I would be willing to offer assistance in the comparison process with these that you do not own.

I have two strong objections though.
- I never believed that a single midi file can show the virtues or pitfalls of a piano library. The midi file should be different for each one. The same piece maybe, but different performance. That's why tests like the one on purgatorycreek fail to paint a correct image. The pianist plays differently according to the sound he hears. The tone of the piano or its nuances guide and affect the player. For example, if I try a piano with prominent low end, then my bass touch will likely be lighter that when playing on a piano with less low content. If I play on a bright instrument, then my playing will essentially be different from that on a dark one.
My point is yes, play the same piece but doing a different performance of it with each library.

- My second objection is on sound. Some libraries are clearly laid out for production work. They are recorded unnaturally dry for this purpose. BDMO for example, is useless without convolution. Other libraries offer a pret-a-porte sound (if I am allowed to use the term). Ready to go. Like the Garritan Steinway. It has ready recorded perspectives with very natural ambience. A classical pianist would definitely be attracted to this one, even though he may later find that this perspective is easier to listen to than play.

If you think that I could be of some help, then we should discuss ways of conducting tests. As I said, this can be very informative to potential users. I wish something like this existed when I was buying. I would have avoided certain bad decisions I most regretfully acknowledge now.

Keep up your helpful spirit.

Thanks, propianist for this ambitious project. This must have taken a great deal of time and effort. The mpeg 2 version plays fine on my MacBook Pro. What strikes me is that what I like to listen to and what I like to play, may not be the same thing.

Thank you for recommending VIMEO, it would help solve problems with uploading big video files (up to 500MB) free, but you have to pay $59 to use the premium HD service with 2GB upload limit.

Anyway, I think VIMEO is only for hosting video files, whereas I need general purpose file storage really, for WAVs / images / or even whole folder directories so I can upload a DVD title set. I already encoded my video to fit the 100MB upload limit of MediaFire, knowing they won't delete it, and it's complete free. Being such a miser, I like everything to be free!

I found this web page with a good summary of what's available, but a lot of these "free upload" sites will delete your files after 90 days if nobody has downloaded it, or they're only limited offers for free trial, then you have to pay.

The best geniunely free solution I've found, and started using myself, is www.ADrive.com which gives me 50GB online storage space, with a 2GB per file upload limit, and they say they'll never delete your files, and this "Basic" package is entirely free - with an easy online sign-in that's fairly anonymous if you have any working email account to activate it.

That's what I made the video for!
It always shows you which piano you're hearing and you can easily tell when the sound changes at each 8 bar musical section, even if you're listening to the WAV file "blind" by just following the listed running order and looking where you're up to in the music.

I never made any note of the actual timings, because I didn't actually need to edit or splice any piano WAV sections together, as such, because the plug-in's audio output was rendered "automatically edited into 29 sections" by my clever use of ALPHA and BETA midi files, as described above. But if you need to have the accurate track timings, I'm happy to calculate them for you, from the video frame numbers.
Is this a bit more useful...?

I'm guessing that he wants to do the same thing I had wanted, to look at your list and quickly go to a specific instrument without having to "hunt" for it. In this way I could find all the A minor trills in your list and quickly go to each instance.

How'd you get the Kemble upright sampled? If I can ever find a piano I would like sometime, I'd like to make it into an Ivory-like digital instrument database or something like that. One candidate would be (when I can get one for a reasonable price, that is - under $500) a 1960s or earlier Baldwin Hamilton studio upright.

I multi-sample recorded it myself, at home, playing the keys individually. That's the only way to do it!

Recorded via my Sennheiser MKH80 microphone and DACS MicAmp into Apogee PSX100 A/D converter at 24 bit 44.1kHz. (I had a Alesis ADAT at the time (yuk!) and so had to use the bit-splitting facility of the Apogee to capture full 24 bit data signal divided across multiple 16 bit tracks.) I manually edited and trimmed all the WAV files, and selected the best sounding velocity groups of notes by comparing their playability on keyboard by loading test samples and playing, to arrive at the final samples for the five velocity layers (pp, mp, m, mf, ff) using trial and error plus careful judgment and critical listening. It was recorded in 1998 and took me a lot of editing time. I made the finished 16 bit 44.1kHz version to fit the 64MB RAM of my hardware rack sampler Yamaha EX5R that I had at the time, modded with an Iomega Zip disk in the front bay, which took about 45 minutes to load it every time! Here's a very old recording of me playing some Fats Waller using this original Kemble Upright sample loaded into the Yamaha EX5R, made back in about 1998.

Kemble Upright Piano_ multisample created ten years ago.mp3

There is no midi file for this original "live to Alesis ADAT" recording, but if you want to test this same piece (for comparison) against various other commercial upright piano libraries like Native Akoustik Steingraeber upright or the brand new Synthogy Ivory Upright Pianos , then you might like to use this MIDI file of me playing that piece again sometime later.

Since then I've re-assembled the raw 16 bit note samples into a handy SF2 SoundFont using Creative Vienna software so I can run it on computer more conveniently, which loads instantly. I've also multisampled a Steinway D concert grand at 24 bit 96kHz, but I didn't include that in this movie comparison.

I've also corrected the L-R pan of my Kemble's original mono key samples (RAM size limitation), which were previously Left-to-Right panned for stereo effect by the EX5R synth parameter according to keyboard scaling, where I could crudely adjust the overall width to taste - resulting in equal effect both left and right. I think the top C should sound further to the right than bottom A which as a bass note is more omnidirectional and comes from the central belly of the instrument, although slightly to the left. With Vienna software, it can individually pan each sample and therefore each keyboard note, so I went and measured the distance from my ears (seated normally at the piano) to the piano hammer / string striking point in front of me. Using high school trigonometry, the tape measure distance to middle C is the adjacent side of a right-angle triangle, while the distance from right ear to top C hammer is the hypotenuse, and the straight line from Top C to middle C along the strings is the opposite side of triangle, assuming each semitone is roughly equal distance along that line. Bottom A the other side is a slightly different triangle dimension, but very similar. If you pan the top C (and bottom A) sampled notes (in headphones) until it sounds exactly in the right place and look at their numeric panpot value (assuming you have measured the relative L/R difference in dB that this produces) you can derive the pan law of this control parameter and then calculate the exact setting to match the calculated angle (based on trigonometry) from which you expect the stereo direction of all the other piano notes inbetween to emanate from, and pan the appropriate sample to that exact angle, resulting in an accurate stereo pan perspective to recreate the sense of the real instrument in front of you. Simple, huh?