Kronos Piano sound v.s Kurzweil PC3 v.s Yamaha Motif XF

[SanderXpander]

So, sample them.

[synthguy]

I find myself jumping from Kronos to Motif to Krome to JP 80 for piano patches. The sound I want depends on the application or song at hand, matched with the most appropriate piano patch sound, has nothing to do with the brand name or even the model of the synth.

This is where I'm coming from too, though I'm hoping to include a Jupiter-80 or Integra - or some Roland from MusikMesse - in my collection soon. Kronos has the best hardware piano I've heard yet as far as the character of the sample. You can't beat an unlooped sample.

I will have to say that I'm disappointed that Kurzweil didn't release anything new yet. Maybe they're hoping to make some money off of their investment in Kore-64 or something. But as much as I like the PC3, it sounds compressed. A couple of grand piano patches even have the master compressor on! And they need to reshape their "natural" envelopes. The one for their piano isn't natural at all.

[Scott]

So, sample them.

You could sample piano sounds from Ivory, and they should be pretty close, but apart from the adjustability you can get within Ivory, I don't think you could capture all the nuances of the sound, either. For example, I don't think there would be an effective way to capture all its resonance effects and put them into the Kronos. Though whether this would be at all noticeable for a particular application would be a different question. For example, some subtleties which would be noticed in a recording of a solo piano piece may well be completely lost in a large ensemble recording, or live group performance through a PA.

[1jordyzzz]

I own a Roland fantom g8 and I have tweaked and tweaked the piano sounds which were supposedly samples of a NY Steinway D (they sound nothing like it). While the motif xf is a step above, I am trading the fantom in for the Kronos. Kronos even via Internet has the best keyboard piano sounds I've heard on any board. Its quite obvious the piano sound is the most difficult one to duplicate accurately but I believe Kronos is the closest.

Yes it's really different.. A friend of mine had an RD-700GX, and the piano sounds were so difficult to tell where it's sampled from.. I think it's edited heavily to suit stage needs.

For kronos, its easy.. Go to youtube to find professional classical pianist playing a solo repertoire (a well recorded one) using steinway D, and after that go play the kronos.. Yep, this is the sound (if it's not happening to you, it happened to me )

BTW, nord pianos sounds good to..

[SanderXpander]

I actually don't mind the 700SX piano, I play one weekly and it sounds pretty good in the band. A lot better than the Fantoms I remember. But I definitely prefer the Kronos.

[1jordyzzz]

I actually don't mind the 700SX piano, I play one weekly and it sounds pretty good in the band. A lot better than the Fantoms I remember. But I definitely prefer the Kronos.

Yes, the piano sound on RD series is engineered to sit well in live mix IMO.

Kronos pianos on the other hand, based on my experience, need several tweakings in order to sit well on a live mix.. I've found that several HD-1 pianos sits better thatn sgx-1 due to the fact that it is fully compressed, and not having great dynamic range as sgx-1 does.. Even in combi mode alone, the sgx sounds dissapear if paired with EP-1 with same volume (say 127)..

[jeremykeys]

I think it also depends on the music that you are playing as well. In my duo I usually tend to use the German grand but in my heavy band I often use a brighter piano. Again at that point it depends on the song.

[countrycreek]

I'm agreeing that it depends on each person I personally use the krome piano more than the kronos,xf,nord or fantom x it just fits my ears better