I was appalled....

apex · Post by **apex** » Mon Jun 04, 2012 4:29 pm

Used my Kronos for the first time at my church yesterday (for morning worship and for a concert that we had last night)

Everything went great no restarts (which I was the most scared would happen, even though it's never happened to me before.... I just knew yesterday it WAS going to happen. But it didn't, so I was very grateful!)

After my choir and praise team finished singing the next group comes up to sing and the guy that was playing keyboard for them says...

"can you put it on just a piano" (meaning no layers nothing, just straight piano), So I was like ok. He's gonna be floored by this piano when he hears it!!!

So I call up the austrian grand (which is the only of the 3 pianos that I have loaded in my preload) - he then says

"do you have a different piano sound?... something more rich?"

I was so stunned that I just kinda stood there. I didn't even know what to do. Seriously I just stood there... I was thinking "are you serious"... you've got to be kidding me. This is the best piano on ANY keyboard right now, and you said "do I have something more rich".

It was kinda funny (honestly), but what was more funny, was that I didn't know what to tell him or to do.

I think it was a matter of the sound guy not giving me enough in the house. so the fact that it was coming out of the keyboard in mono and there wasn't tons of output into the house made it sound puny to him.

Seriously though, I was appalled. SOOOOO OFFENDED!!!!! LOL

no really I was embarrassed.

apex · Post by **apex** » Mon Jun 04, 2012 4:34 pm

oh yeah, I eventually snapped out of it and went into program mode and started letting him hear the different versions of the austrian.... he smiled and said "that's ok." the first one is fine.

I hope he didn't see that it was a Kronos... he'll be telling people....

the pianos are horrible. after church, I tried to explain that I didn't have the other 2 piano samples loaded. again, he smiled and said "oh oh, it was cool"

I couldn't believe it.

mathieumaes · Post by **mathieumaes** » Mon Jun 04, 2012 5:33 pm

To be honest, I have the same feeling about the austrian piano. To me it sounds like it has mostly the attack and then turns very silent... I use the german grand for softer songs but I use the Jap piano most of the times...

Dniss · Post by **Dniss** » Mon Jun 04, 2012 5:47 pm

I think piano on the Kronos needs serious tweak for live performance.

I have to admit that this is the main reason why I've purchased to Kronos, and so it was also my greatest disapointement!

I'm afraid to purchase the Austrian piano because regardless of the review, I have to feeling I will also be disapointed.

Since many of us uses Kronos for live gig would it have been to much to provide us with something that really cut through the mix:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLddJ1WceHQ

danmusician · Post by **danmusician** » Mon Jun 04, 2012 6:52 pm

Apex, I have really come to respect you on this board and it pains me to say it, but I just have not fallen in love with the Austrian. I love the richness in the bass registers, but it is too thin and brittle for me in the mid and upper registers. I play it for awhile and find myself running back to the German. I wish I hadn't spent the money on it. I'm afraid that if I was playing at your church, I'd have asked for something different, too.

I'm truly glad it works for you, it's just not my cup of tea. It could be that I'm so comfortable with the German that my brain and ear associates it with the Kronos and that's what I expect hear when I sit down to play.

I've played a real Bosendorfer and I expected to love the Austrian - I wanted to love it - it just ain't happenin' for me.

One of the beauties of the Kronos is that it can satisfy the unique tastes and expectations of all of us.

jimknopf · Post by **jimknopf** » Mon Jun 04, 2012 7:32 pm

Pianos are always to a certain degree(!) a matter of taste, but besides that, I can't follow some comments at all.

From my view
- the Kronos Steinway is simply the best, richest warm piano for solo play and calm/ballad play out there, on any hardware, below one or two extremely expensive specialised stage pianos

- and the Austrian grand, while definitely not suited for the same purpose, but rather for loud band context, cutting through a mix, and rocky/jazzy expressiveness, again sounds to me like the best piano around for these purposes, definitely ahead of other well known synth piano candidates from my view

Add a little bit of intelligent use for the purpose required, using the variations of each type and/or tweaking details to your liking, and you are done and in midst of piano heaven IMO. I have kicked out the Japanese, and the Steinway and the Bosendorfer together provide ANYTHING I want and need for piano play.

You have to choose the right piano programs in the right context, else you will never be happy with any result.

apex · Post by **apex** » Mon Jun 04, 2012 8:08 pm

danmusician wrote:Apex, I have really come to respect you on this board and it pains me to say it, but I just have not fallen in love with the Austrian. I love the richness in the bass registers, but it is too thin and brittle for me in the mid and upper registers. I play it for awhile and find myself running back to the German. I wish I hadn't spent the money on it. I'm afraid that if I was playing at your church, I'd have asked for something different, too.

I'm truly glad it works for you, it's just not my cup of tea. It could be that I'm so comfortable with the German that my brain and ear associates it with the Kronos and that's what I expect hear when I sit down to play.

I've played a real Bosendorfer and I expected to love the Austrian - I wanted to love it - it just ain't happenin' for me.

One of the beauties of the Kronos is that it can satisfy the unique tastes and expectations of all of us.

wow I appreciate the respect. That's a good thing and must be earned (especially when you don't see a person face to face, but only read what they post)

Thanks alot!!!!

That was my first outing with it at my church. And I think now I will remove the Austrian samples (it did sound thin, once I got in the audience to listen to them play and sing) and I will install the German. (which was my 2nd favorite - for solo piano playing... I think the Jap cuts through the best, but the Austrian seemed to be the best equal point of the 3.

apex · Post by **apex** » Mon Jun 04, 2012 8:10 pm

jimknopf wrote:Pianos are always to a certain degree(!) a matter of taste, but besides that, I can't follow some comments at all.

From my view
- the Kronos Steinway is simply the best, richest warm piano for solo play and calm/ballad play out there, on any hardware, below one or two extremely expensive specialised stage pianos

- and the Austrian grand, while definitely not suited for the same purpose, but rather for loud band context, cutting through a mix, and rocky/jazzy expressiveness, again sounds to me like the best piano around for these purposes, definitely ahead of other well known synth piano candidates from my view

Add a little bit of intelligent use for the purpose required, using the variations of each type and/or tweaking details to your liking, and you are done and in midst of piano heaven IMO. I have kicked out the Japanese, and the Steinway and the Bosendorfer together provide ANYTHING I want and need for piano play.

You have to choose the right piano programs in the right context, else you will never be happy with any result.

with my current preload data though, I have to choose 1. I can't have two of them... and I'm sure you've seen my other thread about this: but I just can't devote anymore time to my preload file right now. I'm ready to get to some music.

MarPabl · Post by **MarPabl** » Mon Jun 04, 2012 11:12 pm

For my personal taste, my order of preference is as follows

1. German grand samples. The most "full and rich" IMHO.
2. Austrian samples. Somewhat dark IMHO.
3. Japanesse samples. Too bright for my taste IMHO.

Newsounds4kronos · Post by **Newsounds4kronos** » Mon Jun 04, 2012 11:29 pm

Hi ,
Since we are talking pianos here would anyone mind trying this patch that i programed and let me know if is any good?
I call it Austrian wanna be however I don't the Austrian on my my kronos.
Cheers
http://korgpatches.com/patches/kronos/austrian_wanna_be

RonF · Post by **RonF** » Tue Jun 05, 2012 12:10 am

MarPabl wrote:For my personal taste, my order of preference is as follows
1. German grand samples. The most "full and rich" IMHO.
2. Austrian samples. Somewhat dark IMHO.
3. Japanesse samples. Too bright for my taste IMHO.

I agree with this!

jeremykeys · Post by **jeremykeys** » Tue Jun 05, 2012 1:34 am

So far I've had the best results with the German Grand. I do admit that I haven't ever heard it with someone else playing and me standing out in the audience. Mind you I do play in a very loud rock band and the sound just pushes through effortlessly.

It's the piano sound that I always seem to gravitate to in my studio as well. I think it probably sounds the closest to the old Gulbransen upright piano I had when I was learning to play. A very rich sounding piano.

danmusician · Post by **danmusician** » Tue Jun 05, 2012 3:14 am

jimknopf wrote:Pianos are always to a certain degree(!) a matter of taste, but besides that, I can't follow some comments at all.

From my view
- the Kronos Steinway is simply the best, richest warm piano for solo play and calm/ballad play out there, on any hardware, below one or two extremely expensive specialised stage pianos

- and the Austrian grand, while definitely not suited for the same purpose, but rather for loud band context, cutting through a mix, and rocky/jazzy expressiveness, again sounds to me like the best piano around for these purposes, definitely ahead of other well known synth piano candidates from my view

Add a little bit of intelligent use for the purpose required, using the variations of each type and/or tweaking details to your liking, and you are done and in midst of piano heaven IMO. I have kicked out the Japanese, and the Steinway and the Bosendorfer together provide ANYTHING I want and need for piano play.

You have to choose the right piano programs in the right context, else you will never be happy with any result.

I find some irony in your comments. First of all, in the world of acoustic pianos, when I think Bosendorfer, I think of classical music, not loud bands, rock and jazz. Perhaps that's my problem with the Austrian, it just doesn't sound the way I expect a Bosendorfer to sound.

And while I know it to be true, I always marvel that we need multiple digital piano timbres to cover our various styles and ensembles. Kinda' makes me wonder how guys and gals survived when they had one acoustic piano to do it all!

I completely agree that the Kronos rules the digital piano world in terms timbre and palette. I found it to be better than all but the AvantGrand when it comes to digital options.

apex · Post by **apex** » Thu Jun 07, 2012 10:04 pm

has anyone tried taking some of the SGX-1 Piano presets and switching the samples out for another of the piano samples.

like taking the japanese presets and putting the german grand samples in their place? I'm asking because I'm wondering if the programming are the same in them and they just have different samples.

I was considering trying it out, but I figured I'd at least ask before I go through all the trouble.

apex · Post by **apex** » Thu Jun 07, 2012 10:22 pm

in the piano type section of SGX-1 what do the little "s" mean? is that a stereo sample?

ex: there is a: German D 1 & there is a German D 1 s

what does the "s" mean?