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Nord Piano 4 - which sounds would you never delete?

Postby agcohn » 23 Jun 2021, 01:14

Hi,

First time poster here. I know that this is likely a very subjective question, but I just received my Nord Piano 4 and I am looking to load some different Piano samples on here but will need to clear some space off first. Before getting in too deep, I was interested in seeing what people would consider to be the primary sounds (Grands, Uprights, EPs, Sample Layers) that you would never consider deleting. As I said, I know that this is a very subjective question, but I just wanted to hear peoples thoughts.

Also, if you replace an XL version of a Piano with an L or M, does the smaller version automatically replace the XL in any existing programs?

Thanks for everybody's input!

-Alex
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Nord Piano 4 - which sounds would you never delete?


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Re: Nord Piano 4 - which sounds would you never delete?

Postby FZiegler » 23 Jun 2021, 01:51

Hi Alex,

congrats to your instrument! Very nice one.

There are plenty of discussions about the best piano sound, best EP sound, the best samples sizes etc. Just not in the Piano subforum. Search terms are "favorite", "best sound" or "most-used".

You will find that there are recommendations which have a little more supporters than others. And which are widely spread. To the upright pianos, too. 'Cause mostly it'll be a thing up to yourself to find the sound the most appropriate for your music and your amplification system.

And you will find that some people switch their favourite piano sound every 2-3 years.

You might e.g. save all your sounds and programs and then delete all sounds and test through the library up and down. Or whatever you want. You can restore them afterwards.

There is a way to replace one sample with another - inside Nord Sound Manager. The function is called "substitute".
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Re: Nord Piano 4 - which sounds would you never delete?

Postby cphollis » 23 Jun 2021, 02:28

Give yourself the time to roll the different samples on and off. I consider XL samples special purpose (very detailed recordings). L is good for most recording and acoustic level stuff, and I use M with a live band, as no one will ever know the difference. If you're evaluating samples, M size samples work fine for me. And you can get a whole bunch of them loaded up on the NP4.

In my world, the one sample I can't live without is the White Piano. Great general purpose piano that sits in many mixes quite well.
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Re: Nord Piano 4 - which sounds would you never delete?

Postby Gambold » 23 Jun 2021, 04:17

I'll propose a contrary - you should load the largest files of the pianos your memory can hold. This may mean only 2 or 3 XLs (I don't know the memory of the P4, but that's about it for the E6).

My reasoning is that while in live performance the audience can't tell an M from an L from an XL, you will spend FAR more time playing the piano alone, often with headphones. You might as well have the richest sample possible to truly evaluate it. If you load up your piano with 12 M samples...well, you're never going to give them all equal time and so most of them will sit there eating memory and doing little else.

So by example - load the XL of the White, Silver and Royal Grand, and work those to death. Find which one(s) you really like, then dump the others and load more and do it again. By the time you are finished you will have a small group of grands that are totally ear-tested and that you know work with your sounds. Personally I would recommend ignoring any of the Grand samples that don't have an XL version...possibly with the exception of the Grand Lady D.

You can do the same with uprights and the EPs too, although the EPs don't take up much memory, so I think most people load all of them on there and then just use a couple. Some of them are ok, some of them are not - you'll find that out on your own. For the uprights, you really just need one or two, and even after extensive ear-testing you're never going to use them much. But it's nice to have something in that category on your board.
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Re: Nord Piano 4 - which sounds would you never delete?

Postby agcohn » 25 Jun 2021, 02:49

Gambold wrote:So by example - load the XL of the White, Silver and Royal Grand, and work those to death. Find which one(s) you really like, then dump the others and load more and do it again. By the time you are finished you will have a small group of grands that are totally ear-tested and that you know work with your sounds. Personally I would recommend ignoring any of the Grand samples that don't have an XL version...possibly with the exception of the Grand Lady D.

You can do the same with uprights and the EPs too, although the EPs don't take up much memory, so I think most people load all of them on there and then just use a couple. Some of them are ok, some of them are not - you'll find that out on your own. For the uprights, you really just need one or two, and even after extensive ear-testing you're never going to use them much. But it's nice to have something in that category on your board.

I took this advise and loaded the Royal Grand 3D XL, White Grand XL, Silver Grand XL and Bambino XL for comparison. Tested using both the Nord Piano Monitors and my headpones (Oppo PM-3 closed-back).

I definitely love the sound of the Silver Grand the most so far, though I can see how it could clash with other instruments in some situations. The Royal Grand is also beautiful, if a little subdued, but it does seem like it stands up better with other mixes, so that one also seems to be a keeper, though maybe worth trying the L size as well.

I'm having a little harder time with the White Grand XL. It definitely has a beautiful tone, but I also feel like it has too much resonance / ringing going on between the notes (even with String Resonance turned off strangely). Haven't had time to test the L size, but maybe worth trying out.

The Bambino is an odd one, as I definitely prefer the sound of the Grands, however of all of the samples I tested, the Bambino feels the most "familiar" to me and I know that my Grandmother used to have a Baldwin in her family room, though I don't think it's the same model.
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Re: Nord Piano 4 - which sounds would you never delete?

Postby Gambold » 25 Jun 2021, 06:13

It's easy to obsess on the Nord samples, and spend way too much time trying to find the "best." They are all generally good and a few of them are excellent. Popular opinion on this board tends to favor the most recent ones...I remember when the Imperial and the Italian were being praised to the skies and now nobody talks about those anymore. When the Royal Grand came out it was like everyone died and went to heaven, but now the White is the front-runner - although there has been some discussion on its flaws.

There is no perfect one - I personally have stuck with the Bright for just about everything, even though I can see that the Silver is probably richer. I really tried to like the Velvet but it took too much EQ to sound good and IMHO you shouldn't have to EQ a good acoustic sample at all. The Royal Grand is a headphone sample, and the rest of them are ten years old. Hopefully we get a new one soon! It's never enough...
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Re: Nord Piano 4 - which sounds would you never delete?

Postby jb1979 » 02 Jul 2021, 22:42

Hi Alex

As other said all sounds are replaceable / recoverable, so try all of them!

Nord's philosophy is to keep the flaws from instruments they sample, so that it sounds more like a real instrument. Also they often sample "wrong" instruments to start with. As a result most of their instruments are "character instruments", not archetypal or standard instruments.
In my opinion, this is good, and bad. I would really like to also have a normal concert grand piano (about 275 cm), for example. I am not talking about a sterile or lifeless instrument, actually just the opposite: a good one that works for everything (as top acoustic pianos do, when they are tuned and voiced correctly)

Fortunately it is still possible to have a single piano, a single Rhodes and a single Wurlitzer that work for quite everything. Of course I filled the memory with as many sounds as possible, but I like to use few pianos. At a particular concert or recording session, most of the time I choose one piano, one Rhodes and one Wurlitzer (and I rarely need them three)
Here are my choices, totally subjective of course

GRAND PIANO
The only two that have a normal sound and (more importantly) are balanced across the 88 keys are the Yamaha S4 "Bright Grand" and the Fazioli 212 "Italian Grand". These are not my favorite piano sounds (I prefer concert grand pianos), but they are both rather neutral and can be used for almost any kind of music. Frankly, I don't like the Bright Grand bass register when played fortissimo (too tacky), and its timbre does not change enough when playing soft or hard; likewise, I would have liked the Italian Grand to be more metallic (more harmonics) when playing very hard. But still, these are the only two that I am sure would never cause any problem on any track.
Here is why I discarded the others for this purpose:
- Grand Imperial: this is the best sounding one in my opinion, unfortunately the mid-high range is very muffled and (worse) the top range is, conversely, very bright (not sure how there exists a Bösendorfer 290 voiced this way but that's another story)
- White Grand: very muffled and boomy bass, sounds very veiled and unclear (medium and top registers are good though, if you can accept its spooky pianissimo sound and resonances)
- Royal Grand: overly muffled, and suited to headphones only
- Velvet Grand: not enough sustain, plus other problems I don't remember
- Silver Grand: sounds too much as if it was processed into a tube amplifier, with a mid-high "woooo" sound
- Grand Lady D: a bit too muffled, except the top range which is too bright

RHODES -- Disclaimer: I have a NP4 which is really not good for Rhodes playing, but I would still choose the EP4 (MK V) and EP8 (Nefertiti). I need a great bass sound on the Rhodes because I often use it to play bass parts as played by electric bass guitar or double bass, so on the EP4 I add some bass with the EQ. The Nefertiti is less enjoyable to play on the NP4, but I am pretty sure it is way better on a Nord Stage. For all Rhodes, on the NP4 I have to put the velocity curve at 3 so that it is closer to playing an actual Rhodes, which limits dynamics unfortunately. I am pretty sure the samples were tuned for a Nord Stage 3.
About the others:
- EP1 and EP7: too belly for me (not my style) + weak bass that "farts" instead of "barking"
- EP2: should have been very good, if not the best of all, unfortunately the mid-high register is surprisingly weak (lacks volume and fundamental harmonic)
- EP3: not my way of voicing a Rhodes (but some friends love it)
- EP5: I was never a fan of Dyno Rhodes, so I have no idea but it looks like they did it right
- EP6: very good medium and high register, unfortunately the bass sounds like a weird kalimba / double-bass hybrid; I still use it sometimes

WURLITZER: I like both but I use #2 now

All the best
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Re: Nord Piano 4 - which sounds would you never delete?

Postby agcohn » 02 Jul 2021, 23:51

I have not tried all of the pianos yet, but so far I have been gravitating toward the Grand Imperial (seems best for Rock/Pop/Broadway music) and Silver Grand (more Classical/Jazzy music).

I haven't really tried any of the EPs other than just scrolling through them quickly.
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