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Re: Nord Grand, customizable velocity curves?

Postby SimonIsHere » 27 Feb 2021, 01:22

So basically it sounds like i can hit a note that gives 100% volume, 75%, 50% or 25%, so it is very hard to make it act like an acoustic piano. I know it isnt a acoustic piano, but having a note reacting to the way one actually press the key should be the first focus area for people making digital pianos.
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Re: Nord Grand, customizable velocity curves?


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Re: Nord Grand, customizable velocity curves?

Postby baekgaard » 27 Feb 2021, 01:54

SimonIsHere wrote:I disagree with your last sentence - and as far as i am aware then velocity is speed and these 3 curves are digitally made. On a piano you have endless combinations


A real piano only have one "curve". It will sound the same whenever it is hit by the same level of energy. A different sound needs a different energy level.

If you could adjust eg the weight of the keys, you could change the curve - but I haven't seen any acoustic pianos that allow this.



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Re: Nord Grand, customizable velocity curves?

Postby FZiegler » 27 Feb 2021, 02:01

MIDI has 128 different velocity levels - which is more than 75%, 50% and 25% of max. volume. I think, internally the Grand has as many steps. That's different from sonic levels - there are a handful ranges or two with different sound character (depends on the piano sample); probably those steps are audible.

If we talk about velocity curves, we only talk about volume, not sound character. The latter is programmed within the samples and cannot be set by any velocity curve.
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Re: Nord Grand, customizable velocity curves?

Postby baekgaard » 27 Feb 2021, 02:24

SimonIsHere wrote:So basically it sounds like i can hit a note that gives 100% volume, 75%, 50% or 25%, so it is very hard to make it act like an acoustic piano. I know it isnt a acoustic piano, but having a note reacting to the way one actually press the key should be the first focus area for people making digital pianos.
Of course the Nord should react to changes in how hard you play. How sound varies with different levels is indeed controlled by the curve, but what you talk about sound more like a problem with resolution - ie how large a change is needed to make a perceptible change in sound.

The Nord (and many other Midi instruments) divide the velocity into 127 different values. It is not a linear curve, and let's just simplify a bit and pretend there were 100 values - so the lowest velocity would be at 1% and the largest at 100%.

The Nord will then sound differently between 1% and 2%, between 2% and 3%, etc.

Different curves will not change how it sounds at the 1% level nor at the 100% level. But at light, the sound you hear when played at eg 30% level may be similar to what you hear at hard when played at eg 70% level.

Now, the Nord uses samples of a real instrument. Every key is sampled at a number of different velocities. We don't know how many levels, but for some I've measured (look for posts on this 3+ years ago) we have at least 10+ different sounds for one key.

So it may play the same sample between 1% and 10%, and then another from 11% to 20%, etc. BUT the volume changes between 1% and 2%, even if the sample (think timbre) is not.

So there are 127 different sounds, all at varying volume levels and with somewhat different timbres.

This is something that you can measure (and I have).

Now, on a real piano, the dynamic range varies from instrument to instrument. Some may have a large range from ppp to fff than others.

Electronic instruments often have the dynamic range limited somewhat - they are often used in a context where that is more meaningful.

The Nord has a dynamic range of at least 30 dB, if I remember right. I think that is sufficient and quite reasonable.

If your Nord only has 4 levels of sound, it's very different from mine then - if I understood what you said correctly? You should be able to hear many more volume difference and also timbre changes.



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Re: Nord Grand, customizable velocity curves?

Postby Mr_-G- » 27 Feb 2021, 14:26

The NS2 has 4 curves (all lights off is the "default" curve).
If you cannot hear when playing with very low velocity, perhaps the volume is too low? How are you amplifying it?
Also check that you do not have the Compressor effect engaged.
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Re: Nord Grand, customizable velocity curves?

Postby SimonIsHere » 01 Mar 2021, 23:19

Let me state it like this: I will feel way richer returning it than I felt poor buying it.

I understand the need of it for some purposes, but recording cant be one of them. The sound and the way if responses to you has nothing to do with a piano, but its keys feel very nice honestly.
I will be back in 20 years to see how far the big players has come in order to make the sound of an acoustic piano in a digital solution. Thank you for your answers guys :)
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Re: Nord Grand, customizable velocity curves?

Postby Superlocrian » 21 Apr 2021, 19:11

Actually created an account in the forum to post in this thread.

Long time piano player (25+ yrs, not a pro though). I had a Nord Stage 3 SP76, and "upgraded" to a grand. The velocity curves of the instrument are driving me insane, as mentioned before, heavy is too muddy, light is just too hard and medium is weird, if I apply a bit more strength to a key it sounds as if I'm hitting it with a hammer. This is specially noticeable in the amped electric pianos, where accenting will peak super highly. EQ'ing to remove some of those high pitches works a bit but it's definitely not ideal, I think controlling the velocity curve of a patch, even through the Nord Software would be *huge* (eg: customizing what heavy/light/medium means for a specific patch), but if that's not possible, then adjusting it for the whole instrument would be the next best thing. I am quite disappointed by my experience here :(

Also, earlier in the post a hardware midi solution to adjust curves was suggested, I was wondering if I can use this solution if I'm not controlling my grand with another keyboard (like route the midi out of the grand into the hardware velocity box, and the output back into the grand)?

Thanks
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Re: Nord Grand, customizable velocity curves?

Postby samfx » 24 Apr 2021, 12:05

Hi,

I'm considering a a Nord Grand so I've been reading many reviews and opinions.

One of the users, a pianist, said that the Kawai keyboard in the NG feels really good, however, he felt that the Nord samples did not do it justice (too compressed / not enough velocity levels / etc).

However, when he hooked it up to a computer and used it to control piano VIs, he was blown away by how expressive the keyboard control could actually be.

Unfortunately I can't remember where I read that review, but would really like to know if anyone else here feels the same way?

If that's true, I wouldn't mind at all since the characteristic of the onboard sounds should work very well in a live/stage setting, and when I'm in the studio or at home I could use it with an external instrument (VI or h/w) and make full use of its keyboard capabilities - What do you think?

Thanks!
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Re: Nord Grand, customizable velocity curves?

Postby devidasa » 28 Aug 2021, 17:17

I'm contemplating the same "issues". I love my NG in many ways, but I'm often frustrated by the velocity curves for the samples. So, I'm researching if someone can customize the velocity curve of individual piano samples. Seems you cannot. I may move away from the internal sounds for home playing in favor of VIs with velocity customization. If I could go back in time, I would not buy the NG. It's good, no doubt, but for the price, no way. I wish I had bought the Kawai ES920.
Last edited by devidasa on 29 Aug 2021, 04:34, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Nord Grand, customizable velocity curves?

Postby ziozeus » 04 Sep 2021, 09:06

Customizing (point per point ala pianoteq) the velocity curves for a piano-centric instrument should be a must for any brand. Period. Maybe with an external software interface... Whatever. Instead, even Yamaha has made a step backward in this regard from cp4 to cp88 to follow nord's philosophy. Kawai has some more options but not fully satisfying (I could work with an hex editor anyway with my mp7se to obtain what I wanted)
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