Frank Posted May 10, 2023 Share Posted May 10, 2023 https://www.strezov-sampling.com/products/view/the-creative-toolbox-piano.html The Creative ToolboX: Steinway Grand Piano The second part of our Anniversary Freebie Collection: A Steinway Grand Piano sampled in a cinematic hall with 3 microphone positions Powered by Native Instruments' FREE Kontakt Player - Full version supported, but not required. requires free Native Instruments Kontakt Player Version 7.0.11+ or full Native Instruments Kontakt Version 7.0.11+ Available for download and installation directly via Native Access Approx. 8 GB Hard drive space (~4.0 GB for the archived files and ~4.0 GB for the unzipped library) Min. of 2GB RAM 6 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jngnz Posted May 10, 2023 Share Posted May 10, 2023 To my surprise, this is actually pretty good. One of the best free pianos for sure. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fleer Posted May 10, 2023 Share Posted May 10, 2023 Nice, nice, nice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PavlovsCat Posted May 10, 2023 Share Posted May 10, 2023 Sounds nice for a freebie. But there's nothing really special about it, IMO. Just a related thought. One of the giant differences from the pre-digital world. I grew up with one acoustic piano and one electric piano (a Wurlitzer) and that seemed awesome. Okay, then I went and played a Steinway D and a Yamaha Grand and was envious, but overall, stil very grateful to have a piano and electric piano (and lots of other physical instruments). But in the current digital era, I have more than three dozen detailed sample piano libraries and still have several on my wish list. It never ends and my collection is modest compared to some others here. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul P Posted May 11, 2023 Share Posted May 11, 2023 1 hour ago, PavlovsCat said: Sounds nice for a freebie. But there's nothing really special about it, IMO. ... But in the current digital era, I have more than three dozen detailed sample piano libraries and still have several on my wish list. It never ends and my collection is modest compared to some others here. I also have a bunch of soft pianos and only one of them gives me the impression of playing a real one, Embertone's Walker 1955 Concert D. When I play it with headphones and the Binaural Perspective it's uncanny. I swear I can feel my Nektar LX88+'s keys vibrating under my fingetips just like when I played the console piano I dragged around since my early childhood till just a few years ago. All my other soft pianos just sound badly recorded with uneven notes and unatural perspective. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PavlovsCat Posted May 11, 2023 Share Posted May 11, 2023 5 minutes ago, Paul P said: I also have a bunch of soft pianos and only one of them gives me the impression of playing a real one, Embertone's Walker 1955 Concert D. When I play it with headphones and the Binaural Perspective it's uncanny. I swear I can feel my Nektar LX88+'s keys vibrating under my fingetips just like when I played the console piano I dragged around since my early childhood till just a few years ago. All my other soft pianos just sound badly recorded with uneven notes and unatural perspective. I love the Embertone Walker 1955 Concert D too (okay, I have the lite version, but it's so good, I'm not compelled to upgrade it; but if you have a compelling reason to offer why I should, I'm certainly open to it), but I still find NI's Noire, made by Galaxy, is my absolute favorite piano library and the piano library I find most inspiring of all. I have pretty bad tendinitis and can't play very well as a result of that and many years of not practicing, but when I play Noire, I feel I am playing better than on any other library because I'm so inspired. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul P Posted May 11, 2023 Share Posted May 11, 2023 42 minutes ago, PavlovsCat said: I love the Embertone Walker 1955 Concert D too (okay, I have the lite version, but it's so good, I'm not compelled to upgrade it; but if you have a compelling reason to offer why I should, I'm certainly open to it), but I still find NI's Noire, made by Galaxy, is my absolute favorite piano library and the piano library I find most inspiring of all. I have no experience with Noire so can't compare. One thing I forgot to mention about the binaural recording is that the sound moves with your fingers just like on a real piano which is a big part of the realism. 36 velocity levels doesn't hurt either. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruno de Souza Lino Posted May 11, 2023 Share Posted May 11, 2023 If I got a dollar for every Piano library which always samples a Steinway, I could buy a Bösendorfer 290 Imperial Grand, have it fitted with the Disklavier system and have a technician shipped from Germany to have it tuned and setup for me. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fleer Posted May 11, 2023 Share Posted May 11, 2023 Embertone Walker 1955 (full) is still the best sampled Steinway in my collection. Noire is a Yamaha C7 if I remember well. Great for sound design, but I prefer the 300 Grand from ProductionVoices for that typical Yamaha sound (albeit a CFX). Best sampled grand overall IMO is still Bechstein’s Digital Grand, although I also love Wavesfactory Mercury (Fazioli) and ImpactSoundworks Pearl. Meanwhile, anxiously waiting for OrangeTreeSamples to update their Rosewood Grand. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PavlovsCat Posted May 11, 2023 Share Posted May 11, 2023 (edited) 1 hour ago, Fleer said: Embertone Walker 1955 (full) is still the best sampled Steinway in my collection. Noire is a Yamaha C7 if I remember well. Great for sound design, but I prefer the 300 Grand from ProductionVoices for that typical Yamaha sound (albeit a CFX). Best sampled grand overall IMO is still Bechstein’s Digital Grand, although I also love Wavesfactory Mercury (Fazioli) and ImpactSoundworks Pearl. Meanwhile, anxiously waiting for OrangeTreeSamples to update their Rosewood Grand. I love Production Voices piano libraries. I know I've heard them in the past, but I'll recheck the Bechstein and Pearl. I'm also eager for the Rosewood Grand update. I did fall in love with a Yamaha grand piano as a kid and even preferred its bright tone over a Steinway (I took piano and organ lessons and my mother was a music teacher and played professionally and her studio also sold pianos and organs, so I was able to play on them from time to time), so I'm eager for that Rosewood update. Candidly, I don't know how to make a great piano preset, so presets for piano libraries are pretty significant to me. That's one of the great bonuses with the Famous E (electric piano for those who don't know), it has more excellent presets than probably any other piano or electric piano library I own. While this piano freebie from Sterzov sounds good, there's only one preset and I really wish there was more (my mindset is that the developer is or works with people with expert skills for making presets; I'm happy to rely on their skills and focus on playing and arranging songs). Edited May 11, 2023 by PavlovsCat 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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