Little Red Toy Piano
A wonderful toy piano from grandma's attic. Recorded with two velocity layers and five round robins.
ByBelaZee
The story
One day I found a little red toy piano in the attic of my grandmas house. I played on it almost every time when I visited her, because there werenβt many other things to do. And now, five or six years later I sampled it to maybe make music with it at home. I placed the mic very near the instrument to get all those beautiful sounds from the keys, and recorded every note 5 times to make round robins, and in two different velocities. I made knobs in the performance view to control reverb, delay, cutoff, saturation, attack and the volume of the releases.
I hope you enjoy it π
Reviews
Well sampled toy piano
This is a lovely morsel of childhood sound, masterfully recorded in exquisite detail. The delay multiplies the tone into a maze of mysterious echoes without overwhelming the senses while the lovely main tone playfully pings about. Equally at home in underscores for the abduction of children and creepy demonic possession of the young, it also works great in happy-go-lucky children's music. So well done!
Super fun toy piano
This is pretty much what a standard toy piano library should sound like in my head. It sounds a little too "perfect" to my ears, but aesthetically that's a very useful tool to have in your production / compositional arsenal. The formant / body of this instrument is surprisingly prominent in the sampleset and that gives it a nice bit of character to stick out in the middle of a mix without being aggressive or touchy. My biggest critique is that while it feels correct / akin to sort of how a midi instrument should trigger, it has a little bit of a step into the uncanny valley to me as a performer because sort of the throw / weight in timing of the keys is lightning quick and on point. I've started to occasionally collect and pass on these instruments in both real life and in the sampling domain and something I've grown to value more in the real deal is the difficulty and inconsistency to play most of the ones you encounter as they've gone through generational rigors of children or cheap quality control processes, this instrument isn't as much of a toy to me as it is a great tool.
A Melodious Masterpiece
This charming instrument is more than just a plaything; it's a gateway to a world of musical expression and creative exploration.