The story
I discovered this Weber piano as it was just abandoned in the main room of a guest house in Somerset earlier this year. It probably dates back to the 1930s/50s and was just sitting there…
I literally had about 5 min to sample it as we were leaving like “now!”
I placed my tried and trusted Zoom H4Npro inside the main frame, using the wide mic’ing position, which worked well to capture both the intimacy of the piano and its resonance in that large and beautiful room.
I strive for ‘expressive sounds’ which (I guess! )does not mean “technically correct” or “exhaustively sampled” in all cases. I suppose this is a good illustration… 🙂
BUT…
The result: It is noisy, slightly out of tune but it has this character that I cannot really find elsewhere … with just 8 samples. Happy to share this with the community
Compatible with Kontakt 5.8 and above, it comes with my own personal presets which you can hear on the demo.
Enjoy !
—
NOTE: The demo links are in the text file but just in case:
* YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07Fd38qpSIc
* SOUNDCLOUD: https://soundcloud.com/guigzgart/free-download-gza-somerset-piano-demo
Reviews for GZA Somerset Soft Piano
- Sound
- Character
- Playability
- Inspiration
- GUI
Leave a review to let others know what you thought of the instrument!
Dusty Charm
Considering this was recorded in a 5 min window this is a job well done, in fact the time constraint has given it its own charm!
The harsh attack takes away the softness...
It has a very distinct attack that doesn't make it that soft to me. The tail of the sample is quite soft though, can't deny that. The long lasting samples have some slight background noises but it's not a big deal. The GUI provides ADSR, Hold and Reverb controls which are always welcome.
A Warm, if slightly uneven, piano
This piano has a very and gentle character. It's well recorded with minimal noise, but there's only one dynamic layer, so it's not particularly expressive nor responsive. There is a certain amount of mismatch timbrally, sonically, and dynamically from zone to zone. Each zone spans one octave. The editing is really superb, though. I love how tight the editing is. there's no wishy-washy attacks here. It's great! The reverb control seems to be malfunctioning. It doesn't seem to have any effect on the sound whatsoever. Despite these minor issues, this is a solid piano that will serve well and might just qualify as perfect in some circumstances!
Interesting sound but could have used deeper sampling
I completely understand that you had a time constraint and couldn't sample this piano more deeply but this is really a deal breaker for me. With just one dynamic layer i would never reach for this while working on a project. Its a shame because while i usually use darker more cinematic felt pianos, this one has that super old fashioned chorus sound that you dont hear often in libraries. It has a really interesting attack in the higher notes you also dont hear often but because alot of these samples are pitch stretched, you dont get any variation between the notes. Its a shame you didn't have more time to sample this more deeply because i think the sound itself is really awesome and unique
