Guilherme Carvalho’s Reviews

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  A vast hammered instrument

  Really excellent sounds in here, you get all the noisiness of a piano's insides and the very sharp toy instruments. The fact that this is actually two libraries and that the authors extended the original recorded notes to cover the whole keyboard is an added bonus.
  Given how noisy and unconventional the material is, this can be surprisingly clear for harmonic content - but also just brutal if you wish it to be.

  It's a must-have even if you use it sparingly.

  ECHORDA

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  Pristine percussions

  This library sounds really good, and one of its appeals for me is how much you can hear the mechanics and uniqueness of the sound production: the hand mutes each note differently, the hammer noises are not the same in different registers, the natural resonance of the original instrument responds to each note in its own way.
  Of course, it would be nice to have more samples per note (round robins and velocities) but this instrument can feel very much alive already.

  Yamaha Palm Mutes

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  Epic to hear and exciting to use

  This is probably the only collection of braaams I'll be using from now on: great sounds, immense variety within a single instrument interface, tremolo and saturation sound excellent. What an amazing project from an amazing community.

  World’s Biggest BRAAAM

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  Very good deranged and noisy piano

  I always like a deformed / deconstructed instrument, and The Gaffer is really good at being that. Sound is excellent throughout, with a nice stereo image that puts you very close to the piano. The variety of release noises was the highlight for me, together with the different mics.

  Two minor points: when repeating a note, the release sound gets progressively louder (even with no change to velocity). I actually liked and used that, but it's a bit weird. Also, FX1 and FX2 could use names - they're easy enough to understand, but it's always nice to have a specification.

  All in all a great pack.

  The Gaffer

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  In a good place between piano and harp

  It's always a good idea to go sticking your nose inside your instrument, and this pack does just that. It's got a good and precise sound on the whole range. It can sometimes sound like a hit string, instead of a plucked one, if there's too much happennig at once, I believe because we go back to thinking about a "regular" piano if the musical gestures are pianistic.
  The main cutoff control has a lot more impact on the sound character than I expected, which was an excellent surprise. Almost two different instruments if you tweak that and the release time.

  I had two small issues: the reverb was always on, because of a wrong index in the xml file (binding of the labeled-knob was pointing to the wrong effect). And since I was using a lot of repeated notes, the strict round-robin made cycles appear where I didn't want them. Both were very easily fixed by changing those details in the file.

  All in all, a very nice pack with some sounds you really don't find everywhere.

  1930s Wurlitzer Upright Plucks

Permanently delete review of A New Chapter with Pianobook