just uploaded a new version of the "famous" Bach prelude in C.... partly in response to a comment that I agreed with, here, too much noise and kinda 60s vintage steinway d sound, which I'm actually trying to avoid. Switched from Cakewalk to Reaper for this version. Process: played in the material (not hard in this case). Did plenty of post live entry (playing live at the keyboard-recorded in midi) in Reaper, tempo, note length, note position, and velocity.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOX8Jc2MlRE&list=PLP5BZzcdRkq21rE5SoYC33Nxltdam8TPG&index=2
The piano is HARD to record live, as most of us figure out pretty quick when we try it for the first time! That's ONE advantage of MIDI + PIANO SAMPLE.
While MIDI is tailor-made for recording sample piano, organ, harpsichord, even guitar to some extent (not so much for string instruments, reed instruments, voice, etc), the SAMPLING side is still a weak link. Some sampled organs are INDISTINGUISHABLE from live recorded organs, but the piano (and the guitar more so) has more nuances of sound, obviously.... because of the damper, the soft pedal, and all the associated nuances of sound that result from sympathetic vibrations and the infinite number of sounds you can get relative to key pressure, in combination with various damper and soft-pedal combinations. You can synth or model or sample all of those combinations, at least, not yet. But like film-making, you are using thousands of discreet photos to create the ILLUSION of movement: ditto for the sampled piano. So the end result of a good piano sample played live, or entirely via midi entry (very hard to make "realistic") is something that practically no one can distinguish from a live recording. This is especially true if you have access to Yamaha's high end midi code (I don't) and to a really convincing piano sample.
Most piano samples don't sound very much like a standard solo classical piano, or even, for that matter, like a solo jazz piano! "Orchestral Grand" Steinway D, to my ear, is about as close as you can get at the moment. American Grand is a somewhat distant 2nd, although it has many more sampled layers, and should therefore in theory sound "better."
The difference between American Grand and Orchestral Grand, in terms of TONE QUALITY, lies (I can only guess) in the mics used, their positioning relative to the piano, the acoustic space, and obviously the quality and tuning of the piano itself. OG has, I think, only four vel layers and 3 mic positions (that's 12 different "sounds" for each note of the piano). American Grand has many, many more, I think. But OG is NO FUN to play live. AG works well played live. YET--and this is the thing-- OG is much, much more realistic as a "scoring" piano.... that is... the recorded result--what you hear through your headphones or speakers (to my ears) is just a whole lot more like your average live piano recording (in any genre) than AM.
Of course, in certain very specific types of music, you can get almost ANY piano sample to sound great, which is why all of us (well me anyway) have loved, say, the online DEMOS of UVI's Bos, or Prod Grand's Yamaha, or Alicia's Keys, or Garritan, or 8deo, etc., etc., etc.. (I own most of them!!!) .......only to purchase them and discover that they just don't sound the way you thought they would!!!
