I was thinking lately how much the string resonance in a piano sounds kind of like a kind of gated reverb, with the damper pedal muting and unmuting it as it goes up and down.

With this in mind I added reverb to a Splendid Grand conversion where both the send and return are gated from the damper pedal. To my ears it sounds pretty darned convincing - much better than the sampled resonance layers that all the Gigastudio pianos use.

Has anyone else tried this? It's a little tricky to set up, but boy does it sound good.

Laurence Kingston

Yes, I've been doing just that in my Kurzweil K2500 with the ROM piano (which needs all the help it can get,although it was considered a pretty good piano sound when the machine first came out). Because the built-in effects are completely parametrable via MIDI, I'd even programmed the reverb in such a way that its "controller off" settings sort of emulate a typical small room, and then when I press the sustain pedal, it grows into that cavernous halo so reminiscent of the piano's dampers being released. It is great that it is now possible to do this kind of thing in Soft:-). I only have the demo version of Kontakt (version 1), but it does keep tempting me! . Are you using its internal reverb? What host do you use?

I am using the built-in reverb. It's the only one I can gate from controller 64. Kontakt has a master settings option that allows you to use controller 64 as a controller as well as a damper pedal. This needs to be set. There is a speed control which needs a moderate setting so that you don't hear a click as the reverb gets punched in and out. I gate both the send and return so that when I press the damper pedal I don't get residual reverb from the last notes played. Only one controller can be assigned to the effects return and it can't be scaled. Since controlling controller 64 from a damper pedal is either 0 or 127, I adjust the level by attenuating the reverb in. It's a compromise but sounds fine with such a subtle effect. A scaleable assignable controller would be better though if any Native Instruments Techs are reading this.

When I first heard a Gigasampler piano with a damper pedal resonance layer I was really impressed. As I tried to play it though I grew to hate it. While one or two notes switched between dry and resonance layer recordings sounds quite good, two hand piano parts have so much added resonance that they just sound muddy. To my ears the damper pedal switched and gated reverb sounds MUCH better with actual piano style playing.

Laurence Kingston

Hmmm...got me thinking:-)...
There is an Impulse Response for Altiverb (I'm on Mac), of a Bösendorfer Grand's resonating strings...I might just be able to use a MIDI input transformer in parallel with a "normal" MIDI track in Cubase to automate the reverb send/return (and also, if possible, reverb *length*, see below) from the sustain pedal..I'll let you know if I succeed and if the result isn't total crap:-))
The advantage of the Zurzweil's reverb, where in fact I used cc#64=0 to also almost completely shorten the reverb length in addition to reducing the return and muting the send, is that when I once again "opened" the reverb, the previous tail had already gone, whereas by merely gating send and return, the previous tail could still be present. The Altiverb, which has very few controls, does have a "length" parameter, but I don't know (yet!) if I can control it from MIDI in realtime while doing all the rest. Gonna be a fun weekend!)

Update:
I don't think automating a Send Effect via MIDI is going to be possible in Cubase (VST Instruments can be controlled by MIDI, but VST *effects* work differently)...I'd have to declare my MIDI keyboard ( for its sustain pedal) as a "Generic VST Remote", which could then control the necessary parameters , but then Cubase would no longer see my MIDI keyboard for anything else...which would rather defeat the object...I guess I could always do a "Sustain Pedal Solo"!!

Does changing the reverb time raise the pitch of the reverberated sound all ready playing? Gating the ins and outs works pretty well though I can see were in theory it might not. I don't believe I'm using a long enough delay setting for this to really be an issue. It would be cool to have other ways to do this effect though.

Laurence Kingston

No it doesn't change the pitch...it is not like changing the delay time, more akin I suppose to changing feedback...if it doesn't alter the pitch when you change the reverb length manully, there is no reason for it to alter the pitch when you do so via MIDI. If you are using the reverb in Kontakt the way I think you are, then just try in addition to your actual settings, putting cc#64 as MIDI remote on the the "Size" knob (a pity though that pressing the pedal sends reverb size right up to maximum). I've just tried it myself, and managed to get it to sound quite reasonable with the send level at about "11 o'clock" when the pedal is pressed.