NAMM 2009Scarbee join forces with Alicia Keys to create virtual piano for Kontakt - Alicia's Keys

American R&B and soul singer-songwriter, pianist, producer and actress Alicia Keys and Scarbee, have joined forces and created a virtual piano software with the obvious name: Alicia's Keys.

In late summer Alicia, Grammy Award winning engineer Ann Mincielli and Thomas Hansen Skarbye (Scarbee) set out on a quest to create a virtual piano of Alicia's favourite piano - recorded in the Oven Studios in NY. By using the premium vintage microphones and preamps and carefully analyzing Alicia's playing they say they succeeded in getting a very warm, soulful and inspiring sound - fun to play. Together with Kontakt script wizard Nils Liberg and through advanced programming and editing they say they have been able to recreate the action and tonal behaviour into what is almost a carbon copy of the piano.

"I feel confident that we came up with the best Virtual Piano you've ever heard and I am excited to Introduce it to you! Thomas and Nils are a Brilliant Team!", says Alicia Keys.

Alicia Keys has sold more than 30 million albums worldwide and has won 11 Grammy Awards, 17 Billboard Music Awards, 5 American Music Awards, and recently she received the People's Choice Award for Favorite R&B Song for "No One"!

Features:

• The sound of Alicia Keys' composer piano - recorded in her own studio.
• Pedal Up: 12 velocities + 2 extra generated soft velocities.
• Pedal Down: 11 velocities + 3 extra generated soft velocities.
• Key Release (staccato): 10 velocities.
• Pedal Up Mechanical Release noises for each of the 88 keys.
• Pedal Down Mechanical Release noises for each of the 88 keys.
• Pedal Down Noise - sound of pedal being pressed down.
• Pedal Up Noise - sound of pedal released.
• Sostenuto pedal support.
• Sympathetic resonance - notes generate harmonics in other undampened strings.
• Adjustable sample start offset - tweak balance between low latency and key hit noise.
• Adjustable Microphone noise for old-school sound.
• EQ and Effect Presets - direct in the instrument user interface.
• Integrated documentation for all settings - direct in the instrument user interface.
• More features will be added on release.

Pricing & Availability

Alicia's Keys will be released and distributed by the artist herself (i.e. it is NOT a Scarbee product) and is expected to ship in Q2 - 2009. More information will be available from www.aliciakeys.com.