KVR Audio

koorby · Post by **koorby** » Tue Apr 20, 2004 6:50 am

I am currently using Splendid Grand, which is a SoundFont (.SF2) format multi-sampled grand piano in 72MB and 128MB versions. I got it here: http://www.soundcreationsinc.com/splendid/

Apart from flawed stereo mapping, it's the best free acoustic piano I have found on the net.

Anyone found anything better? (And I don't mean 600MB or 2Gig sample files, hehe!)

phatman · Post by **phatman** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 12:39 am

URL REMOVED

It's gig but it is about 70 mb.

Markleford · Post by **Markleford** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 1:44 am

Koorby wrote:I am currently using Splendid Grand, [...] Apart from flawed stereo mapping, it's the best free acoustic piano I have found on the net.

It also has some distorted notes in the upper range at certain velocities... Though I still use it on everything!

Don't know what would make "the best", but Splendid suits my taste in piano sound quite nicely.

- m

Jeremy_NSL · Post by **Jeremy_NSL** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 1:55 am

well there is the 256mb version of splendid grand that used to be on akai's ftp site. not sure if its available anymore now..

and there is also the maestro grand sf2 - sounds pretty good.

snooky · Post by **snooky** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 1:58 am

what about strings??

PeterL · Post by **PeterL** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 10:27 am

floyd wrote:and there is also the maestro grand sf2 - sounds pretty good.

Link please !

TrumpCard · Post by **TrumpCard** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 11:09 am

The Maestro is disappointing because notes cut off if you hold them for a few seconds sharply and I have not found a way to fix this yet

PeterL · Post by **PeterL** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 11:17 am

TrumpCard wrote:The Maestro is disappointing because notes cut off if you hold them for a few seconds sharply and I have not found a way to fix this yet

OK, no link required anymore from my side.

Markleford wrote:It also has some distorted notes in the upper range at certain velocities

Splendid Piano is great !! I didn't find any distorted notes. Could it be that you have clipped the audio output ?

soundcreations · Post by **soundcreations** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 12:27 pm

It also has some distorted notes in the upper range at certain velocities

I think these are in C7 to Eb7 range.
Actually it seems that these are artifacts in the actual recordings.

If anyone is interested in the 256mb version I could possibly put it on our site. A CD with the soundfonts would not be out of the question if there is some interest. Just contact me.

you can currently get the 136mb and 72mb versions here:
http://www.soundcreationsinc.com/splendid/

Best,

Paulie Phonick · Post by **Paulie Phonick** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 1:06 pm

Try Sampletank Free + FreePiano - sounds better to me than all of the freeware soundfonts I tried, including Splendid Grand. Don't forget about the online registration (free) if you try STfree, as it won't allow you to set more than 6 voices of polyphony before you register.

http://www.sampletank.com/Main.html?STFreeDw

There are also some other nice sounds on the page, including strings and a Piano+Strings instrument.

aMUSEd · Post by **aMUSEd** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 1:44 pm

Paulie Phonick wrote:Try Sampletank Free + FreePiano - sounds better to me than all of the freeware soundfonts I tried, including Splendid Grand.

I couldn't disagree more - it put me off from buying Sampletank at a time when I was considering it.

soundcreations wrote:If anyone is interested in the 256mb version I could possibly put it on our site. A CD with the soundfonts would not be out of the question if there is some interest. Just contact me.

yes please. I have been using the smaller version myself, though at the moment I use a customised version of the free Bosendorfer Kontakt patch that came with Future Music or something.

Markleford · Post by **Markleford** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 1:53 pm

PeterL wrote:
Markleford wrote:It also has some distorted notes in the upper range at certain velocities
Splendid Piano is great !! I didn't find any distorted notes. Could it be that you have clipped the audio output ?

No, it's in the samples themselves: I've previewed them externally as well and there's definitely some source-distortion going on. I figure I'll extract them and do some surgery one of these days...

Mind you, it doesn't stop me from using it!

- m

papawillow · Post by **papawillow** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 2:17 pm

http://www.wstco.com/pianosounds/freesoundfont.htm

Found this one in my travels and has a realistic sweet sound to my noob ears.

soundcreations · Post by **soundcreations** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 9:54 pm

Just thought I would let you know I have upladed the 256mb version of Splendid Grand to our website.

It is compressed using SFARK available for both Mac (OSX) and PC users. You can download the latest version here: http://www.melodymachine.com/

The archive is a single 75 or so mb download. Use SFark to unpack it.

http://www.soundcreationsinc.com/splendid/256.sfark

After uploading it I downloaded the file from the link and unpacked it and it seems to be fine.

Due to some bandwidth restrictions I will only be able to keep this on the server for a limited amount of time.

Enjoy,

XanaX · Post by **XanaX** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 10:07 pm

phatman wrote:URL REMOVED
It's gig but it is about 70 mb.

It's a pirate site.

The best (Free) Acoustic Piano sample?