The Drinking Piano is released! A Monster Upright with a Classic Beer Hall Sound

[greggg]

Hey everyone! Soundiron is proud to present a brand new piano library: The Drinking Piano. This fat-bottomed monster upright has a classic beer hall sound, evoking images of the roaring 20s and pre-war 30s. It's got all of the brutal wear and tear that you'd expect from a hundred-year-old instrument that has been played hard and put away wet, night after night. The years of alcohol-fueled abuse have been less than kind to this once stately instrument. With worn and rickety key action, unreliable dampers, loose pedal mechanics, wear hardened felts, the occasional misaligned hammer and decades of baked-in dust, every key has all the character and frailty of a hundred-year-old bartender. The strings were far too corroded to be tuned without risking breakage and further internal damage, so the whole thing is a little over a half-step flat. But beneath the beer stains and cigarette burns, this massive aging troubadour has a substantial pedigree. It's an original Ivors and Pond model from the dawn of the 20th century, made of solid mahogany, with expert hand-craftsmanship and detail rarely seen in any modern uprights.

With a fat, wide and close sound, it puts you right on the bench with the yellow, cracked ivories under your fingers. It was recorded right up against the strings in a small, slightly reflective hall, giving it all the presence of a dry studio recording with just a hint of live ambiance. Weighing in at 5.25 GB, The Drinking Piano features 25 Kontakt presets (22 K4 or K5 and 3 dedicated K3 presets), over 1700 samples and over 50 custom convolution impulses. As always there is a range of automatable LFO, EQ, filter and sound-shaping to expand on the creative possibilities that this library offers.

We've outfitted the Drinking Piano GUI with a range of proprietary features, including the latest version of our Uberpeggiator arp system, optional tempo synching volume and filter LFOs, custom convolution effects, parametric EQ and standard performance shaping parameters, like note attack and sample offset, allowing you to simply tighten the sound or create padlike effects; release timing with extended decay range settings and independent release sample volume control; pedal sfx volume control, micro-tuning, stereo imaging and two special modes: Switching the Sober/ Drunk mode button to 'Sober' instantly tightens the sound and the loose action becomes more responsive, instantly wiping away years of wear and tear. In 'Drunk' mode, you hear the piano as it naturally sounds, still plenty playable, but quite a bit rougher around the edges. Flipping the 'Tuned'/'Untuned' switch corrects the tuning of the entire piano, getting it about as close as it will ever be again to 440 and fixing the misaligned hammer action that can be heard souring a few notes here and there. Pour yourself a glass of your favorite spirit and enjoy!


Check out images of The Drinking Piano:




Hear The Drinking Piano in action:

http://soundcloud.com/soundiron/sets/th ... g-piano-1/


Specs:

• 1,778 Samples (standard pcm wav)
• 25 .nki files (open format) - 22 K4 / 3 K5
• 5.25 GB installed
• 24 bit / 48kHz stereo PCM wav format
• Format(s): Kontakt 4/5 .nki and pcm .wav

The Drinking Piano is available right now for the low introductory price of only $69, now through Wednesday, October 17th, 2012. The price then goes up to $79.

Click here for detailed pdf user manual

[Meffy]

What a cool UI. Wish I could afford it, I like battered old pianos (great with fries and hush puppies).

I hope you won't mind my posting this song, which seems appropriate. I'll remove the link if you prefer, just send me a PM.

[freewayland]

Tom Waits certainly had a early influence on us and it probably comes out in the kinds of instruments that we're compelled to sample sometimes.

[freewayland]

We've also got a great walk-through video by Brad Halverson that takes you through our new Drunken Piano Library in detail. Check it out!