For all Rhodes experts and lovers (MrRay73 released!)

[damstraversaz]

thanks a lot
I will try it .

Every time I tweak parameters and variables in the code, I always "feel" that something is missing.. something that I'm used to call "soul" ... Yes, the Rhodes piano has a soul that I can't still hear in my emulations

it is an amazing work which you completed
thanks again

[luCiPHer]

well, soul ot not, i love it

[Jafo]

Howdy.

Rcovering from a nasty flu bug right now, but I think my ears are OK.

This is getting better and better each iteration. It already beats the EVP and LL, IMHO. You can make this puppy sing and bite! The bells sounds are lovely, and the distorted nice and gritty.

However, both extremes of sound still seem a touch too synthetic, the tones developing too quickly and feeling too "static", to be completely convincing. A little compression or resonance in the bass portion of each sound would also help. It'd be interesting to compare spectral graphs of this and, say, the Learjeff sf2.

Also, I find the transition between bell and grunge to be too abrupt as well; maybe you could set this as a user-definable parameter, or use a more complex response curve.

Still, this is already a superb piece of programming! It is good enough that I was able to convince a few friends to use this instead of their pirated EVPs and LLs on purely sonic reasons.

[damstraversaz]

sound really good. really
I think it will be the only I will use for Rhodes.
I had kept the other version of Mr ray... the difference is incredible

thanks again for sharing ! ( BTW after chopin, I use MrRay73 in klezmer music... It sound very good )

[ZioKiller]

However, both extremes of sound still seem a touch too synthetic, the tones developing too quickly and feeling too "static", to be completely convincing. A little compression or resonance in the bass portion of each sound would also help.

Yes, I think it's rather a matter of decay time. The decay is longer on low notes than in higher notes and this gives it the sensation to sound too synthetic. I may try to scale the decay time according to the keyspan and see what happens...

It'd be interesting to compare spectral graphs of this and, say, the Learjeff sf2.

Learjeff's soundfont sounds more clear and belly. It has a complete different equalization. The first attempt to MrRay73 was modeled mainly after this soundfont.

It is good enough that I was able to convince a few friends to use this instead of their pirated EVPs and LLs on purely sonic reasons.

this is good to hear

[ZioKiller]

However, both extremes of sound still seem a touch too synthetic, the tones developing too quickly and feeling too "static", to be completely convincing. A little compression or resonance in the bass portion of each sound would also help.

Yes, I think it's rather a matter of decay time. The decay is longer on low notes than in higher notes and this gives it the sensation to sound too synthetic. I may try to scale the decay time according to the keyspan and see what happens...

It'd be interesting to compare spectral graphs of this and, say, the Learjeff sf2.

Learjeff's soundfont sounds more clear and belly. It has a complete different equalization. The first attempt to MrRay73 was modeled mainly after this soundfont.

It is good enough that I was able to convince a few friends to use this instead of their pirated EVPs and LLs on purely sonic reasons.

this is good to hear

[pljones]

Just got around to trying the new version and got a slight oops on start-up:

Code: Select all

Muzys.Exe caused an Access Violation at location 03fabee1 in module Mrray73.Dll Reading from location 00000000.

Registers:
eax=0000007f ebx=042c6a08 ecx=00000000 edx=0425f1a8 esi=0468f8ac edi=00000003
eip=03fabee1 esp=0012f614 ebp=00000000 iopl=0         nv up ei pl zr na po nc
cs=001b  ss=0023  ds=0023  es=0023  fs=003b  gs=0000             efl=00000246

Call stack:

This was with a .dll modified (according to windows) 17 February 2005, 18:11:08. I guess the dump above is of little use, though...

I went back to the previous version (08 February 2005, 11:12:02) and it works fine.

-----------

I then unplugged the old one, saved the project, installed the new one, loaded the project and plugged the new one in and it seems to be okay...

[ZioKiller]

oh... this is new...

try this: in the folder where you have all your vst plugins (and where there is the MrRay73.dll) you'll find a subfolder named "MrRay73" with some *.sem file inside. Delete that subfolder and reload the plugin.

[learjeff]

Hmm, I see I've missed a lot of the fun here!

I tried an early version of MrRayLE and really liked it, but that was an attempt to capture the sound of my soundfont. I also heard a later version I didn't care for as much (probably LE2). And I'll try the 73 as well and give my feedback.

I saw some comments about it being too "crispy".

Just keep in mind that my Rhodes soundfont, while made from a true vintage Rhodes (1977 Mark I Stage 73, which I've owned since new), isn't necessarily a "typical vintage Rhodes sound", because I used a lot of EQ on the samples to make them much brighter than most folks play their Rhodes. But that IS how I play MY Rhodes.

A more typical (unprocessed) Rhodes sound is Scarbee. Of course, most folks played their EPs through a tube amp, and lots of folks used stomp boxes, etc., so there is no single "vintage Rhodes" sound on real recordings. But unprocessed Rhodes (straight into the board) isn't unusual -- it sounds good that way too!

BTW, My hat's off to Guido for all his excellent work on MrRay and also Organized Trio. And just in case anyone here missed my spam elsewhere, I have a new stereo version available at Learjeff.com.

Playing live, I use MrRay II's Wurlitzer combined with sullivang.net's wurlie samples to get a real kick ass Wurlie sound. Now I just gotta learn more good Wurlie tunes!

[pljones]

try this: in the folder where you have all your vst plugins (and where there is the MrRay73.dll) you'll find a subfolder named "MrRay73" with some *.sem file inside. Delete that subfolder and reload the plugin.

Ah, I wondered what they were and left them alone. I'll try shifting them out of the way. Thanks!

--------------------- Later ---------------
Sorry, no - that didn't help. Same error. Maybe it's Muzys passing back chunks it stored in the project file that are specific to the old version, or something?

[ZioKiller]

Sorry, no - that didn't help. Same error. Maybe it's Muzys passing back chunks it stored in the project file that are specific to the old version, or something?

I think so. I just noticed the same behaviour with EnergyXT and I don't know if it's the host or the plugin. Anyway I said it before, these are beta versions not to trust upon

Anyway, I've just uploaded a new beta dated 02/22/2005 01:13am

I tried to scale the release time and did some small adjustments here and there.

Meantime I also purchased the PrecisionSound Dusty Electric Mk II (which I recomend!!) for 69$. It sounds really funky
I did some comparison between the two... of course the sampleset beats MrRay 10-1 soundwise. As for the expressiveness, MrRay wins (hehe.. there are no layers!)



Lastly, maybe someone could feel pissed off of all my posts about this damned MrRay... Please accept my apologies if this is your case.

[bburtin]

Lastly, maybe someone could feel pissed off of all my posts about this damned MrRay... Please accept my apologies if this is your case.

Definitely not the case. I would love it if there was a reasonably-priced realistic-sounding Rhodes clone that didn't require owning a sampler. Looking forward to future updates.

[learjeff]

Not sure what your problem with "owning a sampler" is. If it's price, try "sfz" which is still free to download. Google "sfz" to find it. (Since RGC Audio was bought out by Cakewalk, you might want to get while the getting is still good! Who knows what might change.)

My Rhodes soundfont is free, too. I like it enough that I use it live rather than lug my Rhodes around. Frankly, I like it better than my Rhodes in many ways -- far less noise, especially. (Rhodes pianos are not the quietest electrical beasts.) And the ability to edit the MIDI, gee whiz!

But we all sure love having MrRay in our kits too. I use it to sweeten up some Wurli samples I use. Also, MrRay is far more adjustable than any soundfont ever will be, for dynamic range, amount of "bark", etc. I'm a big fan!

I don't know what makes Zio think he has the right to bad-mouth such a great program! (Well, maybe the fact that he wrote it ...)

Jeff

[griels]

Definitely not the case.

Indeed not!

I would love it if there was a reasonably-priced realistic-sounding Rhodes clone that didn't require owning a sampler. Looking forward to future updates.

Well, Mr Ray 73 does me just fine

[bburtin]

Not sure what your problem with "owning a sampler" is.

Mostly the time investment. It takes me more time to work with sampled instruments than dedicated ones. I used to own an Ensoniq EPS 10 years ago and found that I spent much more much time tweaking samples than playing. I'd much rather have a black box with dedicated knobs. Yeah, it's probably more psychological than anything else, but I really do find I enjoy playing more when there are fewer options.

The money investment isn't negligible either. If I wanted to get Kontakt and Scarbee I'd be out like $600 just for a high-quality Rhodes sound. It would be great if I could use sfz, but unfortunately most commercial sample sets don't support it. I don't know if there's a way to guarantee that a converted instrument would sound the same with sfz as the native sampler. Maybe ESC really is that good (is it?), but I haven't taken the time to play around with it.

Elektrik Piano is probably closest thing to what I'm looking for, but I couldn't get it to work in forte (my host software). And it still feels sample-based. Even in DFD mode it takes a good 10-15 seconds to load a new patch.

Boris