One of the most beloved instruments in popular music is the piano. Since they are so resonant, lively, and adaptable, they are embraced by a wide variety of musical genres. A piano can undoubtedly make a difference in any kind of music, whether it is pop, classic rock, blues, jazz, or classical. It can do this by having a strong presence and enhancing the harmony in a song, for example.
The grand piano sound, among the many models and styles, is recognized for its own personality and is occasionally connected with grandiose symphonic compositions or cinematic film music. It’s good to know that these instruments may be applied to a variety of circumstances or genres, and the libraries on today’s list provide evidence of this.
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Native Instruments Piano Colors
A true virtual instrument, Piano Colors delivers an incredible range of overtones that will capture your imagination. Whether it’s dark thriller scores, groove-filled dubstep, or straightforward pop compositions, this plugin brings odd and original musical conceptions to life. It combines a variety of cutting-edge playing techniques with a special processing engine that combines dynamics, tone transitions, and movement to raise a piano’s sound to previously unimaginable heights.
This plugin’s cleverness is in the symbiotic relationship it creates between its extensive library of distinctive grand piano articulations and the imaginative modulation engines (which include the “Arpeggiator” and the recently expanded “Particles”). Real-time morphing of complex sounds produces emotive timbres, organically pulsing beats, and ever-evolving pads. This plug-in turns harmonically rich samples into energizing hues that can be combined, shaped, and played back to produce a piece of original flowing music.
The large collection of source samples in Piano Colors were recorded using a variety of strange instruments, including hammers, drumsticks, rubber, screws, and many EBows. Using unorthodox techniques, the strings and body of a grand piano were played, and the accompanying acoustic effects were meticulously captured using the most cutting-edge recording technology, resulting in a wide variety of energizing resonances, expressive harmonics, and vibrant overtones.
The arpeggiator, a characteristic found frequently in synthesizers, is put on this virtual instrument in a very original way. With different configurations like “Humanize Time” and “Velocity,” this tool may instantly generate a range of nuances and musical ideas by constructing ever-changing sequences and randomized patterns. This is the Best Kontakt Piano Library in 2022.
One aspect that distinguishes this plugin from others is the true “Particles” engine. To better fit the innovative and daring musical concepts needed for contemporary music creation, a set of algorithms was painstakingly created. This engine creates new notes on its own and gives your performance an additional sonic layer. An expanded component of this collection is devoted to fine-tuning the sound of your grand piano. The “Color,” “Tonal Shift,” and “Dynamic” adjustments in the “Tone” section can modernize the sound of a traditional piano. Additionally, the envelope parameters provide modulation choices that let you extend this alteration as far as your creativity will allow.
The goal of Piano Colors from Native Instruments is to replicate the distinctive sound of the grand piano while also providing a variety of tools to enable it to be used in even the most sophisticated contemporary projects. A variety of possibilities that might incite any music producer looking for a new piano texture are provided by this cutting-edge and unique virtual instrument, which combines modulation and envelope controls with an arpeggiator and a collection of rich-sounding algorithms.
Native Instruments Noire
Noire offers the supreme experience of hearing a special instrument being played by a famous performer over an equally famous background. German musician Nils Frahm is renowned for fusing aspects of classical and electronic music, as well as for playing keyboards and pianos in a highly unusual manner. That’s why the Native Instruments team choose him to perform on a hand-selected grand piano with unique intonation in a very distinctive setting: the Funkhaus recording studio, which was created in the Bauhaus style.
The end result is a powerful, evocative instrument with a unique, fantastic ambience. The sampling quality is exceptional and ought to rank among the very best choices on the market right now. However, some unusual controls, like the aforementioned “Particles” engine and many effects, can make this grand piano quite adaptable, particularly when it comes to a more delicate and introspective approach when striking the keys.
When using Noire, you can choose between two soundscapes. A clear, unadulterated grand piano sound with superb sound quality is produced by the “Pure” version. The “Felt” version, which uses a felt between the hammers and strings to produce a mellow tone with less attack, is an altogether different sample. To further sculpt the sound, you can also change the envelope, resonance, overtones, velocity curve, temperament, and other factors.
This hand-selected, specially-intonated Yamaha CFX 9′ grand piano was painstakingly sampled by Uli Baronowsky and Galaxy Instruments. The team spent many weeks recording this unique instrument’s whole dynamic and tone range with vintage mics and preamps in Saal 3 at the iconic Funkhaus Nalepastrasse in Berlin. The end result is a remarkable sound quality that captures the grand tone of a piano played in a well-equipped studio.
Noire doesn’t try to replicate other sounds; instead, it gives you the raw materials and a variety of inventive options to make it your own. You can choose from a range of sound design options, add some sub-bass, and experiment with tone shifting in addition to including noises for authenticity. The placement of the piano in the mix is also adjusted using EQ, compression, reverb, and delay effects.
One of Native Instruments’ Noire’s best points is its amazing recording quality, but the fact that a performer like Nils Frahm personally selected a grand piano model and played it makes this library stand out from others. This instrument sounds as vividly as possible, with just as many articulations and dynamics, thanks to the two sound modes, “Pure” and “Felt.” This may please score producers and sound designers, but musicians can also benefit greatly from these auditory resources in the same way.
Native Instruments The Giant
Have you ever considered a piano that measures more than three meters in height and weighs two tons? Well, the amazing Clavins residents not only envisioned it but also created one. In order for us to understand what it would be like to play the giant upright piano, the gentlemen from Galaxy Instruments sampled it and provided us Native Instruments The Giant.
Because to its flexible editing features and convolution engine, users favor Native Instruments The Giant. They continue by saying that this virtual instrument would work best in music for motion pictures. The user-friendly GUI of this instrument is an additional pleasant feature. Users claim that the best film, pop, and urban music would pair well with Native Instruments The Giant.
Native Instruments The Giant has a tremendously rich sound when played on a traditional piano, however this is not its main selling point. In actuality, there are two instruments in one. The first is the mentioned piano, and the second is a set of programmable cinematic piano sounds. And we think that this is the library’s best feature by far. Making your own sound design textures might take numerous hours.
You can acquire a very adaptable piano with Native Instruments The Giant for a very affordable price, to put it mildly. You also receive a very potent cinematic tool for producing organic pads and textures, which is more crucial. This is the Best Piano Library for Kontakt in 2022.
Native Instruments The Maverick
The Maverick is an exact reproduction of a 1905 concert grand made for Prince Frederick William of Prussia, which has a singular sound. This plugin is a unique piano designed for royalty that delivers a broad range of color and an interesting sound, with each key having its own individuality.
This amazing library produces a distinctive sound that fits very well with pop, rock, jazz, and many other genres. The painstaking recording of this virtual instrument includes over 2,500 distinct samples dispersed across 18 velocity levels. Isolated overtone and resonance samples help its inherent harmonics ring out pleasantly. For optimum authenticity, even the most significant releases were recorded with nine velocity levels.
The Maverick excels at bringing a great, vintage-sounding instrument onto your computer, even though it may feature controls that are quite similar to those of other Native Instruments products on this list. Sadly, it’s not typical to have a 1905 grand piano around so frequently. It’s a wonderful instrument on its own. The samples’ outstanding quality is a testament to how great this instrument sounds and to how easily NI’s team was able to bring out its best features.
With all the parameters at your disposal, you can match the vintage piano’s sound to any desired mood. You can rapidly and subtly adjust the tone of this amazing instrument to your preferences by making little adjustments to the EQ or the expressive ambience. You can instantly make it sound bigger, richer, deeper, or brighter without using intricate parameters or a cluttered UI.
When it comes to faithful recreations, companies like Native Instruments typically have a lot of options in their instrument collections. The Maverick is unique due to the source of every sample: a gorgeous old-time grand piano that was constructed (quite literally) for royalty. Although numerous modifications and adjustments may be done to make this software even more adaptable, having such a fine instrument caught into a fantastic set of microphones undoubtedly brings the soul of this software to life.