sostenuto pedal for piano

[Avar]

I\'m using the EastWest Steinway B piano, very nice. But it did not come with Sostenuto pedal enabled. I setup a Sostenuto pedal in GS96, and GS is receiving the MIDI #66, but the Steinway B does not respond.

EastWest does not respond either. I would expect any serious piano disk to have both MIDI #64 and MIDI #66 enabled. It\'s necessary!

Any suggestions on how to make a Sostenuto-impaired piano respond to #66 ???

Thanks!

Avar

[LHong]

As far as We know, even Gigapiano, Only the Ctrl # 64 (Hold Sustain) is enable and the Ctrl # 66 (Sustenuto pedal) is disable. I\'m not sure that we need both # 64 and # 66 for the Piano-sample, because most of Keyboard-Ctrl only has one pedal, which is mapped to the #64.
>>>Any suggestions on how to make a Sostenuto-impaired piano respond to #66 ???<<<
I think that you could change/add the #66 from Giga-Instrument-Editor program.




[This message has been edited by LHong (edited 10-28-2001).]

[Avar]

Thanks for the reply. I\'m puzzeled, however, by your comment. All the 88-key piano controllers I\'ve used support both pedals. It is certainly essential for piano music and I\'m amazed any maker of piano instruments would consider opmitting it. Much of the late Romantic and modern piano repertoire requires the sostenuto. Clair de Lune, for example, would turn into a blurry mush without sostenuto.

I\'ve tried using the Intrument Editor and GS does recognize the #66 but I have not been able to get the samples to respond correctly. That\'s the trickl I\'d like to know!

--Avar


<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=\"1\" face=\"Verdana, Arial\">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by LHong:
As far as We know, even Gigapiano, Only the Ctrl # 64 (Hold Sustain) is enable and the Ctrl # 66 (Sustenuto pedal) is disable. I\'m not sure that we need both # 64 and # 66 for the Piano-sample, because most of Keyboard-Ctrl only has one pedal, which is mapped to the #64.
>>>Any suggestions on how to make a Sostenuto-impaired piano respond to #66 ???<<<
I think that you could change/add the #66 from Giga-Instrument-Editor program.


[This message has been edited by LHong (edited 10-28-2001).]<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

[rediesisminore]

Hi Avar,
I think it\'s the Soft Pedal what you are talking about.
I totally agree with you - being a concert pianist - we (often!) need to use the soft pedal. I do not have Gigastudio yet, I\'m currently using an EMU E5000 sampler with Ultimate Piano Collection.
What I did is assign the Soft Pedal footswitch of my master keyboard to both high filter cutoff and volume softening. Try with light settings, expecially on volume, as the effect of soft pedal on single notes is very subtle, but on long passages will be more audible. I don\'t know how to do it in Gigastudio Editor, on EMUs we have Cords, something I\'m waiting for before migrating to Gigastudio, as I feel that a good emulation of acoustic instruments requires a lot of good programming and as far as I know EMUs are very good at that.
Actually, adding the soft pedal response to sampled pianos greatly improved the overall quality of the instruments and the result can be much more realistic.
Have fun!

[LHong]

The soft pedal is different one.
According MIDI specification, there are about six pedal types can be implemented:
1>Hold: 64
2>Portamento (On/Off): 65
3>Sustenuto: 66
4>Soft: 67
5>Legato: 68
6>Hold 2: 69

Here is a little specs about the Sustenuto:

\"Like the Hold Pedal controller, except this only sustains notes that are already on (ie, the device has received Note On messages, but the respective Note Offs haven\'t yet arrived) when the pedal is turned on. After the pedal is on, it continues to hold these initial notes all of the while that the pedal is on, but during that time, all other arriving Note Ons are not held. So, this pedal implements a \"chord hold\" for the notes that are sounding when this pedal is turned on.\"
BTW, Like rediesisminore said, I\'m not sure that you really wanted the Sustenuto Pedal or just a Soft Pedal?


[This message has been edited by LHong (edited 10-28-2001).]

[rediesisminore]

OK, so we\'re talking about piano\'s middle pedal http://www.northernsounds.com/ubb/NonCGI/images/icons/wink.gif
(please disregard my post about soft pedal)

I\'ll try and do a programming on my EMU and see what\'s coming out...

Anyway it\'s a feature to add to Gigastudio and which should be easily implemented by Nemesys/Tascam team

[donnie]

Guys your missing the point....if the patch is not programmed for a specific midi command then it\'s not going to respond to it.

This reminds of a story where a guy bought a breath controller to use with his sound module and then got mad because the trumpets wouldn\'t respond to it.

Donnie

[LHong]

The question is how to make its particular patch (Piano-sample + GigaStation), which can be triggered by the KB-Ctrl\'s Sustenuto pedal # 66? That\'s all!

BTW, Is it possible?


<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=\"1\" face=\"Verdana, Arial\">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by donnie:
Guys your missing the point....if the patch is not programmed for a specific midi command then it\'s not going to respond to it.

This reminds of a story where a guy bought a breath controller to use with his sound module and then got mad because the trumpets wouldn\'t respond to it.

Donnie<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

[Avar]

Donnie just stated above that the \"patch\" (meaning the sampled instrument) must be programmed to respond to pedals other than #64. Yes, both soft pedal and sostenuto are standard on grand pianos and should definitely be implemented on all Giga pianos.

I you are correct, Donnie, then this is not a job for Tascam. As far as I can tell, GigaStudio supports and receives the complete MIDI specification. You seem to be saying the designers of the piano samples have failed to support these standard piano pedals.

So--what can be done? Is there a way I can program my EastWest Steinway B to respond correctly to soft and sostenuto pedals? Or does EastWest have to do it?

I would expect these instruments to support all three MIDI implementations of standard grand piano pedals because, after all, these guys are sampling a real piano, they can see that it has three pedals, and are presumably knowledgable enough about pianos and music and MIDI to understand what must be done....right?


<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=\"1\" face=\"Verdana, Arial\">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by rediesisminore:
OK, so we\'re talking about piano\'s middle pedal http://www.northernsounds.com/ubb/NonCGI/images/icons/wink.gif
(please disregard my post about soft pedal)

I\'ll try and do a programming on my EMU and see what\'s coming out...

Anyway it\'s a feature to add to Gigastudio and which should be easily implemented by Nemesys/Tascam team<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

[rediesisminore]

Avar, about the Soft Pedal you\'re right: Eastwest and other piano producers should implement the feature in the sampled instrument.
But, concerning the sostenuto (middle) pedal, it\'s behaviour cannot be programmed in the library itself, neither you, neither Eastwest could implement it in Gigastudio as this one doesn\'t have (till now) the required programming options (imagine - we\'re talking about a little application that checks which keys are being stroked when you hit the pedal and only apply sustain to those notes... and then there\'s the problem of the interaction with the \"normal\" pedal (the right one http://www.northernsounds.com/ubb/NonCGI/images/icons/wink.gif)... and what to do if you release the middle one first or the right one... etc, etc, etc..!!!)
I think a midi plugin could do this (maybe something like Maestro tool in GOS), but this should really be a job for Tascam/Nemesys.
You can, anyway easily implement the Soft Pedal yourself as I stated before...
As every Midi instrument, Gigastudio receives the all MIDI messages, but it does not respond to all of them!

[Avar]

Wow.... bummer.

This means I must use my controller to perform music requiring sostenuto, record it, then edit the sostenuto notes in the sequencer to sustain correctly.

If what you say is correct, this is a serious oversight by Nemesys. A system designed to play first-class giga pianos really should implement MIDI for them as well as a standard digital piano keyboard.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=\"1\" face=\"Verdana, Arial\">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by rediesisminore:
Avar, about the Soft Pedal you\'re right: Eastwest and other piano producers should implement the feature in the sampled instrument.
But, concerning the sostenuto (middle) pedal, it\'s behaviour cannot be programmed in the library itself, neither you, neither Eastwest could implement it in Gigastudio as this one doesn\'t have (till now) the required programming options (imagine - we\'re talking about a little application that checks which keys are being stroked when you hit the pedal and only apply sustain to those notes... and then there\'s the problem of the interaction with the \"normal\" pedal (the right one http://www.northernsounds.com/ubb/NonCGI/images/icons/wink.gif)... and what to do if you release the middle one first or the right one... etc, etc, etc..!!!)
I think a midi plugin could do this (maybe something like Maestro tool in GOS), but this should really be a job for Tascam/Nemesys.
You can, anyway easily implement the Soft Pedal yourself as I stated before...
As every Midi instrument, Gigastudio receives the all MIDI messages, but it does not respond to all of them!<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>