soundmagic bluestone

[glittle]

Has anyone spent some quality time with any of the soundmagic pianos? In particular, the "bluestone" whose latest version was apparently released last May:

http://www.supremepiano.com/product/blue.htm

I can't find any real-world reviews out there, only ad-copy announcements. And I have to admit, the web site and ad copy is, well, "different". Seems hype-y, but could just be a non-native-English thing.

Some of the demos sound pretty nice, with a few areas that seem to be just wrong, but with the pianos being so adjustable, perhaps that's just a setting/taste thing. For instance, in a few demos, the soft notes seem to have an unnaturally slow/soft attack.

Will load up the demo when I get a chance, but it's a little disconcerting how little mention there is on google from "real" people.

[glittle]

I should add that the reason I'm looking at that one is that like many I'm still looking for that happy combination of the playability of Pianoteq and the organic, woody "realness" of samples. The soundmagic pianos make claims in this area.

[Randy Fellmy]

Download the demo. If you have the same reaction I did, it’ll take you less than five minutes to realize you’re wasting your time and forget all about Sound Magic.

Note release (playing without using the pedal) is just wrong... bordering on horrid. When the pedal is down, the resonance sounds lively at first... but then you start to pick up something very artificial. The tone is nice and sweet, though it never “bites” when you spank it.

You might want to take a look at True Pianos. It’s not perfect, but it does sit in between the fully-modeled Pianoteq and fully sample-based instruments. The Listen page has audio examples, and the Download page has a demonstration version.

If memory serves me, that download has only the new Atlantis module; but I believe it might also be possible to grab an older demo that has the Diamond module from Internet Archive. (The file names are the same, so be sure you change one before saving if you download both to the same location.) Atlantis is newer, consumes more CPU, and is a bit more “in your face” — nice featured instrument material; Diamond might be a bit less realistic, but it’s still very playable, and to my amateur ears sits in a mix quite nicely, and more easily than Atlantis.

[idon]

I recently purchased the Bluestone piano software and after fussing with it for a few days I returned it and got my money back.

I seems like there is a nice sound in there someplace but I could not deal with the various sliders and knobs that were supposed to help tweaking the sound. They just did not seem to work properly in my mind. I could not get a playable sound out of it.

TruePianos was mentioned above and I agree with the assessment of that product. The Diamond module is very playable and quite nice. I did not like any of the other modules included with TruePianos.

[thb2006]

Seems hype-y

it's a little disconcerting how little mention there is on google from "real" people.

Haha, yea, that was exactly my thought early on. If it really is that great, why is no one else talking about it or reviewing it.

Oh, and look at the UI! Horrible! What the? I mean, who came up with that! Not saying that it can't sound great with such an awful looking UI. Maybe if the UI were fantastic it would sound better. Sometimes it is amazing what tricks can be played on ears because of visuals. They do have another model that was most recently introduced. They call it "Thor". Ha! I didn't see any links to it on their main website. I received it via email because I am on their email list. Here is a link for you:
http://www.supremepiano.com/product/thor.html

Wow! just look at that UI!

Further on, Wow, amazing what these people have done. Notice the other domain names that come up under a Google search of their name (whatever they really are called). If you really want some good laughs, go to: www.vpiano.net and just read and look at everything. They created a bogus competition and awarded themselves a, "TAI Award" (Technical Achievement and Innovation award). They were smart enough to include competitors as runner up's to getting the award.

This has just got to be a joke. A good laugh for sure.