What's new

Midnight Grand by Fracture Sounds - Available Now

7am. Checking my e-mail. Something about a grand piano. I have enough piano libraries...
7:01. "discount to Woodchester Piano owners" Wait, Woodchester? Fracture Sounds! Ok, I must click and read on it, but I guess it is probably just a grand piano.
7:02. "Steinway concert grand", "cinematic tone". Yeah, I have tons of this already. Wait, "atmosphere intensity"? LAYER MIXER? Just like the Woodchester controls. NO. WAY.
7:03. Demo tunes! *click* WHOA! They... It's... Wow... Cool!
7:05. Ok, I get it. Let's see the patch walkthrough for a demo of the layers.
7:09. Love it, but I'm not ready to purchase another piano library... maybe... but hmm, I did regret I was too late for Woodchester intro price.
7:10 This is gorgeous. I wonder what I would compose if I played it.
7:14 "Thank you for your order of Midnight Grand. You may download the library using the links below"
 
That was an instant buy for me, since Woodchester is my favourite piano library on the market.
Midnight Grand sounds amazing, it has it own character which I find very suitable for some pieces of mine. Also, pads are even better than in Woodchester, WOW.
However, I've found an issue -- when I hold sustain pedal down(or use alt version of the library) and play several notes, some kind of white noise (which is def not the 'room tone' sound) kicks in and spoils everything. And what is interesting, it is mainly happens within the range of great octave (c2-b2). It is possible to hear it in some other ranges, but this one is the most audible. What can it be and have anyone else faced it?
Thanks.

They aren't denoised too much which is nice but you will hear it on sustained soft chords quite a bit.

I just tried denoising a chord with 7 sustained notes in the middle range and it worked out extremely well, however. Use iZotope RX elements or advanced spectral denoise module. Since I didn't have a noise profile I used adaptive settings but it still worked well with a very extreme noise curve that I have attached a screen shot of. The second screen shot is of JUST the noise which as you can see really doesn't include much of the the piano at all. If you do this on the entire recording you should be good to go honestly. It's an extra step and a bit annoying but it may even work better than denoising each sound individually actually.
 

Attachments

  • denoise settings.jpg
    denoise settings.jpg
    36.1 KB · Views: 19
  • just noise.jpg
    just noise.jpg
    44.4 KB · Views: 20
Last edited:
They aren't denoised too much which is nice but you will hear it on sustained soft chords quite a bit.
Thanks for your comments Anders and @Afanasyev. We did gently denoise the samples using a noise profile, but it's tricky to get the balance right. I did try de-noising more aggressively, but I felt it removed a lot of the life and spaciousness from the samples, so I dialled it back.
I think the result is a good balance for most situations, but when I crank the volume and hold down a bunch of soft velocities, I can hear the noise you're describing. Good idea about offering two sets of samples - I'll see about doing a more aggressive denoising pass for those who want it. Everyone has their own preferences with these things.

Probably worth mentioning that those softest velocities were VERY quiet in the room - not much louder than the air moving around in the hall. I had to hold my breath and stay completely still during each sample (but it was totally worth it) :)
 
Last edited:
Just bought it! Just couldn't resist. Especially not with this nice discount for Woodchester owners! Will try it tomorrow! Looking forward as I love the Woodchester Piano!
 
Good idea about offering two sets of samples - I'll see about doing a more aggressive denoising pass for those who want it. Everyone has their own preferences with these things.
Sounds great! Of course, if it happens, I am going to say "thank you" with the help of my wallet ;)
And even if it won't happen, still thank to you even for considernig this!

Anyway, @Anders you gave a good advice about RX. Thank you!
Use iZotope RX of course.
Which one you were talking about? There are four of them, is Elements will be enough?
 
This library certainly has turned out to be a real 'gem', and well worth the purchase price (or more). Like others, I am especially fond of the layers, but am also a bit surprised at the significant volume increase that is required to use them in Solo mode. I also appreciate having control over the pedal and key volumes, and the other controls add greatly to the versatility of the library. Definitely inspires and gets the creative juices flowing and, as well, the loyalty discount provided great incentive and was greatly appreciated. So, well done Fracture Sounds!
 
but am also a bit surprised at the significant volume increase that is required to use them in Solo mode. I also appreciate having control over the pedal and key volumes, and the other controls add greatly to the ve

Interested to know if this is the source of the white noise mentioned earlier?
 
Top Bottom