Hey what’s good fam!
Hope all is well with ya, things have been super busy around here, lots of changes…but I’m still on the case finding cool instruments to show you.
Today I’m checking out a new piano from Native Instruments called “The Giant”.
let’s check it out!
So what is The Giant?
It’s a sample library based off of a HUUUUUUUUUUUGE upright piano called the Klavins Piano Model 370i
It’s huge, like 12ft tall type huge.
The library is made for Kontakt and you get control over all aspects of the sound so it’s very versatile.
The regular version and the dark version both have their own preset system built right into the interface as well.
They also did a “dark” version which is made for more experimental and sound design/sfx work.
Quick Specs
- content: 3.9GB
- format: Kontakt 5 player and Kontakt 5
- price: $119
How does it sound?
I dig the basic tonality of the piano, it has a really clean and smooth feel to it.
However I love that you can really get in and change the sound and dynamics of it. I love that I can change it from bright/crisp to more of a mellow and soft tone with a quick turn of the colour knob.
Having control over the noises and overtones is a plus as well.
The included convolution engine and samples really allow you to create some unique instruments.
The “dark” cinematic version is really cool as it throws in a second convolution engine for tweaking and effecting the sound even more.
Plus it’s just plain fun to experiment with.
Overall I really dig the sound quality of the instrument.
So what’s the bottom line?
This is a nice library with a lot to offer even if you have other piano libraries.
The amount of control you get is really cool but the cinematic portion of the library really makes it two instruments in one.
I give The Giant 4 out of 5 subs, it has a great sound with plenty of control for those of us that like to tweak things.
It runs in Kontakt 5 Player which means anyone can use it since you don’t need to have the full version of Kontakt.
It’s just a nice and creative library that is worth checking out if you want something a little different.
Definitely head over and checkout the demos and info on the NI site: http://www.native-instruments.com/#/en/products/producer/powered-by-kontakt/the-giant/
leave me a comment below, let me know what you think
Nice I wanted to know what that was all about seeing it advertised on NI’s site. Thanks for the review!
no problem man, thanks for checking it out
nice one…
this one is on my list for those sound design patches…the straight ahead piano sounds sound pretty good too, but i have some other pianos that beat it…the cinematic side is what i really like…i’m guessing this would be a part of komplete 9 when it drops eventually, (i thought komplete 8 was weak in the piano department) so I’m waiting on it….great review as always…i did recommend this to a piano student as an upgrade from the kontakt factory pianos based on the price point and quality…
Yeah it probably will be in the K9 most likely, usually how NI do, but it’s a matter of…do I wait or do I get it now, really depends on how much you think you want it 🙂
It’s definitely a major upgrade from the factory kontakt pianos.
I want the actual piano this was sampled from… only it’s €230,000 as a base price (i.e. before the building work!)
this may have to do eh!
Hahahahahaha, definitely LOL
A lot of people says that pianos from NI are not good, except by Alicia’s keys. But I think this one sounds great. Thanks for the review, SJ
Yeah this one is good, I prefer the tonal quality of this to one Alicia’s Keys, but it’s good too.
i got to do it…u keep me prepared homie..thanx alot.
Thanks for watching fam, appreciated.
Everything gets 4 subs – lol!
The library is okay…but it just seems to me that everybody here loves everything!
On KvR there are a lot of mixed reviews. Alicia’s Keys got a good rating because it was done by Scarbee – a real labour of love.
This piano is not as impressive as the marketing would have you believe!
The problem is that the market is saturated with piano libraries.
Also – the marketing blurb is always telling us that the latest product is the best thing since sliced bread.
Firstly – it’s Native Instruments – so it is not going to be rubbish. But on the other hand – it is not as incredibly amazing as the product page suggests over on the NI website!
Do you need another piano?
Can you afford it? Does it sound good in your music?
The best way is to try it before you buy it.
I checked out RG – Rob Papen’s Rhythm Guitar “synth” the other day.
It has a great sound – but the chords are lousy. Just totally limited.
Major / Minor on some patches….Minor 7th on others…and that is as far as it goes!
No diminished / augmented chords. No major 7th / 6th chords / sus4 chords.
I mean – if they got the chords right – the product would be spectacular because it does sound great!
Somebody posted a request for Chord Recognition on KvR and the response from the developer (ConcreteFX) was – “It’s not on our list of priorities!”
LOL
“Check out our new Guitar Chord Player which plays a staggering selection of 3 different chord types!” Idiots! lol
Not everything gets 4 subs 🙂
But you’ve been around long enough to know I only post stuff I like. As for kvr…well this definitely aint kvr, I interact there very sparingly, a lot of arguing and back and forth about nothing lol.
Alicias Keys was good at the time when it came out, especially compared to the Kontakt factory pianos, however I’ve been less than impressed with a lot of NI pianos, including most of the ones in K8, this one has a nicer tone imo, plus I love how you can tweak it with the sound design stuff.
It’s definitely not incredibly amazing, but it’s useful, and if I find use for it…I show it. Pianoteq is still my favorite acoustic piano library so far…I need to do a video on the version 4 update actually.
🙂
Synthology Ivory is quite nice!
But to my ears – the best sounding Piano I have come across is something I saved a while back in EnergyXT 1.41
I had created an XT project which has:
Sonik Synth 2 -> The One 152mb (a great piano sound)
The audio goes to two other plugins (Parallel)
Lexicon Concert Hall (as a send FX)
Sonalksis FreeG Stereo Fader
It sounds great – I’ll get an MP3 example together…I just pulled the wire out of my Axiom which is now fluxed up.
Need to re-connect the power inside somehow….
Well -> the reverb is pristine (Lexicon VST) and the FreeG (an excellent freebie) lets me crank up the dry volume without effecting the reverb level (I control that with another fader).
It just sounds so clean, wide and free somehow!
My favourite guitar sound – for pure playability – is the Hypersonic Nylon which is small in size.
I had a Korg X5 module which had loads of great sounds…including big combination sounds….and the whole ROM set was about 6 megs!
Strings, brass, synths, pianos, great drums, clean and pure sounding!
These big libraries suck most of the time.
Size isn’t everything!
Nope, size isn’t everything, Pianoteq is still under 50mb 🙂
My “Go To” composing piano about 10 years ago – which is still one of the best sounding electric piano VST instruments – is the MDA ePiano.
5 Subs
It’s free and it is 1 megabyte in size!
Beautifully done!
Paul Kellet is one of my favourite developers.
He worked for the aerospace industry. He needed to learn acoustic because of the resonance on commercial airliners.
If things start vibrating in frequency and resonating on a large jet – all sorts of bad stuff can happen! lol
Anyway – somebody compiled his MDA pack (50+ plugins) as VST3 plug-ins.
Awesome!
The TalkBox is superb – one of the best vocoders out there.
With VST3 – you can add the effect as an insert on a synth plugin and then add your voice as a side-chained input.
So it now works in stereo!
Try it out using a fizzy stereo supersaw sound in Saurus with a compressed vocal signal!
I’m going to set up my own website with audio examples, music theory basics, song writing advice, etc…
I wrote a 3,000 word email to my buddy last night in less than half an hour!
I realized that if I edited it down a little – it would be a great tutorial on understanding and then using key changes in music.
I was listening to some Madness classics and I realized that they change key loads of times in the same song!
Then I searched “Key Changes” on YouTube and I found a video with 20 Top Key Changes – which were all bloody awful and totally predictable.
ie:
A chorus is repeated two or three times – then there’s a 1 bar drum fill – and the chorus is repeated two semi-tones higher!
This is NOT a “Top Key Change!” lol
Good key changes are unpredictable and they happen in surprising places. They add action and excitement to a piece of music.
They are not there to be just bolted on as part of a fade out on a predictable piece of throwaway pop.
I had the mda ep as well, it was decent for sure
The whole bundle is top quality.
Mr MDA (Paul Kellet) is one of the main DSP programmers for Steinberg these days.
All the new plugins have large chunks of code the he has designed, developed and written.
I forgot how good Cubase 5 and 6 have become!
I am seriously stuck between all these hosts…
Reason, Cubase, EnergyXT, Ableton, FL Studio, Studio One 2 (yeh – go figure! haha)
I like how Clips and presets are saved in Ableton + FL Studio.
I’m gonna make 4 albums in 5 weeks.
I am moving into an empty house for a month with no internet as of tomorrow.
Just me, the dog, my computer, keyboard and microphone.
I’ve got some rolls of wallpaper.
I’m going to write music, song structures, lyrics and everything else on the reverse side of that wallpaper…
Big arrangements!
By writing the music on paper – it will get completed!
When you have endless patterns and clips you end up going nowhere.
However, when you draw a large grid – and fill in the spaces with chords, riffs, melodies, rhythmic figures, etc….you have an overall picture that you are completing…like a painting.
If you get stuck for ideas – and you have existing pieces of the jigsaw – you can add key changes, sections from other songs, other instruments.
I’m going to program everything…not a big fan on looping / slicing the work of others…although I will create stuff by slicing stuff I’ve played myself – like vocals, synth stabs, drum groups.
Loving the Waves OneKnob stuff!
I had a simple project in Ableton. A selection of clips.
Kick | Snare | HiHats | Bass
Once you get some music together – you can start to add the OneKnobs!
Phattener / Brightener / Loudness / Wetter!
Before you know it -> You’ve added $1000 of effects to a kick – lol – but it sounds great!
I did a cover version of a dance song too!
Couldn’t quite get the drums and bass right – then I played the original which I hadn’t heard for 7 months…and noticed that the bass was real quiet in the proper song.
But it had plenty of bottom end…so the trick was to lower the volume of the bass synth – and add a bit of EQ…then kill some lows on the drums…
good luck bro!
It’s interesting I suppose not dying to get it but some folks would probably find it useful for it’s fx cinematic side I think.
Yeah man, definitely
..it’s a good sound’n
Piano for sure; but I have to wait till I reconfigure my hard drive situation till I cop it.
All these vst’s and plug-ins have eaten up too much hard drive sectors for now.
I hear ya bro, thanks for the comment
SJ: This piano hits the spot for those of this genre. Thanks for the review.
no doubt bro, thanks for the comment as always.
this one has really grown on me….been on it for a few hours now – i really like it – takes some tweaking to get good sounds… would like to see better presets – and to be a little louder…but i really like it – 2nd to ivory….but it will get more use because it is in kontakt format…
cool man, yeah it’s a cool piano depending on what you’re looking for, thanks for the follow up
I’d also like to say. All virtual pianos sound/feel way better on 88 weighted key controllers. Huge difference playing this on the Yamaha so8 over my little oxygen.
I can imagine man, good stuff!