Native Instruments Alicia's Keys Virtual Piano Review

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(More customer reviews)I am a pianist and a guitarist and I record on my PC as a hobby. I have been looking for a great piano sound plug-in for my PC MIDI sequencer for a long time. The last time I heard a good MIDI piano sound was from perhaps 10 years ago and it was bundled with the Soundblaster AWE 32 sound card. I happened to see an ad for Alicia's Keys in a keyboard magazine, and decided to give it a try.
I am very impressed. I really found what I was looking for. Now this is the signature Alicia Keys sound. Soulful, subdue, velvety, and is great for accompaniment. This is more a "recorded sound" rather than a sound that you get as if the piano were right in front of you. For those of you who are guitarists and are familiar with the Line 6 POD line of guitar amp modeler, that is what I am talking about. If you are looking for the traditional "in your face" piano sound that you get from a typical digital piano I would recommend the New York Concert Piano also by Native Instruments. Again if you were a guitarist, the sound of Alicia's Keys is like that of a Gibson ES-335, while the NY Concert Piano (which really is a Steinway even though it is not officially referred to as such) is like that of a Les Paul.
In any case, I got both and I couldn't be happier.

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With ALICIA'S KEYS, Native Instruments has unlocked the door to the R&B chanteuse's studio. The rich piano samples included in this sound library were created from her own playing, recorded in her personal studio in collaboration with her trusted engineer, Ann Mincieli. Together with Mincieli, Danish sample specialist Thomas Skarbye (also known by his company name Scarbee) and impulse response expert Ernest Cholakis, Alicia Keys has created a virtual piano that embodies the soulful, passionate sound that's become her trademark. Add this virtual piano to your studio and Alicia's distinguished playing will grace your next composition.ALICIA's KEYS' instrument samples come from the artist's very own Yamaha C3 Neo grand piano. This unique and hallowed instrument was built to celebrate Yamaha's 100th anniversary in 2002 and represents the very top of the Conservatory Collection line. The exquisite and unique sound of the C3 Neo were painstakingly captured by Thomas Skarbye, KONTAKT script wizard Nils Liberg, and Grammy-award winning engineer Ann Mincieli—making these exclusive Yamaha piano samples available to everyone. Using vintage microphones and preamps and through detailed analysis of Alicia's playing, the team succeeded in capturing the warm, soulful, and inspiring sound of the Yamaha C3 Neo piano all the way down to the finest nuances. Great effort was put into making the ALICIA'S KEYS virtual piano as authentic as possible. Designed with incredible precision, and incorporating subtle details such as mechanical release noises, a specially developed sympathetic resonance and release system, and even the sound of fingers hitting keys (optional), this unique virtual instrument software delivers plenty of lively realism. So much in fact, that Alicia Keys herself used it exclusively on her latest album "The Element of Freedom."

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