The story
The James L. Dolan Recording Studio has some of my best memories. I have studied, interned, and recorded within this one-of-a-kind studio. A lot has been changed inside the studio over the years, but this Yamaha C7 has been there from the beginning witnessing all the music, performances, and stories. I am lucky to become part of the history of this piano and as I was graduating, I don’t want to let go of the feeling every time I put my fingers on it. That’s why, Dolan Piano was born.
Dolan Piano is a combination of the best piano, the best studio, and the best recording equipment. It is a Yamaha C7 located inside the fabulous James L. Dolan Studio of New York University. It was recorded through the iconic SSL Duality 48 Console and inherited the clean sound of SSL consoles. Also, Dolan Piano was recorded using 3 sets of world-class studio microphones. A pair of DPA 4011 condenser microphones was set up above the hammers for the brightness and the crispiness of the hammers. A pair of Coles 4038 ribbon mics was placed inside the piano and over the strings to add some extra warmth. Finally, a pair of classic Neumann M150 tube mics formed a spaced pair outside the piano to provide another source of clean piano sound while creating a wider stereo image. Dolan Piano is deeply sampled which has 4 dynamic layers and 2 round robins for each dynamic layer. With over 2000 samples, it captures every detail of the piano.
However, Dolan Piano is not just a regular piano that featured great sounding quality. Different music genres or scoring situations may require variations of piano sounds. If you are looking for some crispy piano hammers, some warm and heartfelt piano, or some wide and dreamy piano sound, Dolan Piano has them all because it was designed to be versatile and was built from the idea of using microphone signals as a form of EQ. Benefiting from the different sonic characters of the microphones, you can now easily shape your own piano sound by blending different microphone signals. Dolan Piano doesn’t just have one sound. It has millions of sounds and they all come from, you.
Interface
Reviews for Dolan Piano
- Sound
- Character
- Playability
- Inspiration
- GUI
Leave a review to let others know what you thought of the instrument!
Fantastic
One of the fullest piano sounds romantic and dynamic at the same time
Best sounding piano here
The sound quality is really good.
When playing at maximum velocities, the sound is still of high quality and does not distort. The piano was really well recorded.
The only thing I complain about is the noise.
There is quite a lot of it, but on the other hand, it disappears in the background, so I really recommend this library.
It has a really great sound.You can turn off the noise!
By default, yes this piano has a lot of noisy notes, but if you start messing with the knobs you will realise you can completely turn the noise off, all the way! Just turn the 1st and 3rd knobs all the way down to 1 (Bright and Width), because these are the guys responsible for all th noise.
The actual piano samples are crystal clear, and the piano is absolutely gorgeous! One of the best I've ever heard here on pianobook. Without these issues, and with a slightly more customized GUI, this could REALLY be in my top 5. Incredible.
Beautiful piano sampling
This is just lovely. Great job with the sampling, the recording is clear and the instrument is easy to play with the velocities mapped well. The lows are deep and meaningful and the highs are clear but not too shrill. This will be a go-to piano in my collection.
Beautiful piano
What a great sounding piano. Thanks to Alex for pointing out the source of the background hiss - I mean, it's not something which makes this "broken" in itself as the sound is so good, but it's nice to be able to eliminate that unnecessary noise.
