The story
I’ve been following Christians’ vlog since Episode 1 and have been ever intrigued by the idea of sampling an instrument of my own; if only I had a piano!
Fortunately I’ve been able to contribute to a couple of Angus Roberts-Carey projects and thought it was time to set out on my own sampling adventure.
My good friend, Philip Hunsicker, graciously allowed myself and my friend Matt Lowery to bring his Helpenstill Roadmaster 64 (very rare) to my studio and have a go at it.
We had a lot of fun and I’m hoping this is something of a starting point as I’d very much love to continue to contribute to this incredible community.
Hope you all enjoy this first iteration of the ‘Hunsicker Helpenstill’
Reviews for Hunsicker Helpenstill
- Sound
- Character
- Playability
- Inspiration
- GUI
Leave a review to let others know what you thought of the instrument!
Awesome Piano
Personally i prefer this electro-acoustic than other acoustic pianos samples very well here... this is amazing is from other level... the only detail is the highest velocitiy appears from nothing and very strong in my Arturia Keylab 49 .... but is something the user can solve using some midi fx to calibrate themax velocity or the midi cc center from Arturia or something else
A piano with character
As others say, this piano is unique. The content can hardly be found for free elsewhere. I think this pack would be especially useful for playing classic songs from the 70's and 80's.
The interface is user-friendly. The choice of the background image is spot on, as it makes a nice contrast with the color of the knobs. It was fun to try this instrument.
Hidden gem
The Hunsicker Helpenstill is a really interesting piano that seems best played with lower velocity layers and a bit of reverb. As the previous review suggests, you can cut down on some of the release trigger noises to create a bit more mellow an experience. This is a bit noisy when played sustained at high velocities, and can get a bit harsh at those high velocities. However, there's a lot of character and playability in this one, and I think it's a a bit of a hidden gem amongst the character pianos. There's some fun tuning issues D1 vs D2 for instance -- but all in all, this is a really great addition to Pianobook! Maybe a bit of noise reduction at the higher sustained velocities to clean it up would help.
Rare and unique piano!
This rare and unique piano is a great addition to Piano Book. It's somewhere between a Yamaha CP-series and an acoustic upright. There is a fair amount of noise in the mic signals, but none in the DI. The highest dynamic layer sort of jumps out at you volume-wise. If this were a Kontakt instrument, it would be a piece of cake to go in and tweak the volume level of those zones. I have to admit that I'm ignorant as to how to accomplish that in Decent Sampler. There's also some double striking which seems to occur at the highest velocity level. I'm unsure if the instrument was double striking or if there's some error in the trimming of the front of the samples. I suspect the latter because the issue goes away when you mute either the mic or DI signals. It might have been better to edit both the DI and mic signals at the same time so that whatever editing was applied to one would be applied to the other so that they would stay in alignment. This same problem causes some phase issues in octave 2 as well. These small issues aside, I think this is a really unique library. It sort of evokes cleansing rain, falling snow, rushing waters of spring, and childhood innocence int he upper register. It fits in a wide variety of musical styles, and I'm sure many will find it useful.
Cool Funky Piano
This piano is definitely unique for pianobook. While most of the electric pianos on the site i feel are better suited for slow emotional passages, this one is better suited for aggressive funk and rock and things like that. It has a more mid rangey, aggressive tone than most on the site. Personally i dont like this as most of my music is chill and emotional. I feel like this piano is kind of empty in the lower mids and lows. Theres also a really loud clicking when playing the high dynamic layers. Its always cool to have these unique instruments on pianobook, this one just personally doesn't inspire me. I hope others enjoy it though
