I’m new to GP over the last few months. Only have done a few rehearsals and one short hour long gig with GP. Have another hour long set this weekend and having trouble with my piano sounds.
I’m using the Arturia Piano v3. When it comes to EQ/getting it right in the mix I can’t get it to sound good out of our PA even though in my studio it sounds great. It might be a stereo vs mono issues, but I’m running my rig mono to the PA. and my pianos (Acoustic Piano and EP) all sound very bell-like with way too much high end and no mids to lows. I’ve played with the EQ in both the software and on our mixer and can’t seem to get it right/even.
Any tips for making the Arturia Piano sit in the mix better? I’m not looking to upgrade just yet to another VST. My controller is a Nord Electro which has fine pianos, but I’d prefer to go all VST for ease of setup/consistency.
I use the Arturia V3 all the time without problems and also have a stereo/mono switch in my master output. Pianos are panned across the keyboard so if you are taking just a single channel out you will be gradually missing half the sounds. You must correctly mix and adjust the levels to get a true mono output. You will lose all stereo effects.
FYI this is my Global Rackspace with the MONO wiring. Ignore the missing plugins they are not on my windows machine. As expected you will need to make a 3dB reduction in the mono out to keep levels the same. Clicking the Mono LED on by the master output (this is a grouped widget with the other instance hidden), switches stereo/mono with the same levels.
My audio interface (Radial USB Pro DI) has a sum to mono switch that I keep on so I only need one channel. But I didn’t think about that GP should also sum to mono.
Should I sum the audio output out of GP to mono?
I’ve got a beater PA at home right now. Maybe I should set that up and see if I have the same problem.
They do not sound as good as a quality sampled piano to my ears.
I think out of the grand pianos, I like the German Grand the best. It seems to be the only one that has a bit of woody piano sound (to my ears) and less metallic flavor. But, to cut through the mix in a band situation, definitely have to beef up the high end.
I did have some issue with potential bug with the velocity curve where it dropped notes until I tweaked the velocity setting graph. I am hoping it won’t happen again.
As you don’t know if the sum to mono on your interface does any phase inverting, the safe bet is to sum it in GP then you change it as required and turn off the sum to mono on the interface.
This post (and everyone else’s advice) definitely helps. I’ll have to play around with mono summing within GP some more. Also saw some good info about changing the actual VST to a more mono piano. There was mention of mic positions in Pianoteq, Arturia also has mic options and a “stereo width” adjustment. Playing around with that might help too.
