Disklavier

Friends,

With all the talk of setting velocities, I thought I would see what the 
readings are for some of the performances at the recent Yamaha piano 
competition.

I tried five at random by putting them into veloset.  The maximum readings 
were all over 100!

Say what?

John S. Morgan

Dr. Swiney's discovery of files with note-on velocities exceeding 100 
exposes a point about limitations of DKV accuracy--at least for a DC3 
Mark II--I don't have a Pro to measure.  Played on a Mark II with the 
volume control set at 0, notes with velocities higher than 90 will 
reproduce as though they were recorded as 90--not as loud as the 
original live performance.

One can beat the wrap somewhat by setting the volume to, say, -3, where 
limiting begins at a velocity of 113 (instead of 90).  The catch is that 
all notes between velocity 113 and 22 will be played more softly than 
the original--about 3 dB softer for a note of velocity 90.  In addition, 
the dynamic range of all notes will be compressed, so that there will be 
less difference in intensity between notes originally played at, say, 
mezzo forte and forte.

Fine pianists seriously endeavor to control dynamic range in their 
performances; however, the original dynamic range, if it matters to you, 
is compromised when you start turning down the DKV volume control.

Life is full of trade-offs and this one is probably satisfactory if 
you'd prefer to be able to tone down a virtual concert pianist who would 
otherwise perform at full tilt in your apartment and perhaps break your 
piano strings.

DrSwiney@... wrote:
> Friends,
> 
> With all the talk of setting velocities, I thought I would see what the 
> readings are for some of the performances at the recent Yamaha piano 
> competition.
> 
> I tried five at random by putting them into veloset.  The maximum 
> readings were all over 100!
> 
> Say what?
> 
> John S. Morgan
> 
> To Post a message to the group, send it to:   disklavier@...
> 
> To Post a private message to Todd Muncy, the group's founder and 
> moderator, send it to:
> disklavier-owner@...
> 
> To reach our group's web site go to:
> http://Yahoogroups.com/group/disklavier
> 
> Todd's family web site was completely rewritten in June 2001 and 
> contains some fun disklavier content and links to midi sites among other 
> things, The url is:
> http://MuncyFamily.com
> 
> THINKING OF LEAVING THE GROUP?
> If you are thinking of unsubcribing because you are getting too much 
> mail, go the the web site and change your email delivery option 
> instead.  That will fix the problem, while maintaining your access to 
> the group.  If you insist on leaving us completely send a blank email to:
> disklavier-unsubscribe@...
> 
> Know someone who wants to join?  Have them send a blank email to:
> disklavier-subscribe@... or give them this link:
> http://Yahoogroups.com/group/disklavier/join
> 
> 
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service 
> <http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/>.


-- 
Robert Welcyng
Anchorage, Alaska

Well, there's an added twist to this story, once you bring the
Pros into the discussion.

The piano-e-competition files were recorded in "low-res"
enhanced mode (sigh), so they don't really reflect the
capabilities of the Pro.  Had they been recorded in
"high-res" XP mode, there would be an extra 3 bits of
velocity info (10 bits in all), as well as 10 bits of key movement 
info.

I'm building a small library of XP mode recordings.  In the next 
several weeks, it'll be interesting to look through their max
hammer velocities and their corresponding key movement measurements. 
I'm curious how the two correlate, and what the range of min/max 
values are.

John Q. Walker
Zenph Studios, Inc.