KVR Audio

FrankT · Post by **FrankT** » Sun Mar 04, 2012 4:49 am

Still waiting for EZFame...!

filkertom · Post by **filkertom** » Sun Mar 04, 2012 4:56 am

A.M. Gold wrote:I'm waiting for them to come out with EZGroupie.

Duuuude, you're hangin' out with the wrong groupies, then.

vespers75 · Post by **vespers75** » Sun Mar 04, 2012 5:04 am

Dean Aka Nekro wrote:The Maryland, DC Dope Groove

'Tis home for me...

Dean Aka Nekro · Post by **Dean Aka Nekro** » Sun Mar 04, 2012 4:37 pm

vespers75 wrote:
Dean Aka Nekro wrote:The Maryland, DC Dope Groove
'Tis home for me...

Closest i get Joe is a good half of skunk or tai stick, The section in my record collection dedicated to Clutch and similar plus a few packets of Maryland chocolate chip cookies

jtiis · Post by **jtiis** » Sun Mar 04, 2012 10:24 pm

I play the piano but my theory isn't very good... (I know - get a read a book...) but I like the chord progression/switching part of EZkeys... anyone know of a similar (but cheaper) plugin like that? I'd go for that...

audington · Post by **audington** » Thu Mar 15, 2012 9:09 am

I've been playing with the demo for this for a couple of days, and after thinking it was the best thing since sliced bread by watching the videos, I'm completely disappointed in it. No matter how much I want it to work for me, it just doesn't. The piano itself is fantastic without a doubt, but I already have numerous pianos that I'm happy with. But the midi file handling... in my opinion it need a LOT more work before it's truly useful in my opinion, which is a shame as it promises so much.

Jelly · Post by **Jelly** » Thu Mar 15, 2012 9:14 am

Yep, I agree, its pretty disappointing.
Didn't even think the piano was that stellar

Uninstalled it after I couldn't bear the demo detuning one more time... The EZKeys demo (fully functional for 10 mins without saving) was a much better idea!

nathanrice411 · Post by **nathanrice411** » Sat Mar 17, 2012 11:13 am

What the hell? I own a TON of Toontrack software and it seams like when i dont visit the site for a month or 2 I am surprised with something new. I dont know what to think about this one? So far every product I have bought is KILLER!

FrankT · Post by **FrankT** » Sun Mar 18, 2012 7:11 am

audington wrote:I've been playing with the demo for this for a couple of days, and after thinking it was the best thing since sliced bread by watching the videos, I'm completely disappointed in it. No matter how much I want it to work for me, it just doesn't. The piano itself is fantastic without a doubt, but I already have numerous pianos that I'm happy with. But the midi file handling... in my opinion it need a LOT more work before it's truly useful in my opinion, which is a shame as it promises so much.

I notice that in most TT EZkeys videos there is lots of talk, but very little musical evidence of the concept.
What is it exactly that does not work for you re midi handling?

C-note · Post by **C-note** » Sun Mar 18, 2012 7:38 am

jtiis wrote:I play the piano but my theory isn't very good... (I know - get a read a book...) but I like the chord progression/switching part of EZkeys... anyone know of a similar (but cheaper) plugin like that? I'd go for that...

Try the demo of this - http://www.cognitone.com/products/nav/intro/page.stml

audington · Post by **audington** » Mon Mar 19, 2012 9:51 am

FrankT wrote:
audington wrote:I've been playing with the demo for this for a couple of days, and after thinking it was the best thing since sliced bread by watching the videos, I'm completely disappointed in it. No matter how much I want it to work for me, it just doesn't. The piano itself is fantastic without a doubt, but I already have numerous pianos that I'm happy with. But the midi file handling... in my opinion it need a LOT more work before it's truly useful in my opinion, which is a shame as it promises so much.

I notice that in most TT EZkeys videos there is lots of talk, but very little musical evidence of the concept.
What is it exactly that does not work for you re midi handling?

Unless I'm missing something, it does not change the chord layout in its circle of fifths depending on key. So if you are working in C major, and you change the key to A minor, the layout of the chords is the same - it does no clever transposition, neither does the circle of fifths 'suggested chords' change to have Am as the tonic - it stays with C F & G as I IV & V etc. This basically leaves the 'suggested chords' thing redundant if you don't already know a bit of music theory (and if you do, you don't really need this program anyway).

Randomize chords doesn't seem to do anything clever. I expected that it would have some kind of 'best guess' calculation to work out chords that sound nice, but the results are so massively hit and miss that I can only assume that it doesn't. Even a simple cadence calculator based on the song structure would go a long way, but the chords seem pretty random and most of the time inappropriate for any kind of popular song structure.

In fairness, the piano sounds nice, the interface is nice and it is very easy to use. But the most important part of it (at least as far as I can perceive) is as a songwriting tool and for that reason it falls short. If it was a third of the price and didn't have the piano I would be considering buying it anyway as it is very quick to prototype chord sequences and structure (plus its inbuilt midi files are absolutely lovely, but there's just not that many of them), but at the moment it's far too expensive for what it actually does in my opinion.

As I said, I might have missed something and got this all wrong, but I have been playing with the demo for a few days and I *really* wanted this to work for me, I really did!

filkertom · Post by **filkertom** » Mon Mar 19, 2012 10:40 am

audington wrote:
FrankT wrote:
audington wrote:I've been playing with the demo for this for a couple of days, and after thinking it was the best thing since sliced bread by watching the videos, I'm completely disappointed in it. No matter how much I want it to work for me, it just doesn't. The piano itself is fantastic without a doubt, but I already have numerous pianos that I'm happy with. But the midi file handling... in my opinion it need a LOT more work before it's truly useful in my opinion, which is a shame as it promises so much.

I notice that in most TT EZkeys videos there is lots of talk, but very little musical evidence of the concept.
What is it exactly that does not work for you re midi handling?
Unless I'm missing something, it does not change the chord layout in its circle of fifths depending on key. So if you are working in C major, and you change the key to A minor, the layout of the chords is the same - it does no clever transposition, neither does the circle of fifths 'suggested chords' change to have Am as the tonic - it stays with C F & G as I IV & V etc. This basically leaves the 'suggested chords' thing redundant if you don't already know a bit of music theory (and if you do, you don't really need this program anyway).

Randomize chords doesn't seem to do anything clever. I expected that it would have some kind of 'best guess' calculation to work out chords that sound nice, but the results are so massively hit and miss that I can only assume that it doesn't. Even a simple cadence calculator based on the song structure would go a long way, but the chords seem pretty random and most of the time inappropriate for any kind of popular song structure.

In fairness, the piano sounds nice, the interface is nice and it is very easy to use. But the most important part of it (at least as far as I can perceive) is as a songwriting tool and for that reason it falls short. If it was a third of the price and didn't have the piano I would be considering buying it anyway as it is very quick to prototype chord sequences and structure (plus its inbuilt midi files are absolutely lovely, but there's just not that many of them), but at the moment it's far too expensive for what it actually does in my opinion.

As I said, I might have missed something and got this all wrong, but I have been playing with the demo for a few days and I *really* wanted this to work for me, I really did!

I'm fairly sure they decided to have the chord wheel not change for the sake of helping beginners. I know exactly what you're saying, and perhaps they should put in a mode that does transpose their chord choices for those who are more familiar with music theory, but what they have now gives them a standard layout so people who do not know music theory can at least find the chord every time.

As to the rest, like I said earlier: Band In A Box pwns this. Between having the piano RealTracks (i.e., recordings of real pianos) that adjust to every chord, and being able to use any VSTi for the MIDI -- oh, and, having thousands of styles you can mix and match, and lots more instruments, and and and -- EZ Piano seems pretty useless to me. And I did want it to be good.

audington · Post by **audington** » Mon Mar 19, 2012 10:50 am

filkertom wrote: As to the rest, like I said earlier: Band In A Box pwns this. Between having the piano RealTracks (i.e., recordings of real pianos) that adjust to every chord, and being able to use any VSTi for the MIDI -- oh, and, having thousands of styles you can mix and match, and lots more instruments, and and and -- EZ Piano seems pretty useless to me. And I did want it to be good.

Yup, I think that too, hence why in its current form EZKeys is just far too expensive. Band in a Box is amazing, but the interface is so bloody clunky... a true product of 15 years ago where features have been shoehorned in without ever having an interface upgrade. BaiB is definitely the most powerful and flexible songwriting software, but unless you use it all the time it's a nightmare to operate

EZKeys has that bit nailed - the interface is super slick and even without reading the docs you can take to it like a duck to water. I only wish for EZkeys to have a fraction more of BaiB's functionality, or for BiaB to have an interface upgrade and to make flexible song structure more accessible (not everyone wants to write AABA form!)

braj · Post by **braj** » Mon Mar 19, 2012 11:31 am

I like http://www.chordpulse.com/ it is no Band in a Box but PG Music could learn a lot about interface design from this app, and if you are looking for some backing track help with a decent variety of styles and flexibility, it is pretty cool, and pretty cheap. As a quick tool to work out chord progressions it is really neat.

I got this response from the developer when asking about a VST version:

I'm working on a comprehensive but easy and convenient music style editor (including support for style variations (e.g. verse, chorus, bridge, etc.), drum fills). Unfortunately, I cannot tell you when this will be available, it will take several months.

Regarding VSTi version: Yes, this would be nice, I have thought about this, but first I would like to add the music style editor, support for custom chords, new music styles, several minor improvements, release ChordPulse for Mac and iPad. I try to do my best.

filkertom · Post by **filkertom** » Mon Mar 19, 2012 11:43 am

Trust me, guys, there's lots of noise on the PG forums about dragging BIAB's interface into the 21st century. There are some movable toolbars now, and you can delete things from 'em, but honestly the best looking change at this point is to simply change the fonts and lock the number of rows of bars on screen. We hope for a better interface someday.

As audington implies, though, once you get used to it it's pretty easy.

And don't get me started on AABA. I have found so many ways to overcome that in BIAB, and they even have many more possible configurations now (having enabled more than two business variations, so you can have ABAC, for instance), but there's still the dang 256-bar limit for the sake of backward compatibility....

... and dang, braj, you're right about ChordPulse. That's a nice li'l program there.

Toontrack EZKeys!