Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Digital Pianos - Electronic Pianos - Synths & Keyboards Resonance in low end of FP-50 in earphones as well as spkrs

I would really appreciate it if you could all give your impression if this is something that could be fixed easily enough by a Roland service center or I really need to send this back. I'll have to find another source if I do, as the company has no others in stock. I really would prefer to have it repaired if it looks like a repair would be successful. But if the resolution is in doubt, I guess I will have to send it back.

I have recorded the resonance for your appreciation(not):

B1,

https://soundcloud.com/user783695884/b1-with-notes-above-and-belowwav

https://soundcloud.com/user783695884/b1wav

G2,

https://soundcloud.com/user783695884/g2-with-notes-above-and-belowwav

https://soundcloud.com/user783695884/g2wav

A little history here, https://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/2294093/Re:_All_about_Roland_FP-80_&am.html#Post2294093

Thanks all,

Hi Tuneless.

A couple of things I need to clarify.

This is direct wav recording to a USB stick?

I think what you are hearing is the resonance of the Harp or Frame of the grand pianos captured to make the Supernatural sound. This can be especially apparent at forte and fortissimo levels as you played here. Based on what I hear, I don't think that there's anything a technician can do to make changes to the piano. This is inherent to the SuperNatural piano engine. The next FP-50 will sound the same.

A couple of parameters you can adjust to attenuate the resonance you're hearing are the KeyTouch, as you're hitting the notes pretty hard in isolation. Try turning the Key Touch up to "heavy".

Also, as described on page 17 of your owners manual, in the EQ section, try adjusting the high mid eq to between 1-2K hz and dial in a cut of around 3db.

This should help.

Jay

Tuneless,
Your FP-50 isn't broken. As a former Roland DP owner, I can affirm: that's just the way Roland's SuperNatural piano engine behaves. It's a very cool technology, but it sounds a little weird from time to time. Some folks really like the SuperNatural sound, and some don't.

Small changes in velocity can produce a quite significant difference in timbre, and consequently some people find the SuperNatural pianos a bit artificial or hard to control. If you search the archives here you'll find a fair amount of discussion about this.

Meaning no offense, because you obviously have very sharp ears, as well as a methodical approach to investigating quirky software, I think your options will be:

a) get over the peccadillos of the SuperNatural piano and enjoy your new FP-50; or,
b) return it and choose a product from another manufacturer.

Kind regards,

Ben

Well, I guess I will make one more trip to a Sam Ash to see if the one they have on the floor does the same thing. If it does, I guess I will live with this, but it sounds to me, that if this was in the recording of the original piano, some one was delinquent in making sure all the fittings on the piano were tight. Not trying to be negative, but that is what it sounds like, and if I heard this on my acoustic, I would be searching for the cause. But let's not jump to conclusions until I can hear another FP-50.

My recordings were made using the USB stick in the back of the piano and rec mode of the FP-50 and with all personalization settings turned off, and ambiance off as well a good part of the time I was testing these keys. Ambiance being on or off made no difference.

I'll go do a factory reset just to be sure that makes no difference.

That is a resonance that is inherent to all acoustic pianos in varying degrees. Tight or loose fittings will have no effect on it whatsoever. It sounded like a normal FP-50 to me.

What you're hearing is the "brassiness" of a bass string struck hard, that is reverberating through the iron plate and soundboard of the piano. Without it, there would be no "fff" dynamics.

I've compared what you posted for recordings to recordings I've made of an FP-80, that has the same piano engine, and the lower notes exhibit the same characteristics to differing degrees depending on how the notes are played. In isolation, it will drive you nuts now you know about it, but in normal playing, you'll almost never notice that they are there.

The Speaker system and possible resonances in your room can accentuate these characteristics. But they are present in every SuperNatural piano.

Acoustic pianos all have some amount of variation in tone from note to note, but I'm sure that Roland and its competitors are very attentive to quality control during original sampling. I believe abrupt discontinuities of the kind you discovered are more likely caused by the "secret sauce" of modeling/processing/black magic that Roland's SuperNatural piano engine uses in conjunction with sampled piano sounds, than by artifacts embedded in the original samples.

I owned a Roland SuperNatural piano for four years, and found that certain notes sometimes "barked" at me a little bit when played ff or fff, as if small changes in the upper range of the velocity curve caused more tonal variation than would have occurred naturally in an acoustic piano. I think some other posters here characterize that quality as a "metallic" sound.

It didn't bother me in daily playing; I liked my Roland very much.

I actually like that kind of variation in timbre. If you think that's a lot of variation, you should try some sample libraries!

Greg.