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Well, not necessarily, this also occurs when layering identical sounds, as indicated before. That's a unique CA93/CA63 feature by the way!



Yes, given that Kawai tuning is consistent over the whole dynamic range (ppp -> fff). As an analogy, you could just compare it to dedicated fine detune parameters for two oscillators and I'm sure you'll recognise the point made.
http://csound.noisepages.com/2010/10/detuned-oscillators/

Additional:
In general, layer dynamics works like a charm: please note that when playing pianissimo, the two layered sounds tend to be of more equal volume in many of my presets, compared to playing mezzoforte or fortissimo. That's why the pianissimo remark of CyberGene is correct.

James, thank you for your comments

Regarding the normalization - usually I am normalizing to -1dB, because I've noticed that 0dB leads to crackles with some audio cards (and/or headphones/speakers). This time I've forgotten and normalized again to the default 0dB and that could be part of the problem you mention.

Yes, my speakers were crackling a little, now that you come to mention it...although this may also be because they're not terribly good quality.

Cheers,
James
x

I like Chopin very much, but at first I thought: how did you manage to practice this particular piece (unknown to me) for hours without getting a nervous breakdown? Then, after listening to it many more times, it really seems to grow on me too, becoming so deeply addictive and dramatic: great sound and playing style!

Thanks for your encouraging comments, Pini!
Here's the one-and-only Yamaha C7 vs Kawai RX-7 shootout, check it out:


CLASSY YAMAHA C7 R1.0

Dual Voice: Concert Grand, volume 4 + Concert Grand 2, volume 6

1 Basic Settings
1 - 3 Tone control: low +1, mid -4, high -4

2 Virtual Technician
2 - 1 Voicing: mellow 1
2 - 2 Damper resonance: 10
2 - 3 String resonance: 10
2 - 4 Key off effect: 9
2 - 5 Touch: light
2 - 8 Stretch tuning: Wide

3 Key Settings
3 - 4 Layer dynamics: 8

Reverb: Hall 2

Effect: Delay 2, time 1, depth 6


---------------------------------------------------------------


CLASSY KAWAI RX-7 R1.0

Dual Voice: Concert Grand, volume 6 + Concert Grand 2, volume 4

1 Basic Settings
1 - 3 Tone control: low +2, mid -4, high -6

2 Virtual Technician
2 - 1 Voicing: mellow 2
2 - 2 Damper resonance: 10
2 - 3 String resonance: 10
2 - 4 Key off effect: 8
2 - 5 Touch: light
2 - 8 Stretch tuning: Wide

3 Key Settings
3 - 4 Layer dynamics: 9

Reverb: Hall 2

Effect: Delay 3, time 1, depth 4

Let's share another undocumented KAWAI CA93/CA63 feature:


ABOUT DUAL VOICE MODE NON-LINEARITY

With a linear DP (and dual voice mode support):
Voice 1 + Voice 2 = Voice 2 + Voice 1 = New Sound

Our CA93/CA63 is a non-linear DP, offering much more diversity*:
Voice 1 + Voice 2 = New Sound A
Voice 2 + Voice 1 = New Sound B

If you don't believe it, DIY! (make sure you have set Volume Balance = 5-5 and Layer Dynamics = 10 for unbiased results)

*) Voice 1 and 2 are even allowed to be of the same (e.g. Piano) Sound Group and Layer Dynamics can be used to timbre match these voices.

I wish you all a merry Christmas and don't forget to enjoy your wonderful CA93/63 instrument.

Hear, hear!

Public announcement: there's a (slightly delayed) Christmas gift upcoming in the form of a CA93/CA63 preset that can be directly compared with the sound of this software EX Grand by Lance Herring: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0E_TSkkWxBs

Keywords: intimate pianissimos, thunderous fortissimos and great key-off resonances.

Allright, here's my much anticipated Christmas gift for you guys!

The below preset has been developed for direct comparison with the software EX Grand (a 17,49GB sample bank with no loops, recorded at 24Bits/48Khz): actually, I personally prefer this one with the heavy+ setting, yielding an intriguingly intimate and warm sound with unbelievable NICE !! pianissimo -> mezzoforte control (pump up your overall volume to really appreciate this). Enjoy!


TAKE THE EX TO THE MAX R1.0

Dual Voice: Concert Grand, volume 5 + Concert Grand 2, volume 5

1 Basic Settings
1 - 3 Tone control: low +3, mid -3, high +1

2 Virtual Technician
2 - 1 Voicing: dynamic
2 - 2 Damper resonance: 8
2 - 3 String resonance: 10
2 - 4 Key off effect: 10
2 - 5 Touch: heavy+ (closed lid) / heavy (half open lid) / normal (no lid ;-)
2 - 8 Stretch tuning: Wide

3 Key Settings
3 - 4 Layer dynamics: 10

Reverb: Hall 2

Effect: Delay 3, time 1, depth 4

Thanks for your gift and you've found another nice name for this one TAD! I'm hopping over to my (brand new) CA93 to give the new patch a spin. I'll be back with a comment later on, as well as with my personal top-8!

Great to hear! Quite curious what you'll come up with (as you may have discovered already, the CA93/CA63 have one more user memory space, so no worries if you happen to have a top-9)...

After playing my new CA93 for a couple of days now (love it!), here are my first (non-professional) impressions of the layered sounds (and I've tried them all! ):
8 available spots are for sure not enough! There must be a 9th one somehow but I don't know how to store it.
BTW A nice trick with visitors: play your favourite piece on the standard grand piano sound and ask them if they like it: they all do (so far). Then play the opening bars of Rach's 2nd Concerto (that's all I can play from this piece btw ) with the Brutal Bösendorfer patch to make them fall of their chairs.
In general I like 'heavy touch'.

My 8 spots are at the moment occupied with:

1. Steinway normal touch CA 93. For classical pieces this is by far my favourite. It has the most complex sound spectrum IMHO and gives you the opportunity to easily change colour, from angry to sweet, brilliant patch!
2. Bösendorfer. Impressive but difficult to play pianissimo with the light touch, not a very subtle patch IMHO, but still nice
3. Shigeru Kawai very wide-ranging, nice and clear piano sound, but again, difficult to play ppp.
4. The brand new EX to the Max very deep basses, nice discant (trebles), I use it with heavy, not heavy+ (too easy to play soft with that)
5. Red Piano Niiiice, I love playing Elton John, Billy Joel etc.... Put on some weird glasses and you're there. Great patch!
6. Supertramp 'Dreamer' Wurli sounds just like them
7. Heavy amped Rhodes has cost me a glass already
8. Hollywood Strings play two quick notes (D & F for instance) in the basses and you have the 'Jaws' theme!

Seriously, this is impressive stuff and a great plus to the basic sound library of the CA63/93
I find this thread highly informative and amusing at the same time. May it long continue! TADUTCHMAN
If only I knew what stretch tuning does???

...fulfilling all of the criteria as stated here at once:
http://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1509389.html#Post1509389

Thanks a lot for your feedback, vabejas! If you want to save your user memory settings, just check out Chapter 10, page 53 of the user manual, it's quite easy (once you know it). Following in the footsteps of Pinipon, you are hereby the second CA93/CA63 owner to be promoted to:

Kawai CA93/CA63 custom presets reviewer
That's some incredibly quick pioneering, having owned your CA93 for only a few days!

Thanks again! Some related info on stretch tuning is given here:
http://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1534373.html#Post1534373
If I recall correctly, CyberGene also commented on stretch tuning in this thread.

Stretched tuning is basically a tuning where the highest notes are tuned slightly higher than the mathematical values and the lowest notes are similarly tuned slightly lower in order to compensate for certain string irregularities (where higher overtones are not an exact factor of the fundamental but get slightly higher) and thus provide better overtone matching which arguably creates better sounding intervals. You can easily hear the difference if you play simultaneously the middle C and one of the higher C-s or E-s (for a major third across octaves) and switching between wide and normal. Stretched tuning sounds more lively when playing solo piano but can cause you troubles when played in ensemble with other instruments because it's mainly string instruments that posses that irregularity.

In short: use stretched (wide) when playin solo and equal (normal) when playing with other instruments.

Thanks for your detailed explanation Cybergene, I'll try it out, still learning all this.

Thanks for that TAD, I'll check it out!

Wow, really? I accept!

After seeing and hearing this guy live in Antwerp by coincidence yesterday, for a short moment I thought of the DIRTY UPRIGHT ROCK preset:

Hi TAD,

I like the C7 and RX-7 patches but the EX TO THE MAX R1.0 is a really gorgeous sound and goes directly to my favorites: I like to play it with half-open and open lid

+1

I think all CA93/63 owners agree with that: an "USB Settings Loader" would be a very useful feature, brings an added value to the instrument and has been requested for several months ago but unfortunately Kawai will not develop this feature maybe Kawai James could tell us something about it...