The 10th instrument in the free Blueprint series is now revealed, and this one’s a special.
Presenting Fracture Sounds’ first piano-based library, Blueprint Epic Grand is the latest free Native Instruments Kontakt Player-supported VST.
Similar to another recently released freebie (the Plucked Grand Piano by SoundPaint), this new Blueprint instrument seems like yet another successful take at experimental sampling.
Although not mechanically manipulated like the above mentioned, Epic Grand brings acoustic recordings of a Steinway Model D concert piano, sampled in octaves. The instrument was captured in a large concert hall for enhanced dramaticism, utilizing multiple microphones in the process.
Conceptually, Epic Grand piano serves as an experimental, film-orientated sound design instrument that was made to complement the more specific genres and styles. It’s not your typical, classical sounding Steinway and shouldn’t be treated as such. Instead, this roughly 4GB Kontakt instrument gives you a different kind of piano – one that is pre-stacked with a bunch of octave intervals played loudly – offering a sound that is rather very bright, cinematically dramatic, harmonically rich and unique.
Microphone Positions
For those of you that follow the blog, the Perspective feature is a relatively new Blueprint feature which I covered quite extensively in my Blueprint Gentle Strings library review, where it was first introduced. In short, it offers a more advanced and dynamic approach to the conventional manual mix of microphones, using distance-based parameters (such as close and far) to determine the utilisation of each mic signal.
Personally, I like to look at this Perspective feature as another expression control (as I demonstrate in my Gentle Strings YouTube demo). I am not exactly sure if a piano library actually needs it, but it’s a nice luxury to have so there are no real complaints here.
Individually, I find the Close microphone in Blueprint Epic Grand to be rather usable on its own. The proximity of the microphone to the piano, the piano strings and the hammered keys was able to capture quite a lot and every element can be heard in much detail. This, of course, adds even more charm to an already special sounding piano VST instrument.
I also like the Mid microphone they included here, which pairs quite decently with the first one. The third microphone (“Far”), on the other hand, is just a little too reverberant to my music making philosophy. Generally, when the goal is a more cohesive mix, I usually prefer the pliability and workability of dryer signals over sounds that are more wet and acoustically spacious, particularly when considering reverb sends and other space-generating/spatial-based effects (or any FX manipulation pretty much).
Dynamics and Features
Tonal Range, Instrument Dynamics
All sampled notes across the virtual keyboard seem to have at least two round robin variations. There are also a couple of dynamic velocity layers (in the low/mid registers) as well as Release triggers all across.
The playable range of the instrument is visually split into two sections – the low/mid section on the left which has darker-blue colored keys, and the mid/high section on the right which is represented in lighter blue/cyan.
The higher range of this piano sounds very impressive and is a joy to play really, but I am quite disappointed with the lower end of the instrument which feels more muddy and distorted the deeper you go.
Also, it is worth noting that due to the tonal alterations performed on this piano and the use of stacked octaves instead of singular notes, the instrument has a significantly smaller (playable) range than the 88-key Steinway standard. The layering of the lowest and the toppest octaves generates a much more modest range that is exactly five-and-a-half octaves – hence a total of 66 playable notes (or keys).
Additional Features, Sound Design and Effects
The Blueprint Epic Grand Kontakt interface provides exactly four FX modules: Colour (one knob EQ), Hype (which is a volume/gain compressor/saturator), a Stereo Width feature and Reverb.
Additional features such as Sample Start (offset) and Velocity Response (key sensitivity) can be accessed through the left-sided extra panel.
Blueprint Epic Grand works in the free Kontakt Player 7 (and up). The Native Instruments sampler is available in stand-alone, VST (VST3), AAX & AU plugin formats as well as NKS for 64-bit Windows and macOS.
