🎹Vienna Symphonic Library: Bosendorfer 130 Upright Piano VST Plugin Review & Demo🎹

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#VSL #Bosendorfer #Piano
Greetings and welcome to the Merriam Pianos KZbin channel. We’ve got another VST video for you here, but we’re going to be looking at something a little bit different in this video. Instead of looking at a grand piano plugin, we’ll be checking out Vienna Symphonic Library’s Bosendorfer 130 upright piano plugin.
Upright piano patches, both with VST’s and digital pianos, are seldom talked about and focused on, and frankly, often forgotten. We love VSL’s other plugins so we’re excited to dive in here.
If this is your first time on the channel please like, subscribe, and hit that notification bell!
Opening Remarks
It’s fair to say that upright pianos really do get the short end of the stick in the digital piano emulation universe. Now, there are some logical reasons for this. When most people think about digitally recreating an acoustic piano, the vast majority of the time the focus will be to emulate the best possible piano, which is of course going to be a large, high-end grand piano.
On most digital pianos that even include an upright piano sample, they are not well rendered and generally not usable.
The thing is though, a great upright piano in real life is a different but equally musically compelling experience to playing a great grand piano.
The Bosendorfer 130 is one such piano, and without question one of the top 5 upright pianos on the planet.
Sound
The first thing that jumps out about playing this Bosendorfer 130 patch is just how excellent the sustain is. The amount of damper resonance is just amazing. Even without reverb and changing to a minimal mic setup, the tone is just so resonant.
It doesn’t respond perfectly for more jazz-like playing, but for really melodic and pad/sustain like playing, the tone is perfect.
There are different presets to choose from, and for instance, the Concert setting is even more reverberant.
There are also a bunch of effects presets you can get into as well, some of which are very fun to mess around with.
Other editable parameters include cabinet resonance, sympathetic resonance, timbre shift, MIDI sensitivity, pedaling, dynamic range, reverb etc.
Closing Thoughts
Overall, this patch is really unique and modern, with an incredible amount of cabinet resonance and a very immediate attack. Like all VSL patches, the 130 offers an immersive playing experience and immersive post production experience as if you were mixing an acoustic piano after a recording session.
It’s going to be your go to option for every project, but it’s definitely a worthwhile patch for your arsenal. We could see it being a great creative aid when composing, and there’s definitely situations where you would want to record with this piano.
Moving forward, we hope some of the world’s other top upright pianos get this same, high quality VST treatment.
Thanks so much for watching!
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[@dynoroad]

Sounds absolutely glorious... Far better than most mid tier, mid sized grands I would say.

[@smplchmp]

Your playing in this review is some of my favorite of all your reviews. I can tell that the experience of playing this instrument is special, thanks for sharing!

[@christophertown8843]

I don't comment on YT Videos that often, but I'm a huge of fan of both your playing and this particular VST sound. Absolutely wonderful. Warm, nuanced and in no way distinguishable from the original. Truly stunning.

[@benjaminsmith2287]

Sounds great. I'm a big fan of the Bosey 130.

[@Instrumental-Covers]

I just pumped Stu's playing through the speaker system of my Yamaha DGX 670 (which has two woofers and two tweeters). On top of that, I reinforce the sound with two open baffle full range satellite speakers to add a sense of room ambience and increase the detail in the upper midrange/treble, and then compared it with the built-in piano samples of the digital piano. I tried to imitate Stu's playing (not very successful at it lol) trying to get the same type of music, key and chords he was using. The purpose was to get an idea of how this vst piano compares with the built-in CFX. Of course, they are different pianos and different techniques to sample them, etc. I must add that the DGX 670 is, as far as I know, even more sophisticated than the Yamaha P515, which is twice the price. The amount of parameters you can control in the DGX 670 is higher, and you can go to submenus (touch sense depth, offset, portamento, modulation, brightness, harmonic content, attack, decay, release, vibrato, and a large list of DSP effects that can be adjusted to minute details). It comes with Virtual Resonance modeling, lid position, etc. So, you can have a great deal of control over the piano sound. Don't assume that Yamaha is "bright" and "simple sound with too much fundamental and little harmonics". As I said, you can adjust the harmonic content to make it sound like the harmonic content in the default treble of the Kawai ES920, or tame the brightness to make it more warm. That's why you buy a digital piano with sound control settings, to adjust it. This is what I find: vst pianos make sense for a recording session, but they don't have a significant advantage (if at all) over digital pianos for live sound. I would say my DGX 670 can be adjusted to sound basically like this vst piano, because you have so much control over the sample. In fact, I have stored presets in my DGX 670 titled "Sangah Noona" (popular jazz player who owns a Shigeru Kawai SK6), "ES920", "Jacob Koller" (Yamaha sounds), and so on. If you are going to play a digital piano in a live setting, you want to invest in a good set of speakers. You will also need a stage monitor. That is a minimum. And I doubt your audience is going to notice the difference between your vst and your digital piano, mainly because of the speakers. The upper partials aren't likely to be projected properly in a live situation, which would nullify any advantage a vst could have over a digital piano. Now, if you are sitting in front of a pair of studio monitors 2 feet away from you, and that's how you play piano, or if you use headphones, these vst pianos make sense. If you are going to record solo pieces, they are great for that. But the minute you talk about live sound, I would say don't waste your time on vst pianos. Go to a store and buy a pair of QSC speakers or Yamaha PA speakers concert series (they have several lines of professional speakers). And don't forget a stage monitor for yourself, because all you will hear is a rumble piano sound as the HF drivers are pointing at the audience. If you want to put a piano sound in a room, even in a small room, not just for you but for an audience, then vst pianos and digital pianos (the good ones) will sound similar. Don't assume what you hear if what the other people hear. You step away from a digital piano just 1 or 2 feet away from your privileged position, and the sound becomes much smaller, more localized, less inspiring. So, my take is: for live sound, spend more on speakers, and worry less on details of the sample because chances are you will not be able to get it to your audience.

[@Javier-jn6cc]

Great video! Would appreciate a video review of the actual Bösendorfer 130 CL. Thanks!

[@MerriamPianos]

Thanks so much! And thank you for the suggestion! We will do our best to tackle that review for you in the future. :)

[@calikokat100]

I miss my Heintzman upright,,,having said that VSL Bosendorfer 130 Upright Piano is my favorite VSL :)

[@MerriamPianos]

It is a wonderful VST plugin for those seeking an excellent upright piano sound. :)

[@BlueGrovyle]

Funny enough, it sounds way more like a real piano to me than the library of the Imperial does. Super pretty. Thanks for all your videos, Stu. We appreciate your perspective on all these products, as well as the samples to listen to.

[@SessionsWithMike]

Wow! This library has so much character and the attack is so authentic. Great playing and great video.

[@BlueGrovyle]

I agree; I'd argue the attack is more realistic (or at least it sounds like it is) than most of the other piano libraries at VSL. Definitely sounds quite like a piano. The upper range has some seriously pretty sound too.

[@Instrumental-Covers]

Differences between Kawai and Yamaha regarding digital pianos (specifically the CA series vs Clavinova CLP series): Kawai places their acoustic grand piano in an anechoic chamber, record the sound for their samples, then use Harmonic Imaging XL and modeling engines to simulate the rest of the sound complexities, on top of that dry sound. Yamaha, on the other hand, has a $100,000,000.00 Innovation Center with one of the largest anechoic chambers in Japan, and also a speaker testing room. In this state-of-the-art building, they have a studio (which is home to a CFX) where they sample the CFX, and this room is also used to compare digital pianos with their acoustic counterparts. After the samples are taken, they place the digital piano in an anechoic chamber to fine-tune the speaker system and make it free of room acoustics. But it doesn't stop there: then they place their digital pianos in a hemi-anechoic chamber (it sort of resembles an icosahedron), where they perform a three-dimensional analysis of the digital piano sound pressure to measure and adjust the sound for authentic acoustic piano sound. They state that it is more than just perfect reproduction, they also put the digital piano in a 3D chamber to capture all elements of the hearing experience, such as the impression of space. I think this is a point where Kawai and Yamaha differ: their approaches to the sound ultimately produced by their digital pianos. While Kawai seems to pay attention to the sample and a good speaker system, Yamaha seems to seek organic integration of speakers and sample to provide an overall authentic acoustic representation. In other words: Kawai approaches the issue as the sum of its parts, trying to improve each part by itself, while Yamaha's samples and speakers are more synergistically blended. Kawai does not make any mention of how they adjust the speaker system for authentic piano reproduction to give the impression of space. Maybe it is not adjusted in the same sophisticated manner as Yamaha does.

[@Zoco101]

Wow! That's interesting. The important thing is what works, works, but I appreciate the concept of a piano being much more than just the sum of its parts. In the same manner, a piano doesn't really shine until a performance is in flow and assorted notes are beating against one another. Pressing down one key tells you almost nothing about a piano, because the accummulated sound of the strings or samples is much more than 88 pretty but isolated notes. 6 notes together are arguably 6x6 (36) while 1 is only 1x1. It's a crude mathematecal analogy, but it explains why Stu doesn't waste time pressing individual keys when he is demonstrating what a piano can do.

[@Instrumental-Covers]

@@Zoco101 Very true. It is unfortunate that he wasted time pressing individual treble keys when comparing the Yamaha P515 vs Kawai ES8 in a previous video, trying to imply that the sound of the Bösendorfer (2nd piano sample) was "pingy" as opposed to rich in overtones in the ES8, and therefore, the ES8 was "better". Of course, we know that Merriam Music is not a Yamaha dealer and they need to push Kawai sales. His analysis of acoustic pianos are less biased than his reviews against Yamaha digital pianos, probably because they sell all those pianos in their showroom, so there is no need to put down any instrument.

[@marianogringaus]

Thanks so much. I love your videos very much. Also your playing! Is this the best upright sampled piano today? what do you think?

[@MerriamPianos]

You're very welcome! Thank you for tuning in! At the end of the day, the "best" sample is the right sample for the job. The nice thing about VST plugins is that they don't take up any physical real estate, so there is virtually no restriction to how many you can have access to. Having a large collection of sample sets to choose from for the right musical situations and repertoire. :)

[@marianogringaus]

@@MerriamPianos Thanks for the quick response. Which other good upright pianos are there to buy besides the 2 of VSL? Regards from Germany, the home of Bach and Steinway.

[@mfurman]

I got it today. Thank you Stu.

[@MerriamPianos]

Amazing! You're very welcome! I hope you enjoy everything the plugin offers musically! :)

[@Zoco101]

One of the few tweaks I can do to my Yamaha P-255 is increase the sustain. This definitely helps me, so I see what Stu means about having plenty of it on this virtual instrument. I also increased the sympathetic vibration.

[@Transterra55]

Such a lovely, resonant sound....reminds me of my old Steinway upright I had many years ago. I actually prefer this sound over many of the grand pianos you have reviewed. The Pop preset reminds me of the Vince Guaraldi sound.

[@qhazwel]

Does it do a saloon style ( I believe you called it vintage upright)? Serious question. I was listening to engelbert humperdinck, "Last waltz" and just fell in love with that twangy piano. I love that sound!!! Can you recommend a program for that?

[@MerriamPianos]

Hi Will! Are you referring to a "honky tonk" piano? If so, there Syntheway has one called the "H-Tonk Tack Piano", which you can check out here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/ooCskIqsqtKKqpY It is a very cool sound and could certainly be the ideal choice for the right musical moments! :)

[@music86999]

Merci pour cet agréable moment musical, une présentation magnifique! Un univers pianistique sublime!

[@Zoco101]

The more I listen, the more I like this virtual instrument.

[@JibberJabJones]

first piano vst i've heard that doesn't sound thin, over-compressed and plastic. is it possible to make the piano sound completely dry in the reverb department? like it's being played in a small, dead studio?

[@MerriamPianos]

Hi! Brent from Merriam Music here! I don't have any firsthand experience with this specific Bosendorfer 130 sample set, but, perhaps, one of our helpful community members here can chime in and clarify whether that is possible. :)

[@HeartMere]

Thanks for perfect review!

[@MerriamPianos]

You're welcome! Thanks for tuning in! :)

[@hosseinjavidiniroomand]

Nice and beautiful. Because inspiring and useful for me as a professional composer. Many thanks🙏🌹❤🌹🌹

[@elizabethvhwong]

Beautiful sound.

[@roryonabike5863]

Given VSL's pice for its upright, and VILabs's considerably better price for its Yamaha Modern U, I would have thought that you'd say something about whether there's a difference in quality, and if so whether it justifies the major difference in price. I also think that you should be talking about Pianobook, or don't Christian Henson, who started Pianobook, and Spitfire Audio exist in your rarified world of outfits like VSL :)

[@Zoco101]

Thanks for this Stu. So right about the uprights getting overlooked. Arguably, some of the older jazz sounds best on an upright - no I don't mean a honky tonk. And (the better) upright actions still have a place of their own too, particularly in education. We know that the NV5(s) has an upright action, so I'm a little surprised that the Shigeru SK-EX patch occupies 90% of the marketing for that instrument. Doesn't it feature a good upright patch as well? Sometimes I think that manufacturers forget that a digital piano is typically an alternative to buying an upright, and they should prioritise in helping it to performing upright functions as well as possible.

[@Instrumental-Covers]

Kawai digital pianos do include upright pianos... not sure if they are good quality. Kawai does not say they sample all 88 keys of their upright pianos... in fact, they don't even mention how they get the sample of the upright pianos. Probably a poor sample, compared to the effort they make for the Shigeru sample. Typically, the best sound is the first one and you can skip the rest. I agree with you that digital pianos don't give much attention to upright pianos. The NV5S is an upright piano trying to imitate a Kawai upright acoustic piano, despite all the Shigeru Kawai samples in it. There is a channel of another Kawai dealer who compares a K300 and an NV5S, and the K300 still sounds much more resonant and alive than the NV5S. After all, the speaker system of the NV5S is set up like an upright piano (well, strictly speaking, not even!), so it will not sound like a grand. I guess all the marketing goes to make people believe they are playing a concert grand, when in reality the sound that comes out of those digital pianos has the sound field of a bad upright piano. With the exception of the NV10S, the rest of Kawai digital pianos are nothing grand (speaker-wise). But the NV10S is a poor effort speaker-wise, with 4 tiny 4" drivers on top driven by a stereo amplifier and nothing below except a woofer around the pedals. Much better than that is the Yamaha AvantGrand N3X, which has 12 speakers with 12 amplifiers properly distributed in a 3-way configuration and 4 different true stereo channels, where the microphones were placed, two resonator boards close to the player for upper harmonics, transducers to simulate the vibrations, and a piano lid to channel the sound towards the audience. The AvantGrand is the only hybrid piano on the market fitted with a speaker system that more authentically simulates the sound field of a grand piano.

[@Zoco101]

@@Instrumental-Covers Everything you are saying in your reply makes perfect sense to me. Implementation is a huge factor. Yamaha seems to have the edge with speaker variety and speaker placement on digital and hybrid pianos. But not having tried the very best Kawai digital/hybrid pianos myself, it's still guesswork. It must be frustrating for classical music students who are genuinely seeking a substitute for a good upright, but are told that they are getting a substitute for a grand piano. And in the end they get neither one thing nor the other. Should it matter? Well maybe. The NV5S is the only hybrid boasting an upright action, but Kawai and the assorted reviewers push the Shigeru SK-EX patch ad nauseum, irrespective of the application. For anyone who genuinely wants a quality upright feel and sound together in a digital/hybrid piano, good luck finding these things!

[@Instrumental-Covers]

@@Zoco101 I think you summarized it in one word: implementation. You can't get a grand piano experience if you are playing a spinet-type console like a CA79/99 or a medium-sized upright style like the NV5S. I recently played the CA79, which has the same sound engine that the CA99/NV5S have, but it has two woofers below the key bed rather than the small wooden resonator Kawai calls soundboard. They didn't have the CA99/NV5S at that moment, but according to the Kawai dealer I visited, both salespeople told me they were not impressed by the "soundboard", and the manager called it "just a piece of wood". My experience with the CA79 is that the tweeters sounded a bit harsh or disconnected from the rest of the sound, a bit tiny, not exactly rich and with presence. The CA79 has a small cabinet and the sound was not immersive. They also had a DG30 digital midi grand, but the sound system was very mediocre. It made the body of the piano vibrate unnaturally and sounded harsh and dull. Yamaha also uses two types of anechoic chambers to fine-tune their digital pianos: a true anechoic chamber and a 3D hemi-anechoic chamber that measures sound pressure and adjust the speakers to simulate the sound file of a piano.

[@Zoco101]

@@Instrumental-Covers Well, maybe Kawai went a bit shrill with the Onkyo speakers. I doubt there is any real sound improvement in the ES-920 over the ES8, except perhaps that there are more speakers. The Yamaha P-255 sounds better to me than the ES-920, though it is a much older piano. I prefer its CF patch to the Shigeru SK-EX, and I think I prefer the speakers too. I haven't been able to try a P-515 yet.

[@Instrumental-Covers]

@@Zoco101 The ES920 has the same speakers that the ES8, it is just a couple of oval speakers, TV style, which are ported for bass. They just added a few watts to the amplifier, which doesn't necessarily mean you will need it or use it. It is the same speaker system basically. Yamaha typically beats Kawai in actual sound through their speakers.

[@loboestepario003]

The Vsl pianos and the Ví labs pianos are the Best sample base pianos try the modern U it's an amazing upright piano

[@benjaminsmith2287]

Modern U is wonderful.

[@JoeLinux2000]

I own an antique upright at the present time, but I'm thinking of putting a Casio inside the rather nice case.

[@Instrumental-Covers]

Sounds like a fun experiment. I would keep the soundboard and strings, and fit it with two or four Dayton transducers. You will then have the type of setup that you get in a Kawai K200-ATX4 hybrid. By the way, that piano is about $12,000. You will get the sound of your Casio channeled through the soundboard.

[@Zoco101]

Internet Privacy: I often wonder how well an 88-note DP can fit in an upright, without massive changes to the DP. I suspect that a 73-note piano such as the CP-73 might fit better. It is quite slimline, and has some great features. But maybe it's too expensive for this purpose. Costs around €1700. The Viscount K5 (73-note) is much cheaper (around €1200) but perhaps it's too deep, and it is a deep blue colour too. A Yamaha P-121 might be a good candidate, subject to depth fitting.

[@Instrumental-Covers]

@@Zoco101 There is a video of somebody dismantling a Casio Privia PX870 to pieces and fitting it inside a baby grand piano. He did have to remove the case of the Privia. He removed the strings and frame of the piano and fit the Casio speakers in the soundboard. I think that was a mistake. He should have left the strings and buy 4 Dayton transducers and attach it to the soundboard. I have done that experiment, which is basically the same approach found in the most advanced hybrid pianos: the Yamaha TransAcoustic and Kawai AURES/ATX-4. If I had a real piano to spare, I would remove the action only, but not the strings. Once you activate the transducers, the strings will also be activated, which in turn will activate the soundboard, and you get true sympathetic resonance, unlike those synthesized resonances in digital pianos. Using speakers and throwing the soundboard is like a step back, sound wise. The heart of a piano is the soundboard.

[@hz7984]

Hello Stu, Thanks for many useful videos. Be absolutely sure to check out, and make a great video of, VI Labs' Modern U. Chances are you'll be very pleasantly surprised. Then, go nuts and make a comparison video between that and the B130 🙂. Cheers!

[@EdPin_]

8:16 Splendid :)

[@jpdj2715]

Very nice playing. I'm not a fan of the B brand in general, but this "upright" hits a chord with me. The midrange is beautiful. The "Player" microphone placement gave a very realistic soundstage sitting at computer desk as if you are at the piano. When you went to the more remote listening position, the soundstage became unrealistic, first and then the larger space did well again.

[@CanaldoOTA]

Modern U!!!!!!!!!

[@CanaldoOTA]

BTW, beautiful playing(as always, STU)

[@ausrider99]

Sounds good but not as good as real - we own a Bosendorfer 130 upright.

[@Zoco101]

I daresay you're right. But if you're only hearing the VSL version through KZbin streaming...

[@ausrider99]

@@Zoco101 We have heard the VST in real life on monitor headphones.

[@BlueGrovyle]

@@ausrider99 I think Mike's point is that you probably can't tell the difference between recording the upright manually and simply using the recordings the professionals at VSL have made. Or, if you can, VSL would likely come out on top.

[@ausrider99]

@@BlueGrovyle I am a professional sound engineer.