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Native Instuments' Crosstalk Piano
By Lars Deutsch
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Crosstalk Piano
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| Crosstalk Piano |
Crosstalk Piano by 10 Phantom Rooms for Native Instruments is an upright piano library combined with processed multisamples. It is an authentic piano emulation with additional layers of sub, air, attack, sustain, depth, noise, when needed.
Crosstalk Piano works with the free Kontakt Player 7, comes with 15GB of samples, and is easy to install via Native Access. It features 200 presets that include three sound variations each.
It is simple to adjust variation A,B,C to taste and save the individual settings. The A,B,C variations (or sub patches) are controlled via the mod wheel which corresponds to a slider in the GUI that shows how much of each variation is used.
Felt pianos have been very popular in scoring and introspective songs. Crosstalk can deliver well sampled mellow felt tones, but unlike a conventional felt piano library it offers the option to add brightness, attack or a booming sub.
The fluid adjustment from real to extended for any of the three tones is implemented very well. The generous amount of presets showcases the wide expressive range. In my day-to-day work as a composer, I often use two or three different piano libraries for full control over mellow and bright piano colors. A muffled piano that sits nicely behind the dialogue often does not work when you want a piano to play melody between words. Crosstalk can effortlessly slide or blend between blurred and precise sounds--between background and foreground sounds.
In my first test, I used a show theme that was originally written on synths to see if I could emulate all the sounds just using Crosstalk Piano. I was able to create long dark held out notes that evoke choirs or strings or synths quickly. Adding a little digital edge was no problem either. My second test was using Crosstalk for baroque music, essentially replacing a harpsichord and strings. The option to create a seamless fade from a harpsichord to a subdued blurry piano is unique and offers great creative flexibility. Not to mention precise control for transitions for scoring and pop arrangements. I liked using Crosstalk for creating a huge-sounding single piano note, often used in movie trailers.
It is hard to find fault in the idea and execution of Crosstalk Piano, especially from a media composer's perspective. I was not surprised to see a film composer among its developers. For the classical composer and pianist that is exclusively interested in naturalistic tones there are other libraries that focus on providing more dynamic layers. For the composer/producer who has more piano libraries that they can remember, Crosstalk has a very unique sound and offers something I've not seen in any other single piano library.
Crosstalk Piano sells for $149 US MSRP
Lars Deutsch is a composer/music producer in Los Angeles, CA. Check: Lars Deutsch
E-mail: mail@larsdeutsch@net
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