Hello Paul, mega thanks!

Just installed it. First impressions (and please forgive any excesses here; I've fallen in love with this instrument):-

This completely exquisite harp sounds so perfectly at home in Synchron Stage A; a match made in Heaven. I simply cannot imagine a better sound of a recorded harp. This is surely destined to be the world's No.1 pedal harp sample library.

Each and every Regular note is a hymn in itself, and Tina's consummate artistry beautifully expresses and subtly adorns all the Harmonic and Bisbigliando notes at every level of intensity. Expressive depth in spades!

A really superb production; my thanks and congratulations to each and every person involved in its making.

[P.S. Can't wait to get it into my Situater Orchestral Intonation subsystem and start playing some heavenly Pythagorean melodic lines. (Move over, Elysium, the Queen has arrived.)]

I just installed, but it's not showing up in the player. It's in the database. Have restarted the player, and the computer

I did the installation while the player was in use in Dorico; probably a mistake...

OPPPPS  New Player!

@Paul said:

Hi everybody,

It is here, our pride and joy: SYNCHRON HARP!

92 GB of samples, up to 8 velocities, each string sampled in each pedal position, repetitions, custom player with pedal simulation, and of course the trademark multi-mic recordings of our Synchron Series...

Check out our Introduction Video right here. 

The technical details of this virtual instrument are impressive - but you will not care about any of these as soon as you trigger the first notes and hear the magical sound this instrument will add to your productions!

Guy Bacos was inspired to this beautiful piece, combining it with Synchron Strings Pro, Synchron Elite Strings, Synchron Brass and the new Synchron Woodwinds!

Get your license for this angelic instrument during the intro sale for just:
- Standard: € 145 (regular € 195)
- Full Library: € 255 (regular € 345)

With best wishes from Vienna!

Just downloaded and its fantastic. Awaiting some extended techinques to complete a brilliant library!

Congratulations on another brilliant release. The harp sounds magnificent, and the pedal mode is brilliant.

Any ETA on an update for VE Pro including the ability to insert the new harp player?

Merry christmas

Hi, 

Thanks for your kind feedback!

You can already add the Synchron Harp in VE Pro, just like any other plug-in (it does't have a dedicated button yet). 

Best, 
Paul

@Paul said:

Hi, 

Thanks for your kind feedback!

You can already add the Synchron Harp in VE Pro, just like any other plug-in (it does't have a dedicated button yet). 

Best, 
Paul

D'oh! Thanks Paul. I'm a moron. 😊

New Synchron Harp is amazing, both in sound and design - thank you!!! Only thing missing is pres de la table - any chance that might be added?

Congratulations on a great product!

Hi, 

Glad you like our Synchron Harp! No plans for any additions in the near future. But you are right, there are many options indeed!

Best, 
Paul

In regular play mode, are their "round robins" at each of the 8 velocities? If so, how many? Thanks! Steve

Hi, 

If you can't find out how many robbins there are, we must have done something right 😊.
So there are enough round robbins for each of the 8 velocities of each string, and each string was recorded with the 3 possible pedal settings. 

That's also part of a new approach we established with our Synchron Series: We're getting away from numbers as indicators and want our users to focus on the musical qualities of the recorded instrument. In our eyes, this is an approach that helps both us and our users emphasize the musical aspects rather than the raw technical data, also in product descriptions and ads. 

As a result, we are not adding every detail to our product descriptions. Of course there's always the sample number there.... 63.184 Samples that capture the sounds the 47 strings of our Synchron Harp can produce... 

Best, 
Paul

Thank you, Paul! That's a fair answer, which got me thinking of another question I hadn't considered. As a pianist, I've been using the chromatic mode because it is easier on the brain. If I use the pedal mode instead, will there be a noticeable difference in the musical aspects that I hear? It sounds like this might be the case if you've sampled each string in different pedal settings. Thanks, Steve

So glad to see this addition to the Synchron libraries, especially since I mentioned it here in the BBO poll. 😊 It's kind of disappointing though to see there aren't any glissandos that can be triggered with a key, or at the very least some sort of sequencer to create them within the player. It would be amazing and invaluable to be able to do this, especially since I am planning on using the harp for live musical theater performances where this type of thing is a very common occurrence.

Also, I'm having an issue with the harp player always opening saved presets to pedal mode rather than chromatic. I've tried the standalone version, VST 64bit and VST3 versions. I'm using Windows 10 (everything is updated as much as it can be) and have tried them in both VST Host and VEP and get the same results. I also tested this with previous versions of the Harp player and received the same results. I will send an email to support shortly to hopefully figure this out.

BTW, Happy New Year!!

Wow, I'm still ramping up on this product and had just assumed that pre-recorded glissandos would be part of it (like original VSL harp product). Fingers crossed that VSL will bring us a future version that includes these glissandos and the pres de la table sound that is so beautiful - then we'll have all the functionality we had in the original VSL harp product. Thanks! Steve

Hello T.J. and Steve!

We are aware of the problem that saved projects get opened with pedal mode and will fix that as soon as possible. Sorry for the inconvinience that this has caused.

We think that with the pedal mode of the harp we have something way better to offer than pre-recorded glissandos. In pedal-mode you can perform any possible glissando with every possible speed and with every possible start and target note easily yourself. Just set up the pedals and perform the glissando on the white keys. This should also work well for live performances in theaters, because you can easily make your pedalisation presets with the pedaling banks.
https://www.vsl.info/en/manuals/synchron-harp-player/introduction

You can find all details on how to use the pedal mode and the pedaling banks in the Synchron Harp Player manual.
https://www.vsl.info/en/manuals/synchron-harp-player/gui-overview

Best regards,
Andi

Thanks for the update Andi!

I'll keep an open mind and try creating my own glissandos as you've described. One issue for me is that my controller keyboard is Kawai fully-weighted piano action, and it is rough on the hands to perform glissandos on that keyboard. Of course, I could get an additional keyboard but if I am buying additional keyboards every time a plug in requires it I'm going to have to answer to my already very tolerant spouse for that!

Another concern, and perhaps others can weigh in - when a harpist plays a glissando isn't the way that the sound of each string is "sounded" by the harpist's finger (or finger nail?) uniquely different as it glides quickly across many strings than the sound of the string being "sounded" one at a time? So if you put together a glissando with "one at a time" note samples will it really sound the same as a real glissando?

I also hope VSL can provide a more comprehensive manual soon. I was not able to find all the details in the short, web page that Andi referenced. I am particularly struggling with the "ringing" and "damping" settings, both in terms of how they function when I play back MIDI tracks, and my attempt to control which of these settings applies at a given time. VSL support has been great helping me, so I'm sure they'll get me to where I need. But it might have been a little easier with a more detailed manual.

Best, Steve

Hello Steve!

We have a glissando smoother option in the Synchron Harp player. This option should take care of your sound concern.
https://www.vsl.info/en/manuals/synchron-harp-player/gui-overview#visyharp-play

"Ringing" keeps the strings ringing with a soft fade out according to your Release setting.
"Dampened" will dampen the strings as soon as the key is released.

Best regards,
Andi

I'm glad you said this Steve:

"One issue for me is that my controller keyboard is Kawai fully-weighted piano action, and it is rough on the hands to perform glissandos on that keyboard. Of course, I could get an additional keyboard but if I am buying additional keyboards every time a plug in requires it I'm going to have to answer to my already very tolerant spouse for that!"

I recently played for (of all things) a production of "The Little Mermaid" which has numerous harp glisses. I only made it to the second song during sitzprobe before I had blood smeared across my keys from playing the glissandos. While I prefer performing glisses in pedal mode, there are many reasons triggerable (if that's a word) glisses are a necessary resource. For recent musical theater shows, the keyboard scores specifically call for glisses to be triggered because our hands are often too busy playing multiple other sounds/instruments. 

On a different note, I have noticed the lower range of the harp (staring around G/F3) is much softer than the mid & upper ranges even though the velocity is the same, almost a difference of 10db. I need to do a little more checking to make sure I didn't select something incorrectly, but I remember this happening when first testing it out. Thanks for your help!