The window

This page goes through PianoFlex's window from top to bottom.

The top row

• Preset shows the name of the piano you're playing. Click the name to choose another piano (see Presets). A * after the name means you've changed the sound since you chose it.
• Character shows a number that identifies this piano's character, which is what makes it sound like one particular instrument. It's shown so you can write it down. See "The panels" below.
• MIDI in shows the MIDI keyboard PianoFlex is listening to, or None. Click it to choose your keyboard. PianoFlex listens to every MIDI channel, and the sustain, sostenuto and soft pedals all work.
• OSC shows the connection PianoFlex uses to hear ComposerFlex. It shows a number when PianoFlex is ready for ComposerFlex. It shows Off, in yellow, when another program is using the connection. PianoFlex then keeps trying once a second, and connects as soon as it can. Click OSC to try again at once. See With ComposerFlex.
• File shows the name of the MIDI file that's open, or No file. Click it to open one.
• Delay is the short time between a note arriving and you hearing it. A shorter delay makes the piano feel more immediate as you play. If you hear clicks or gaps in the sound, click + to make the delay longer.
• Output sets how PianoFlex shares your speakers or headphones with other programs:
  • Shared plays through Windows along with every other program. This is the usual setting.
  • Exclusive gives PianoFlex the sound device to itself. The delay can then be shorter, but other programs can't play sound on that device while PianoFlex has it.
• Fine: when this is lit, the mouse wheel and the arrow keys move sliders in small steps, for exact settings.

The second row

• load shows how hard the PC is working to make the sound.
• voices counts the notes that are sounding right now.
• dropouts counts the times the sound couldn't keep up, which you may have heard as a click or a gap. If the number keeps climbing, make the Delay longer.
• late notes counts notes that arrived too late to be played on time.
• volume has a − and a + button. PianoFlex keeps loud passages from distorting, and "limiting" shows how much it is holding them back.
• Mute silences the sound. The button turns red and reads "MUTED". Click it again to hear the sound again.
• The meters show the level of the left and right channels, as it goes out after the volume and the limiter. The limiter keeps it just under the top, so it never goes over.

Playing a file

The Play and Render to audio buttons, and the strip on the same row, are for MIDI files. See Playing, rendering and recording.

The buttons

• Save preset… saves the sound as a preset of your own. Delete preset deletes the preset that's loaded, if it's one you saved. It asks you first. Compare… puts your sound beside another preset so you can hear the difference. See Presets.
• Open MIDI…, Record and the Files: button (it shows the level and ending you've chosen) are for playing MIDI files, recording what you play, and choosing how the saved files sound. See Playing, rendering and recording.
• All notes off lets every key and every pedal up at once, if a note ever keeps sounding; the notes then fade as their dampers stop them.
• Vary moves the sliders a little, at random, from where they are, for a slightly different piano. Click it again to move a little further. Randomize moves them further, around the preset, for a quite different one. Both move only the sliders of the instrument itself, in the Build, Hammer, Strike, Strings, Sustain and Body & ring panels. Neither changes the tuning, the age of the piano or the overall resonance.
• Undo takes back the last bigger change, such as Generate, Variation, Vary or Randomize, a choice from the Piano, Style or Space list or of the room's Type, Reset sound or Reset all, Flat in the EQ, or a shape drawn along the keyboard or in the EQ. It puts every slider back as it was before that change, so any slider moves you made since then are taken back too. You can undo up to 50 of these changes. A slider you've simply moved isn't undone on its own: move it back, or click Reset slider to return it to where the preset has it.
• Reset slider puts the selected slider back where the preset has it. Reset sound does the same for every slider that Vary and Randomize move. Reset all puts every slider of the slot you're editing back as the preset has it.
• Help opens a window with the list of keys, the User guide button, which opens this guide, and the About button.
• Quit closes PianoFlex. If you've changed the sound since you last saved it, PianoFlex asks before closing, so you don't lose it by mistake. Closing the window does the same.

The slots A, B, C and D

Each slot holds a piano. Usually one slot sounds at a time. Turn on two or more slots to play their pianos together, as layers. See Layers.

The MIDI out box beside the slots sends the notes to another instrument instead of playing them. Click the box to switch it on or off, and click the port's name to choose where the notes go. It shows the port it sends to, or "None". See Playing, rendering and recording.

Piano, Style and Space

These three lists change many sliders at once, so you can build a sound in three choices:

• Piano sets the size and type of the instrument, from a concert grand piano to a small upright piano.
• Style sets how the piano is voiced: Natural, Warm, Bright, Jazz, Felt and others.
• Space sets where you hear the piano, from dry and close up to a concert hall or a cathedral.

Once you change one of the sliders a list sets, that list reads "custom".

The sliders

The sliders are grouped in panels, and each panel shapes one part of the sound, from the hammers and strings to the microphones and the room.

• To select a slider, click its name. The line under the sliders, above the keys, explains what the slider does, and shows its range and where the preset has it.
• To move it, drag it, turn the mouse wheel over it, or press ← and →. Hold Shift while turning the wheel or pressing ← and → for small steps.
• Colors: a slider turns magenta when you've moved it from the preset (a slider set along the keyboard shows its shape instead), and a small tick marks where the preset had it. A slider in cyan is still where the preset has it.
• Along the keyboard: a few sliders can be set differently from the bass to the treble: Hardness, Strike, Aftersound, Sustain, Damper, Velocity brightness and Knock. Click the small wave at the end of the slider's row. A window opens with eight bars, from the lowest keys on the left to the highest on the right. Drag each bar up or down. All up and All down move the whole shape at once, and Flat makes it the same on every key again. Click OK to keep what you've drawn, or Cancel to put it back as it was.
  • A slider set this way shows its shape along the keyboard instead of a single bar, and its range instead of one number. Click it to open the window again.
  • Some presets come with these already set. Session Player, for example, has its Damper set this way, lighter toward the top.

The panels

• Build: the size of the piano, where the hammers strike the strings, and how heavy the hammers are.
• Character: what makes this piano one particular instrument, the way no two real pianos sound quite alike.
  • Generate gives the piano a new character. The Strength slider sets how far it moves from the plain piano: around 25 it's a slightly different piano, at 50 clearly another one, still a piano for many characters. From 75 up it goes beyond a real piano for most characters, and at 100 it's often unlike any real piano.
  • Variation makes a close relative of that character. Its slider sets how close.
  • To keep a character you like, save the sound as a preset.
• Hammer: the tone, from warm to bright, and the hardness of the hammers' felt.
• Strike: how each note begins: its attack, and the knock and ping of the hammer.
• Strings: the tuning, and how the strings of each note beat against each other. Age puts some keys a little out of tune, like an older piano.
• Sustain: how long notes ring, and how quickly their highest overtones fade.
• Body & ring: the soundboard, the wooden body, and the other strings that ring along with the notes you play.
• Mics: where the microphones are placed: inside the piano, at the player's head, at the side, or across the room. Also how wide the stereo sound is.
• Reverb & output: the room's echo (reverb), and the Gain, which is the output level. Type chooses the room, such as Studio, Jazz Club, Chamber Hall or Cathedral.
• EQ: eight bands, from the deep bass to the airy highs. Drag each bar up or down to boost or cut that band. Flat resets all eight.
• Touch & pedals: how the piano answers the way you play (how hard you have to play for a loud note, and how far it is from the softest note to the loudest), and how firmly the dampers stop the notes. Its last slider, Una corda, sets how much quieter and darker the notes get while you hold the soft pedal.

The bottom of the window

• The explanation line describes the selected slider.
• The yellow line below it tells you what just happened, or why something didn't work.
• The keyboard lights up the keys being played. You can also click or slide on it to play. Clicking nearer the front of a key plays louder.
• The pedals, to the right of the keyboard, show the Sustain, Sostenuto and Soft pedals. The Sustain bar fills as far as its pedal is down, so you can see half-pedaling. The Sostenuto and Soft bars fill when their pedal is down. They move with your keyboard's pedals, a MIDI file, or ComposerFlex. You can also set them with the mouse:
  • Click or drag along the Sustain bar to set how far the pedal is down. It stays there until you change it, or until your keyboard's pedal moves.
  • Click Sostenuto or Soft to put that pedal down, and click again to let it up.
  • All notes off lets every pedal up.

Point at a pedal, and the explanation line says what it does.

For the keys that do all of this without the mouse, see Keys.