Recording - June 2012 - 30

B Y M I K E M E T L AY

Toontrack EZkeys Grand Piano
Chord theory education, songwriting assistance... and a great piano, too
Once you’re up and running, the interface is very clear and easy to follow; aside from a couple of popup displays (like the Song Browser), everything is in one window. Getting around The main window of EZkeys shows the instrument being played (in this case, the Grand Piano—see Figure 1). You can select different libraries and presets from the top dropdown menus; the presets are variations on the basic samples with eq changes, chorusing, etc. There are a few more out-there choices, but the straight piano timbres are the most effective to my ears. The keyboard displays the notes being played; if you’re playing from a MIDI controller, the chord structure you’re playing is displayed on the music rack. Flip-up windows hide controls for dynamic response and tuning, and the three pedals (una corda, sostenuto, and damper) all work as they should. Below the keyboard itself is the Song Track section. This is a one-track piano-roll sequencer into which you can drag and drop chunks of MIDI data called Song Blocks, arranging them into full piano performances. While you can’t record notes directly into the Song Track or pencil-edit at the note level, there’s a lot of flexibility for tweaking songs to taste based on music theory and chord structure. We’ll talk about that more in a moment. Making music Song Blocks are selected from the Song Browser, shown in Figure 2. There are music theory examples plus a whole library of piano MIDI files in different genres. As you can see, you choose a genre, then a specific song type and tempo, then a song part type (intro, verse, chorus, prechorus, break), then choose from one of several variations. Blocks can be previewed right in the Browser, as seen in the Figure—note the Play button and red dot to show progress through the part. You can play back at half or double speed, and elect to have the part previewed in the original key in which it was composed or in the key of the Song you’re building. To build a song, drag Song Blocks down into the Song Track and arrange them to suit on the timeline; they are colorcoded so you can quickly find verses against choruses and so on. Tools are provided to move them, subdivide them at chord changes, merge them, even randomize their chords. The Song Browser has a Favorites window where you can drag and drop Song Blocks that you like, giving them names and organizing them into your own folders. This is a copy operation; the original isn’t disturbed. The Song Blocks are a fantastic resource for songwriters who don’t have access to a great keyboardist; they range from very sparse block chords to more complex stylings, with each chord notated on the timeline, bar by bar. You can hear for yourself how

Toontrack established a reputation for plug-ins that provide tremendous flexibility and power, like the Superior Drummer virtual drum instrument we reviewed in our July 2010 issue. But Toontrack is now also known for musical and easy-to-use solutions to problems beginners and home studio users might run into. Need convincing and good-sounding drum parts for your compositions but don’t have a clue how to program a drum machine? Toontrack’s EZdrummer gives you a release-worthy head start. Want to tweak a recorded track but don’t know much about effects processing? EZmix (reviewed December 2011) offers a great way to quickly and effectively process tracks with excellent-sounding results. The latest EZ product from Toontrack, EZkeys, offers similarly simple and easy-to-use tools for the songwriter at the keyboard. It’s a MIDI player, keyboard-based virtual instrument, music theory teacher, and more, all in one simple-to-use interface. It’s EZ to get started EZkeys installs on Windows or Mac as a VST, RTAS, Audio Unit (Mac only) and standalone. It’s not very demanding of CPU resources at all, so it will run even on older machines—a Pentium IV running Windows XP SP3 is fine, as is a G5 Mac running OS X 10.5. The registration process requires an internet connection or an extra step or two to transfer an authorization to an offline computer. Your registration information is maintained in a personal account on the Toontrack website. Besides the plug-in and standalone programs, the EZkeys installer also creates a sound library for the virtual instrument you’ve purchased. As of now, the first and only sound set for EZkeys is the Steinway D grand piano; more are planned.
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RECORDING JUNE 2012

Recording - June 2012

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Recording - June 2012