Vienna Instruments Bösendorfer Grand Upright 130 Full Library summons the experience of almost two centuries of grand piano making. To capture the Bösendorfer Grand Upright 130 with all its subtleties, VI’s engineers developed a highly precise motion-control system that controls a noise-free robotic finger. The micro-controller moves the finger with super-human precision. This provided flexible curvatures for down-strokes and release movements—the latter corresponding with the preceding note length and various release speeds.

Viennese Tradition of Piano Making

Although physically an upright piano, the Grand Upright 130 features surprising nuances and powerful bass. It has a pure and pristine sound without further tonal colors usually added by the large body of a concert grand. Bösendorfer uses more than 80% naturally dried resonant spruce wood to build an instrument. When a note is played, the components become acoustically active. This forms a complete resonating body similar to a violin. The carefully hand-spun bass strings—steel core strings with one or two layers of copper—also add to its warm and sonorous sound.

8 Microphone Positions

To capture the Bösendorfer Grand Upright 130 in Stage B of Synchron Stage Vienna, engineers used multiple high-end microphone arrays. This affords a variety of options for shaping your individual sound. Even if you're not using a surround setup, you get more ambience variations and spatial depth out of the Full Library by adding the room and surround microphones' signals to your stereo mix. The "Close" and "MID" microphone positions are ideal for a more player-oriented mix.

• Close 1/Small Condenser: “ORTF” setup with a pair of Schoeps MK4 aiming at the perfect representation of the player’s listening position.
• Close 2/Ribbon: “Blumlein” setup of a Royer SF24 for a fast, direct and vintage sound.
• Close 3/Large Condenser: “Quasi AB” setup of a Neumann TLM 170 with broad cardioids. This is ideal for producing the typical pop piano sound.
• MID 1/Condenser: “ORTF” setup with Sennheiser MKH40 behind the piano for a warm and dark timbre.
• MID 2/Sphere: The KFM 6 Sphere setup aims at the perfect representation of the entire dynamic range of an ideally balanced piano.
• Main/Room Mic Stereo: Decca Tree array (L-C-R) with three Neumann KM133 mics. Used in a stereo mix, you can easily hear where the piano is placed. In a surround setup, the Decca tree microphones will feed your front L-R speakers.
• Main Room Mic Mono: Neumann KM133 mic
• Main Surround: Wide A-B stereo setup with two KM184 cardioid microphones. In a surround setup, these signals would be used for your rear speakers.

Customize Your Personal Sound

In addition to the multitude of options from mixing various microphone signals, the Bösendorfer Upright comes with the free Vienna Synchron Pianos software. This offers multiple options for shaping your sound and playing experience. Hosting a high-performance playback engine, Vienna Synchron provides a full mixer with a broad range of effects. Effects include EQ, compression, saturation, algorithmic reverb, delay, chorus, flanger, rotary and many more. You may also adjust the volume of body resonances, sympathetic strings and pedal noises right in the main Play window. In the Edit window you can even tweak EQ, volume, tuning, dynamic range, etc. for each individual key.