Anyone whose been a subscriber to our channel or blog will know we’ve spent a lot of time over the past couple of years exploring the world of piano VSTs. As a result, our resident piano reviewer and company president Stu Harrison has become something of a VST aficionado.
In today’s video and companion article, Stu will be joined by his wife Annie Bonsignore, who also happens to be a professional vocalist and frequent collaborator of Stu’s.
Annie is going to randomly toggle between three meticulously recorded VST instruments from some of the most well-known brands - Yamaha vs Kawai vs Steinway and some of their high-end models with the Hamburg Steinway D-274, Shigeru Kawai SK-EX and Yamaha CFX Concert Grand Pianos - to see if Stu can actually tell the difference between these three pianos without knowing which one he’s playing and hearing.
This should be a good test to see how our pre-conceived notions about a given instrument affect our musical perception of said instrument since Stu will not know which instrument he is playing.
We’ll get started here with a little bit of background information.
Yamaha vs Kawai vs Steinway - Background Information & Piano Design
Let’s start by covering some of the differences that make a Yamaha, a Steinway, and a Kawai different from one another. These are three of the most recognizable piano brands in the world, and in terms of full-sized concert pianos, their flagship concert grand pianos- the Hamburg Steinway Model D, Yamaha CFX and Shigeru Kawai SK-EX - are among the most commonly selected instruments by pianists who perform in concert halls and with symphony orchestras.All three piano manufacturers and these specific pianos have a very interesting pedigree and interesting history, but for our purposes, what’s really important is to look at the major differences in the design and materials used in these instruments that contribute to the unique sound that they each produce.
We’ll take a quick look at each instrument.
Hamburg Steinway Model D
The Steinway & Sons Model D’s most people in North America are used to are of course New York Steinways which use Sitka spruce for their soundboards. Since we’re working with a Hamburg Steinway Model D Concert Grand Piano made at the Steinway factory in Germany here, the soundboard will be either be an Austrian or Bavarian white spruce. In either case, it would be slow growth, high altitude spruce grown in the 700 to 1,000-meter range, such as what would also be used in other high-end European pianos like a Bosendorfer or Steingraeber.This soundboard material is different from what Yamaha and Kawai are using, and the Steinway has some other things that make it unique as well. For one, they use an inordinate amount of Hard Rock Maple in their inner and outer rims and feature a remarkably strong pinblock.
There are several aspects of Steinway design which make it unique. It uses an inordinate amount of Hard Rock Maple in their inner and outer rims, which gives it a very specific tonal flavor that is often described as a blended tone.
The Hamburg Steinway also has a treble bell, and in combination with the specific duplex scale, this tends to create a very particular treble experience with an ambient wash and well-defined attack. Steinway D’s are also known for having an extraordinary dynamic range to them, to the point that it’s almost impossible to make them distort.
Now, they’re not known for having the widest tonal palette compared to other fine instruments, but in terms of dynamic potential and ability to project across the range, they’re really quite exceptional and one of the main reasons Hamburg D’s are often cited as one of the top two or three concert pianos in the world.
Pianos from the Hamburg factory are also generally regarded as a tier above their New York counterparts, and that includes the Steinway Model B, Steinway Model A and Steinway Model M.
Shigeru Kawai SK-EX
The Shigeru Kawai SK-EX has borrowed quite a bit from the Steinway grand piano heritage, as have most modern pianos (fun fact, Kawai manufactures the Steinway sub-brand Boston). The SK-EX uses vertically laminated bridges, just like the Steinway does and a Hard Rock Maple cap, just like the Steinway does also.The rims also feature some Hard Rock Maple, though not as much as the Steinway, and it also blends a number of other hardwoods as well. The SKEX does not use a treble bell, and the approach to the treble generally in the Shigeru is quite a bit different. The SK-EX also uses Sitka spruce, just like a New York Steinway but different from the Hamburg’s Austrian or Bavarian spruce.
The end result is a tone that isn’t as blended as the Hamburg Steinway, but at the same time, it’s not as clear and defined as a C.Bechstein or Bosendorfer’s tone. Really, it's sitting somewhere in the middle and is overall very warm but also very colorful.
It’s capable of both a very intimate sound but can also be pushed for serious fortissimo volume and power as well. In general, SK-EXs are often regarded as very versatile instruments which is why they’re so popular.
Yamaha CFX
The Yamaha CFX first hit the market several years ago and served as the next-generation update to the CFIIIS concert grand piano, which was the Yamaha Corporation’s previous flagship model CF Series 9 footer.That said, the CFIIIS was seen a step below a Steinway or Shigeru Kawai, whereas the new CFX is at a level where it can now properly compete with these other two concert grand pianos by upgrading the specs to what one would expect out of a top-tier instrument.
For instance, they’ve gone with a high-quality European spruce soundboard and are also vertically laminating their bridges. The rim consists of a blend of Beech and Mahogany for its own unique tonal experience as part of what they’ve called their Acoustic Resonance system.
They’ve also improved the piano wire and bass string material and levelled up their hammer design while going with a very realistic ivory substitute they’ve dubbed as Ivorite for the white keys and a matte finish for the black keys.
The end result is a tone that is still on the brighter end of the tonal spectrum, but the middle partials are much more present than they were previously. Overall, it’s a more natural sound than what Yamaha has been able to achieve in the past.
Note that the CFX is also available as the Disklavier Enspire Pro version (DCFX) which allows you to record and playback right on the CFX as a digital piano can.
Piano VST Comparison
As mentioned above, we’re not going to be in a showroom playing the actual acoustic piano versions of these musical instruments, but rather VST versions. In the case of the Hamburg Steinway Model D and Yamaha CFX, we’re using the Vienna Symphonic Libraries Synchron engines, while for the SK-EX, we’re using the Kawai’s NOVUS NV5’s SK-EX Rendering Engine, which combines a multi-channel sample of the SK-EX with a resonance modeling engine.The reverb is set up as similarly across the 3 samples as possible, and we’ve tried to make the settings as evenly as possible as well.
Stu’s Blind Playtest
We would definitely recommend checking out the video to see and hear the blind playtesting for yourself. In the end, Stu was able to guess 9 out of 10 right, only at first mistaking the Hamburg Steinway D for the SK-EX, but he would subsequently realize this and eventually change his answer.Stu is obviously a gifted and highly experienced piano player, but it does speak to how distinct these three samples truly are with how accurate his blind play-testing proved to be.
Annie’s Ranking from a Vocalist’s Perspective
We’d also recommend checking out the latter portion of the video to hear professional vocalist Annie Bonsignore sing along with each sample and give her feedback as to how she would rank in terms of compatibility with a vocalist.She ultimately enjoyed the SK-EX the most due to its warmth and very dynamic tonal range. She had the Yamaha CFX ranked second and liked it overall, she just, however, felt it was a little bit too bright and perhaps a bit like an upright piano.
In third, she had the Hamburg D as she felt it was least equipped to compliment the contours of the natural human voice.
Closing Thoughts
Thanks very much for reading! This has been a very interesting experiment comparing these three superb concert grand piano samples that we hope you’ve enjoyed.The post Yamaha vs Kawai vs Steinway | Piano VST Comparison | Yamaha CFX vs Hamburg Steinway D vs Kawai SK-EX first appeared on Merriam Pianos
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