Nord announced the fourth generation of their award-winning Piano series at Musikmesse this week. We got an exclusive demo at a secret meeting room off-site.
The new Piano combines greatly expanded voice polyphony (now 120 voices), a premium Triple Sensor keybed and the company's acclaimed Virtual Hammer Action Technology.
What's new in the Piano 4 over its predecessor is the addition of dedicated Piano Filters and Split Point Crossfades making all the more playable in a live setting. The first of these features lets you define the character of your sound — Bright, Mid and Soft — while the latter lets you merge between different patches split across the keyboard. This means no more awkward piano notes when you take your bass part too far up the keyboard.
Also, a refined Organise Mode makes rearranging programs quicker, and a Numeric Pad Mode allows direct program access.
The updated Sample Synth Section features expanded memory for the Nord Sample Library 3.0 (doubled from the Piano 3 to 512MB) and vastly extended polyphony.
The Nord Piano 4 is scheduled for shipping in Summer 2018 with pricing to be announced, although we expect it to be in the same ballpark as the current Piano 3 which is around €2700.
