Novel Piano

Dorico
#1

I’ve just received a Steinberg email about a FREE program called Novel Piano. Very little is said about it, and Dorico isn’t mentioned. Is it usable with Dorico 3? If so, would it come with instructions for such use? …Or, if so, would someone on the Forum know how to use it?

–Norm

#2

I got the same email too. I have enough pianos so I didn’t bother downloading it, but as it’s a HALion Sonic SE instrument I assume it will work fine in Dorico. Here’s the link for anyone that doesn’t already get all the Steinberg emails:

1 Like
#3

The links on that page all seem to want to download the SDA. How do I get the Piano to download?

EDIT: Finally got it. The second link, that looks like a way to get Sonic SE actually gives the activation code. Very confusing.

#4

The activation code is for Halion Sonic SE which is included with the Dorico license. I installed Novel Piano without the need for any activation.

#5

Craig_F,

Can you now say how one actually would use Novel Piano in Dorico? Have you used it?

–Norm

#6

I didn’t really look at it that much. I did manually load the patch in Play mode. It plays but very quietly. It may need a expression map to work fully.

#7

I played around with it in Cubase, and I liked the sound for certain things. Reminds me somewhat of a spinet piano with a bit of dampener. A unique sound for just the right piece. I opened up Dorico 3.5, which has changed a bit (yes, I upgraded without trying the new version - I’ve been busy), and thank you for asking the question since it made me relearn Dorico a bit. Depending on how you have Dorico setup, you should default to Halion Sonic SE. If you have installed the Novel Piano:

  • Click on Play
  • Click on the Keyboard icon next to Halion Sonic SE, which should bring up the HSSE editor and filter on category Piano.
  • As long as you did download and install through the Steinberg Download Assistant, you should see Novel Piano in the list of available pianos in the HSSE edit instrument window.

Double click on Novel Piano, and you should be ready to go. Happy scoring!