Tue Dec 09, 2014 7:13 pm
THis is about TWO famous Dutch organs, from which samplesets have recently been made.
After I came home form the ofiicial presentation of the Haarlem Bavo sampleset, which was very well organised, with concerts on the real instrument in the church as well as on the virtual in a concert hall nearby,
I bought the Laurens Transept.........
Much fuss about Haarlem, on this forum, and far too few comments on the Laurens Transept.
THis is a little gem....very transparant sound, and you can hear all sorts of details in the pipe-speaking.
It is financially as well as concerning PC requirements within reach of many people, which cannot be said about the Haarlem. Besides, the Haarlem sounds convincing with small registrations, but gets less convincing with heavier registrations.
What did it, for me, is, that in this concert hall, where they had the virtual Bavo installed, the Philharmonie, there is a fine Cavaille-Coll instrument. I had hoped for a short demonstration on it too......
Now the presentator said that they would not play that instrument, because of the short reverberation, it would not sound as good as the virtual Haarlem, which of course has the reverb of the church.
THis is not true at all!! I once asked a very famous organist, who gave a concert on the CC-Philharmonie, if this short reverb is not annoying. And he said, its no problem at all!!
So what they were really afraid of, is, that the real CC in this hall, compared with the virtual Haarlem, would in fact point to the weakness of virtual organs in generall!! Apart form the qualites of the Bavo sampleset, which I will not discuss here, I was negatively struck by this bald assumption.
Happy playing,
Geert ( Netherlands)