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New St Ouen Composite Set

Existing and forthcoming Hauptwerk instruments, recommendations, ...
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soyeso

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New St Ouen Composite Set

PostSat May 21, 2022 3:34 pm

Since I have not seen this set mentioned I am sharing a recently released composite set patterned after St Ouen.

It is made up principally of demo sets of CC organs plus the free Friesach sample set.

I would like to know what others feel about this set. There are so many ears available here who may hear what I might not. The videos are quite good at exploring the sounds.

Here is the main link https://www.samsleath.com/rouen-cavaill ... -composite.
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1961TC4ME

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostMon May 23, 2022 10:30 am

I haven't listened to the entire demo as of yet, but what I've heard so far sounds awesome!

Appears to be well done, and for those willing to do some downloading (who hasn't? :mrgreen:), the asking price is more than reasonable to get an instrument like this.

Thanks to you and the sample set producers for this.

Marc
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RaymondList

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostTue May 24, 2022 8:24 pm

I'm no expert, and really not a person whose opinion should be listened to, (I might be hesitant to listen to myself! :D ) but after hearing the demo, I immediately purchased this instrument. Have not played it yet for more than a couple of hours, but love this composite! My thanks to those producers who allow their demo sets and free sets to be used for this. Thanks too for all the time that was obviously spent to put this together, and for the reasonable price.
Regards,
Ray
Ray
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Henk61

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostWed May 25, 2022 12:41 am

I also purchased the composite and i agree with Ray!!

Regards
Henk
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B777Captain

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostFri Jun 24, 2022 3:19 pm

May I ask…

I have Nancy already. Would this sample set be worth the effort…. or is it more just of the same CC sound?

Thanks

Pat
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mnailor

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostFri Jun 24, 2022 3:29 pm

Nancy doesn't have all that much left of C-C sound. I hope you have a more intact C-C organ like Caen or Oloron. Listen to the 8' fonds on one of those to hear what was removed from Nancy - two each of the original strings and harmonic flutes. Nothing against the sampleset, which I really like, but the 1960s alterations were ill-considered and changed some of its fundamental character.

I haven't tried this Rouen composite because it's not surround, but it should include more authentic C-C stops than Nancy.
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Posaune32

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostSat Jun 25, 2022 12:07 am

B777Captain wrote:May I ask…

I have Nancy already. Would this sample set be worth the effort…. or is it more just of the same CC sound?

Thanks

Pat


There are some demos up on the website linked in the OP. It's not totally realistic of course due to being a composite that uses only free/demo samples of organs in different acoustics, but it does somewhat resemble the real St. Ouen and has a different sound than Nancy (which personally I don't find that convincing). One consideration is that as you have to install multiple demos and only use a few ranks from some of them, it could take up more disk space (though not RAM) than expected from an organ of this size.
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B777Captain

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostSat Jun 25, 2022 4:57 pm

Thanks for the opinions!

I honestly have never really liked Caen although I realize I’m in the minority on that. Just sounds… hollow on my system.

I’ll have a listen to the samples on the website. I enjoy Nancy very much and enjoy adjusting it to all the variety of acoustics it offers. Sometimes too “boomy” nicely adjusted to become less so. I like Piotr Grabowski’s “Settings” on his sample sets!

Pat
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Organorak

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostTue Jun 28, 2022 5:01 pm

Well done!

How does this St. Ouen compare to earlier composite sets? I think at least two composite sets requring Caen and Metz have been produced in the past. Is the specification identical to Ouen here?

Also besides RAM, how much disk space is required for all the organs that make it up? I have Caen already but my hard drive is virtually creaking it's so full. Will it have space for this (around 49GB left...)
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triapavl

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostMon Jul 04, 2022 6:23 am

This is, hands down, the best value-for-money sampleset which I have had the pleasure of playing. It perfectly captures the magic of the Cavaille-Coll sound, and I would even dare to say that it sounds better than even a number of fully-priced sets!
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mesch

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostTue Jul 12, 2022 3:00 am

I agree that for the money it's best you can get. However, I'm not convinced of it compared to Caen I purchased later. When I played this sample set, my wife came in once and said that it all sounded very artificial. And yes, somehow the brilliance in the treble is missing, but also the powerful basses of Caen, for example, are missing. In addition, of course, Caen is in surround, this composite only in stereo. Yes, you are comparing apples and oranges here, which is not permissible. But in the end, the result for me is that I only play Caen in the case of CC and not the composite.

Again, I am of the opinion that for this money the sample set is excellent.
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Antoni Scott

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostFri Sep 02, 2022 4:24 pm

There has been a lot of discussion about how realistic Hauptwerk Cavaille-Coll's sample sets sound (all versions and producers, Metz, Caen, Nancy ) compared to their real Cavaille-Coll counterparts. The truth is, not very realistic at all. That's not to say that the sample sets don't sound good, they do, but to suggest that they sound like Cavaille-Coll's is a stretch. And this is not just my opinion, but that of a close organist friend and colleague of mine that is a titular organist at a, you guessed it, Cavaille-Coll. That opinion is also shared with their curators. In their words, "it sounds good, but not like a Cavaille-Coll".

I don't know what is missing in the sound that allows such criticism. Is it the number of speakers, the type of speakers, number of channels, etc. ? I only listen through headphones ( AKG 701's) so only hear everything through two channels, but even listening to a CD, DVD or even a HD Youtube recording through these same headphones, I always can tell what is Hauptwerk and what is a real intrument recording.

Its unfair to blame Hauptwerk technology because it is still as good as ,or better, than any of the commercially available digital organs. I consider my Hauptwerk to be the perfect practice organ with unprecedented realism and have said that for almost fifteen years. But when it comes to duplicating a Cavaille-Coll it falls short. I recently acquired the Nancy sample set and didn't find it to be any more realistic than any of the earlier sample sets. I guess there are too many variables and parameters (microphone placement, microphone distance, channels, (2 vs 32) to make an accurate sample identical to the real pipe in its real acoustic environment.
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JulianMoney-Kyrle

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostFri Sep 02, 2022 7:34 pm

The nearest I have ever come to a Cavaille-Coll organ is the 1994 Walker organ at Exeter College, Oxford, which was built in the CC style:
https://www.exeter.ox.ac.uk/about/chape ... r-college/

I was lucky enough to have the opportunity both to hear it and briefly to play it a few months ago. After the various HW CC sample sets that I have (of which Caen is my favourite, though I also like St. Omer a lot), and the many recordings that I have on CD, it was a revelation.

My HW set-up has 12 channels playing through Behringer Truth 2031A speakers arranged in three stereo groups - in front of the player (i.e. either side of the console), slightly behind and off to the side, and behind, which is the arrangement that I have (so far) found to give the most realistic spatial effect; I also have an SRS subwoofer. The room is large with a high ceiling and a stone floor. I would say that I have HW sounding rather good, particularly after upgrading to version 7, and running it on a 14-core i9 workstation. I enjoy playing it a lot and I have far too many sample sets. However, it is not the same as the real thing.
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seh52

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Re: New St Ouen Composite Set

PostSat Sep 03, 2022 10:03 am

For a Hauptwerk sample set to sound like the organ it emulates usually requires a lot of tonal finishing--voicing and detuning.

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