Clavia finally gave us "Long Release" -function which was, so to speak, a little bit embarrassing to not have. Nord Piano 88 is supposed to be a flagship piano model of Clavia line but this feature was missing. Nord Stage 2 introduced it and then they put it into the newest Nord Electro 3 HP but still their flagship piano, Nord Piano, did not have it.
Fortunately now this is corrected with OS 1.40 update. Long Release gives a new kind realism to this already great(est) digital piano. To be able to use this function you must download also latest v5.3 piano sounds from Nord Sound Library.
Besides giving nice new realism to piano sound, this update has also kind of symbolical value: now all the essential parameters are there and Clavia shows us to pay attention to its customers' needs and wishes. In fact we raised this issue on Nord User Forum (http://www.norduserforum.com/nord-piano-forum-f10/piano-release-t988.html) and Clavia responded with a new update.
Nord Piano is a great product but if I could choose, I'd like it to have at least two improvements:
First, there's no chance to adjust preset volumes. Different pianos with different effects can have very different output volume and still you cannot set up a volume for a certain preset. What does this mean? You have to manually "mix" the preset volumes with main volume knob... This is not a very useful.
Second, Nord Piano is very powerful piano but same time very simple. This means that you'll only get piano from it. Many players would like to use for example a laptop to provide some synth pads or strings under piano sound. Basically it's easy with Nord Piano; it has normal MIDI in/out and also usb MIDI. To me its a pity that Clavia did not put any kind of external section to Nord Piano panel. I am sure that many players would really like to have external midi on/off -button and perhaps some knob to control some midi CC (control change) parameters.
