Hollow Sun Tubelitzer KONTAKT

Most people are familiar with the Wurlitzer EP200A but Wurlitzer were making electric pianos back in the 50s starting with the Model 110 in 1954. The company was set up by Rudolph Wurlitzer in 1854 and it imported acoustic pianos into America. In 1908 they were manufacturing organs and in 1935, they made a compact spinet acoustic piano which was very successful as it could fit into the smaller houses and apartments at the time.

What we have here is the Model 120 as used by Ray Charles on his hit, "What I'd Say" (a 120 was also featured in the biopic 'Ray').

The mechanical principles with Wurlitzer electric pianos are pretty much the same between models (and very similar to Rhodes pianos - a hammer striking a tuned 'tine' ... and it is said that Harold Rhodes actually advised Wurlitzer's deisgner/engineer, Ben Meissner, how to achieve stability with the tines) but the difference between the early models and the EP200A we are more familiar with is that up until the early 60s, the internal circuitry was tube/valve-based giving a mellower, warmer sound and doesn't 'bark' as aggressively as the later models.

The 120 we have here is such a model. Each note has been painstakingly sampled chromatically by Hollow Sun friend, Christohopher Reis, who owns the orginal 120, with up to 27 velocity layers per note and release samples. A mammoth task on which Christopher has acquitted himself more than admirably. All samples are full length with no loops so you hear the actual sound of the original instrument 'breathing', warts, blemishes, grunts and all!

There were various cases used in the range over time and we've modelled our Kontakt instrument's graphics on a funky surf blue customised cabinet that was done....

We've also taken a liberties with functionality...

We've added tremolo (which the later EP200As had but the 120 didn't), allowed control of release noise, a balance control for tempering the bass end with the high frequencies and we've also added the facility to have a pseudo-stereo keyboard.

There are also a variety of velocity curves to choose from (plus you can save your own custom curves) and it comes with presets (again - you can save your own).

And for a bit of of authentic silliness, you can disable the earth link to add mains hum and switch between a 'restored' version (where the samples have been tweaked a little) and an 'original' version (where the samples are raw ... but the difference is subtle, to be honest).

And it comes with a tidy little pedal board of stomp box FX...

Featuring distortion and cab simulation, chorus, phase shifter, rotary speaker, echo and reverb (convolution), many popular Wurli sounds can be created and stored as presets.

This is a unique electric piano library featuring quite a rare Wurlitzer electric piano. It's a mellower, warmer Wurli than maybe we've become accustomed to over the years and doesn't have that characteristic 'Supertramp bark', falling instead somewhere between a Rhodes and the EP200A most people are probably familiar with. But above all, because of its vintage, it is wonderfully 'warty' and flawed and deserves a place in any electric piano aficiando's collection.

My thanks to Christopher Reis for the meticulous sampling of his instrument and to Mario Krušelj for scriptmeistering beyond the call of duty.

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
Kontakt 4.2.3 full version

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