Pssst Instruments Avant-Gardist: Tonally Prepared Cinematic Piano KONTAKT
Yes, this is a very special instrument. No, it’s not just another prepared piano library. Avant-Gardist introduces an entirely new category of tonal cinematic acoustic instruments — playable like a piano, but unlike anything you’ve heard before.
It’s raw, organic, unpredictable, and profoundly human. It can be dark and brooding, or subtle and intimate. Recorded using unconventional techniques, it captures a living, breathing performance that feels as if the pianist is right there at the keys. Sometimes dirty, slightly out of tune, and filled with beautiful imperfections — all by design.
Unique • Inspiring • Playable
What makes Avant-Gardist so unique?
Imagine a group of pianists, each playing a single upright piano string using fingers, horsehairs, chains, eBows, magnets, and other materials — each note recorded with its own close stereo microphones. Instead of capturing the piano as a whole, every tone is isolated, intimate, and vividly detailed.
The result is a deeply expressive and immersive sound — one that blends tonal and non-tonal articulations to create textures, rhythms, and timbres impossible for a single pianist to achieve. Creative sampling and tuning techniques preserve the acoustic authenticity while adding a natural instability reminiscent of hand-tuned string instruments.
A Cinematic Instrument Like No Other
Avant-Gardist provides a wide range of playable content for modern composers:
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Melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic multi-articulation instruments
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Tonal and non-tonal playable textures
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Loops, creative menus, and piano ASMR layers
Play just a few notes and you’ll instantly find inspiration — whether you’re scoring thrillers, psychological dramas, horror films, or intimate emotional scenes. This is an instrument designed to spark creativity and deliver one-of-a-kind tones for any cinematic context.
The Sound
Avant-Gardist can be played like a traditional piano but offers a much wider sonic palette. Its depth and richness make it capable of carrying an entire score on its own. A large selection of playable textures and effects ensures cohesion without repetition.
Every sound was recorded extremely close to capture all nuances and imperfections. Almost all instruments remain fully acoustic and lightly processed — they’re mix-ready straight out of the box.
Need more space? Adjust the built-in reverb to create distant cinematic ambience, or remove it for an intimate, close-miked tone.
The intuitive interface offers quick access to key controls, including one-knob filters, tone shaping, attack/release, stereo width, pitch, compressor, distortion, bit crusher, decimator, rotary, delay, and reverb.
Inspirations: John Cage, George Crumb, Krzysztof Penderecki, and other avant-garde and minimalist pioneers.
Instrument Structure
56 Inspirations
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Playable preparations (round robin)
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Tonal one-shots
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Playable tonal textures
23 One Player Ensembles
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Multi-layer round robin instruments
8 Noise & ASMR
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Key mechanisms, creaks, room ambience, and player foleys
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All round robin
9 Creative Menus
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Motion Textures
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Rhythmic Textures
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Noise & ASMR Textures
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Hits & Pings
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Fills & Swells
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Reversed
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Mixed Textures
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Loops (120 BPM and 90 BPM)
Built-in Effects
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Reverb & Delay
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Lo/Hi Filters
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Tone
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Attack/Release
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Pitch
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Stereo Width
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Compressor, Distortion, Lofi, Bit Crusher, Decimator
Technical Details
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Library Size: 2.8 GB
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Format: Kontakt Instrument
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Requirements: Full version of Kontakt 6.8 or newer
(Runs in demo mode in the free Kontakt Player)
