Leo Fender’s 1959 patent is brought to life for the first time thanks to Sampleson

The company has created the keyboard plug-in with spectral modelling.

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Sampleson 1959 GUI

Sampleson, known for their recent string of easy-to-use plug-ins, has released 1959, a keyboard plug-in based on an original patent drawn up by Leo Fender. You may have heard of Fender – legendary instruments like the Rhodes, Stratocaster and Jazzmaster were all produced by the company.

There is, unfortunately, no possibility of comparing this emulation to the real thing as Fender’s vision never got past the concept stage. The original patent focused on an idea relating to string vibration detection that improves the effectiveness of the pickups. The patent is available to view via Google Patents, here. Sampleson says the sound of 1959 is “warm, clean and bright. The expressiveness of the piano action we emulated gives it a nice and wide range of timbres. From warm lows to metallic shines on higher velocities”.

Sampleson seems to have a knack for creating no-frills interfaces for their virtual instruments that make them straight forward to use. This 88 note electro-acoustic piano plug-in features no more than six knobs. The knobs control the following parameters:

  • Resonance amount
  • Hammer noise amount
  • Release sound amount
  • Static noise emulation level
  • Velocity level
  • Reverb amount

The interface is scalable up to 200% of the original size. It’s available in VST/AU format, or as a standalone instrument, and only takes up 35MB of your storage. You can purchase 1959 for its introductory price of $39, which will soon move up to $59.

For more information on 1959, visit sampleson.com. More music technology news can be found here.

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