Janilia,

I agree with you, I don't believe just making the section bigger will solve everyones problem. Concentrating on the tone and the Vibrato probably will make them sound more "Real" (What ever that word means now). The fact of the matter is.....We are still going to have to tweak them and add our own imperfections to the samples to give it a human touch. People expecting Epic Strings to solve all thier string problems out of the box WILL be disapointed, I guarantee.

-Ben

It's both.

Just making them bigger alone isn't the answer of course, but it definitely is part of the answer.

The passion in the playing, the expression, is most important. Add size to that passionate, emotional playing, and that's pretty much the difference between that sound and what we have now.

TH

If not 'epic strings', then why not call them 'rich strings'. That sounds like what we need if everyone thinks the old ones are thin. [:D]

@Jonathan Mitchell said:

If not 'epic strings', then why not call them 'rich strings'. That sounds like what we need if everyone thinks the old ones are thin. [:D]

Rich, expressive strings it is [:D]


Jonathan (did you parents listen to Joni Mitchell?) - one of my favorite femail vocalist!

No, no, no - Jay said what it needs to be called - Romantic Strings. (Note the purple passion.) Also what is most needed here - an mp legato that is espressivo. Not a huge section that is the same, nor a loud one. I think the current f espressivo and f portamento sound really good. But the sound becomes thin in mixes when you use the typical expressive range of the violins, in the pp to mf. And as Jay noted, the p is almost senza vibrato - an almost dead tone.

I wonder if anyone else has noticed this - the single most expressive "romantic" violin ensemble sound - even now - is Miroslav Vitous, "Soft Violins." The non-looped version. It has that characterisitc the Jay also discussed, being able to hear individual players as well as the ensemble. But also a rich sound, that came from the players, the hall and the extremely good recording on those old samples. They are too limited to compete with current libraries, but if they were re-recorded with the amount of detail that VSL does it would be the best possible sound.

@William said:

Also what is most needed here - an mp legato that is espressivo.

Yes, I agree totally.

Rob, you're about the millionth person who's asked me that!

The answer is no. I was safely born and up and about long before Joni became famous. However, f you want a Twilight Zone moment, do a google search for Jon, or Jonathan and Mitchell, you'll find an alarming number of people with this name who have a musical connection.

@Jonathan Mitchell said:

Rob, you're about the millionth person who's asked me that!

The answer is no. I was safely born and up and about long before Joni became famous. However, f you want a Twilight Zone moment, do a google search for Jon, or Jonathan and Mitchell, you'll find an alarming number of people with this name who have a musical connection.

Freaky Joni, er Jonathan [:D]

All the best,

(BTW - I saw and heard Joni on a PBS concert recently and she can still keep it in the groove. Singular vocalist that is for sure.)

How about something for people who bought Epic Horns or Opus I?
I just invested late last year in Opus I, Epic Horns and Solo Strings and I'm only getting a real helping hand on upgrading Solo Strings. I find out now that Opus I and Epic Horns is now basically a waste of money. I don't want to have to run Giga at the same time because I'm sick of the BSOD [;)]

I bought in to the early bird special on VI and I'm hearing from the US distributor that it will ship hopefully in March now. Maybe you could give us a perk for the wait??

I love the product, bought it anyway even without the perk but it would be cool.
Thanks.

William, I could not agree with you more. Till this day I still use the Miroslav String Ensembles. The sound is just there, pure and simple. And I will probably still be using it for a few more years to come. Its a antique, but still works.

Boy, I haven't checked this thread for a while, but it seems to be saying the same thing over and over about some ideal romantic strings, and I agree. I hope the message has come across by now...

Hey VSL peeps!

Hows the recording session going with the new strings? Should be doing it around this time according to my calculations?

-Ben

For what its worth... Here is Thomas J comments on Northern Sounds...

@Another User said:

There are perfectly explainable reasons why the higher range of strings are difficult to capture musically. Unfortunately, and ironically, by traditional sampling methods you're suffering by the technical excellence of the professional musicians. They'll strive for perfect intonation, which in such a concentrated context (a long note at a time, in isolation, at half or whole note increments) will be rather easy for them to achieve as a group. As they go higher and higher up the highest string, it'll become increasingly difficult to maintain good intonation and vibrato, but because these are professional players they'll make it sound quite effortless. Therein lies the problem. If you're present at the recording session you may marvel at the great tone and technical supremacy being displayed there and then, but when time comes to build a patch in your sampler you'll find it to be anything but realistic sounding in other musical contexts than simple, lengthy static parts. Just for the sake of comparison, if you were to give these musicians some music to play (specifically something less static in the upper register of their instruments) the ensemble would immediately take on a very different character. Why? Well.. because of the inevitably more noticeable intonation discrepancies between each individual player in the group that happen as natural results of playing "sul corda" or in 3rd or 4th position where fingers are cramped, the ensemble will sound bigger and the vibrato will sound wider at the beginning of longer notes before intonation is corrected within the group. What many people don't realize is that the exaggerated romantic high strings hollywood vibrato that you all love is actually considered bad technique among many string players (particularly in Austria I've gathered, hence the relatively conservative string ensemble vibrato in the VSL library) because it essentially comes to life with (oftentimes even deliberately) poor intonation. Knowing this is absolutely crucial to the outcome and success of any string sampling endeavor. This is what developers need to focus on in order to reproduce the high range of string instruments in a way that more accurately resembles people's general conceptions of what strings sound like in that register. It's by no means an easy task, though. It's a given that they'll have to step away from conventional methods of sampling and look into ways of coaxing musicians into performing what will ultimately yield more natural results in the domain of a digital sampler. Sorry if I went a bit off topic. As for more audible rosin noise in the higher range of the violins? Welcome to reality

Food for thought maybe?

What do you say VSL? Can you step away from intented perfection to achieve what so many people want (particularily from the high sweeping <insert your preferred term for romantic, expressive, etc.> Strings.

Make a lot of sense. Hopefully it is not too late for your upcoming session.

Rob

I feel that it is more linked to vibrato than anything else. At a medium and above volume of playing one tends to hear the slightly individual vibratos (vibrati?) seeping through. However, whether or not it is possible to translate this to samples I don't know, but it would be good to be able to layer with something else and then duck and dive as necessary. I find that if I do that with either Chamber Strings or Solo Violin it sort of works, but makes the sound smaller, which is the opposite of what I want.

DG

@Rob Elliott said:

Hopefully it is not too late for your upcoming session.

at the moment we are looking for the final setup, and we've read all of your comments so far. of course, i've made my mind up about this tuning and vibrato issue, but there is nothing to refer about at the moment.
we're not going to produce only a bigger violinsection, without any influence of the whole experience of the VSL-community, which includes our customers and the VSL-team, thats all i can promise by now.
regards, michael hula

Thanks Michael for the update. I just noticed how active this thread has been - I hope you get a feel for how truly important this is (I am sure you do [:D] )

Get this right and I am sure you know what this means to VSL ($$) [[;)]]

Thanks again.

Rob

I am happy that such an addition to the violin library will be added.

FWIW, as a conductor I chuckle at the different descriptive terms over which some are fencing. The words "epic", "romantic", "expressive", etc. should never be considered apart from their behavior over the ENTIRE dynamic range. Romantic or expressive playing is not limited to the much-needed p-mp-mf range. Little good it would do to have only these dynamics to use if a composition called for a respectable forte, as with dunk187's example of Princess Leia's Theme.

One thing I miss from a lot of electronic realizations of orchestral scores in the strings is an awareness of when and where a string player will be forced to use one-finger portamento, especially when playing larger intervals in altissimo passages. Granted, the need for a fatter, warmer violin section is not to be overlooked, but there are so many other elements to creating a convincing violin track which aren't always employed.

I do agree that having access and control over varying degrees of vibrato are crucial, something I really enjoyed seeing demonstrated with VI solo violin earlier this week.

I'm all for using a larger section-- large sections CAN play softly as well-- it's not *always* about loud playing, but there are plenty of times when I miss a good expressive f-ff as much as I do a convincing espr. p-mp-mf.

I say, bring it ALL on-- and don't hold back.

...and when the violins are done, how about those violas and cellos?

Romantic celli - mmmmmmm - me like

@Christian Marcussen said:

Romantic celli - mmmmmmm - me like

YES! Imagine having these new romantic violini and celli doubling each other two octaves apart. Juicy!!

..and hey-- violins playing entire passages on the G string. I miss that a lot. It's not the same as creating the same part on an extra viola track.