Take a deep breath, folks, and let us disagree in a cordial and non-personal manner. We don't want this tread locked too, we want the DAW, right?! [:D]
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Yes but by re-opening this, you've allowed some of us for the first time to witness (Errikos), go from hero to zero in his own thread. Errikos addresses Civilization 3's Stravinsky comparison, without addressing his own condesending tone. It was that tone which upset Civilization 3, and (OTHERS), in the first place... Errikos appears to be of the belief that (Symphonic Orchestration) is the only valid form of musical expression. I get that.... But don't be surprised when those who disagree, vigorously push back.
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Back to the original topic (aka turning a blind eye to the other stuff going on) I came into the forums searching for exactly this type of a thread because I knew I couldn't be the only one thinking it's a good idea. The way I imagined it would work would be like this. When you first install the Vienna Notation, or whatever it would be called, you either tell it which libraries you have or which libraries you'd like for it to use, OR it just checks which licenses you have downloaded. This informs what I'm going to call Vienna Notation (VN) which articulations are available to you. As you input notes into the notation program, it automatically drops them onto a piano roll as well. That seems simple enough. At the same time, however, VN will be looking at which articulations would be best suited for what you just placed onto the score. This should also be fairly simple to do, and a setup like this actually makes MORE sense than what we currently have. For instance, PLAY takes information about what you're playing and picks which articulations are best. So if you play repeated notes, it automatically plays back repetitions. VN would have the advantage over PLAY because it would be able to look at the score as a whole. It wouldn't be constantly struggling to keep up with what you're playing--it would know what you're going to play in advance.
From that point, VN is pretty much making a custom matrix based on the software you have and sending that information to VEPro. It will see if you have a run approaching and it will be able to then play back a timestretched run from the appropriate instrument. There should also be an "alternate" option where if you don't like a particular articulation that the software has preselected, you can control-click or option-click or something and see which other ones would work. For instance it's playing a staccato but you don't like the sound of the samples playing, you can control-click or right-click or something and it gives a dropdown list of articulations it can substitute for you, like spiccato for example.
I know that this will get hit with comments about being more work than it's worth, however I think people who say so are only seeing a small part of a bigger picture. With new libraries from EWQL, Symphobia, 8dio, LASS, Spitfire, etc., we've come almost as far as we can go with the current method of sample playback. My belief is that, far from being a niche product, something like VN would not only be the logical next step in sampling, but in fact we're a few steps behind by NOT having anything like it yet. For the first time ever the sample player would know what sample will be played next. The implications of something like that are astounding.
Imagine how many samples are in each product and how easy it is to not realize that what your bassoon is playing is essentially part of an arpeggio. VN wouldn't miss that, it would be able to snip out the part of the arpeggio your bassoon will play for you automatically and you get that much more realism out of doing things that way compared to just using a legato articulation. Of course the product may need to go through several different updates and revisions and improvements before it can get quite that good but I'm barely even scratching the surface of what's possible if your software knows what you will play next. Plus imagine how low-latency the playback can be if the samples can be pre-rendered before you ever even play them.
Well, I'm done with my speech for today lol, but this is something that's been on my mind ever since I started getting into samples a few years ago, and we're missing out on so much potential quality due to the unavailability of something like this.
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Well that's an interesting way of looking at it. Personally I prefer to have control over articulations e.g. sometimes the staccato sample is just wrong for the music, not to mention the speed of the trill. I much prefer the idea of a notation staff where you can open a CC controler staff and a keyswitch staff below it. I like to program things they way an individual performer would play... I'm not a big fan of automated events/keyswitches, they sound too robotic.
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My apologies to you Clruwe... That was rude of me. If I may ask, what WOULD you do if you had that "million bucks"?
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What? What are you talinkg about? You weren't rude at all...
Million bucks? Well... Obviously finance the R&D for this dream software and I would definitely commission the IT team at VSL to do it!
VSL products are the only ones in my windows machine that don't crash all the time, the updates are actually meaningful and they reward (not punish you) for being a loyal/longtime customer.
Aaaah (sigh!), how wonderful it is to dream...
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Well I had imagined the piano roll to be editable in terms of timing and dynamics and modwheel. But of course there will be times when you'd prefer to play things in yourself. I'm that type of person myself. Well good luck on the road to a million, and if you ever do fund R&D for something like this you'll be my hero!
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"Beat monger" is a strawman you have devised to make someone appear foolish. You've used it a couple of times on me, in place of saying anything intelligent and in this thread to obviate any comprehension of what I actually wrote.@Errikos said:
@civilization 3: Are you comparing yourself and the gazillion other droves of beat-mongers to Stravinsky?!?!?!
In short, had VSL (and similar companies) never existed, you would still be able to realize your music through computers. A lot of us wouldn't be.
I was realizing my music for decades before there was the personal computer. I went in my life from 'concert performer' to 'free improviser' (in the meantime I spent some time in the 'electronic music lab') which are both activities where a person functions in real time. If you were unable to use a computer to realize music at all prior to VSL products, that is a sad case indeed. It puts a cart before a horse it does.
There is nowhere I particularly put myself up as Stravinsky, but you have argued in these pages by the most bullying fashion for some quite reactionary ideas. Reacting against technology (unless it's VSL). For an audience of today, Le Sacre has the weight of history behind it. In 1913 it was seriously radical. It's hard to feature you fighting on behalf of new ideas in music. You need people using drums and distortion to be 'popheads', now 'beat mongers', you do. I find from you a precious and insulated idea of things out of this kind of overheated cyberaggression: "Don't start talking again about things you don't understand - stick to computers and studio matters which you seem to know." I may know more about the studio or technology than you, but I was a musician for a long time to lead me to that. You need to make me look foolish to support your superior condescension; apparently it isn't just me noticing.
One of the reasons Le Sacre was reacted against that vehemently was loud drums (that weren't merely decoration or accent: drums qua drums) in combination with time signatures that were new to these people. In combination with dancing to those rhythms and the perceived lasciviousness. "Whores of the 16th Arrondisement!!!" If you can prove that isn't so, you have a point against mine. I remain skeptical.
As per your idea, it argues for a product geared towards, well, you... a restricted user, hence a more narrow user base comprised of people that don't use effects?? Movie music people nowadays have to have a pretty good grip of 'the studio' and 'pop production' and things that you have an aversion to out of that insularity it appears. There isn't a market share of purist virtual symphony-only people to justify the R&D expense I don't reckon. I don't think it's 'one step' from what VSL does, based in my understanding of this virtual music world, which is wider than yours at least. You are asking for a product that does less it looks like.
But ideas are good! I wouldn't hold my breath as far as this one, I would recommend obtaining a better grasp of the tools that are available, they work for people.
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One reason why I don't think these ideas are quite as limited as you do is because I'm not looking at this concept as one that is limited to orchestral instruments, but one that has a very wide number of possible applications. If VSL does something like this, there will obviously be an orchestral slant, though, due to the fact that their libraries are, for the majority, orchestral. So I do see your point there. But all in all, yes the current system works just fine, but as long as we need the disclaimer "Well, nothing sampled will sound exactly like something played live..." there's room for improvement, which means innovation won't stop.
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Well, to be frank I agree that the tools available now are in fact enough to do everything. I just find them slow. There was no actual need for a vienna ensemble and they've could've just worked with Kontakt, but both made life better and work easier. I get lost in piano-roll. I'm a musician, I'm used to reading music not colored bars in a grid... I've been working with DAWs for a year now and I don't think I'll get used to them ever, I still try to do the majority of the performace in Sibelius (basic dynamics, swing feel, keyswitches, etc.) and just do the touch up in Cubase. However, I love the latter for mixing! I find it intuitive and extremely fast. But for music performance I need a staff, otherwise I don't get it and loose the feel of it... So if I do become a millionaire and we develop this you are all getting a free copy!
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I play each line separately. There's not a single line of music that I can imagine that would be too difficult to play while still sounding musical. By line I mean single voice, single note. Maybe if there are two flute parts I'll play them both in together, or if there are simple block chords or a simple four-part that's not too hard to play in I might do that too. Now if it's a piano, organ, or harpsichord track that's exceptionally complicated it may get a bit trickier--the tempo may need to be slowed down while recording then sped back up afterwords. I'm a decent enough player to be able to learn a very difficult but very short piece of music just long enough to get a good recording after a few takes, so often if it's a hard piano part the full line will be made up of a bunch of takes put together, two bars at a time or so. What kinds of lines do you need to play that are far too difficult?
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Hello Casiquire, thank you for your reply. That actually answers a lot of questions. In rare occasions, when I need to imitate a real soloist, I will use an electronic wind instrument. I am actually very good on it and have never encountered limitations on it. Nevertheless, I will sometimes need to do 3 of 4 takes and still edit it a bit (keyswitches, etc.). Not to mention the time spent learning the part. So basically, the more I exercise this practice the more I realise it's not a very efficient approach and extremely time consuming. Because of the nature of my work (I must sometimes produce the whole product in a week or less) I cannot afford the time spent in learning and practising every single part in the ensemble.
At the moment I copy my handwritten score into Sibelius (I don't need to do this every time since some clients don't require a score), and there I will try to adjust playback as much as the stupid software lets me. Unfortunately I then have to transfer the MIDI into Cubase for further tweaking (More human and subtle dynamics, pitch bends, etc.) and then convert the whole thing into audio for mixing.... Aaaargh! If I could do the whole MIDI editing in Sibelius and just mix in Vienna Ensemble from the same software, I could do everything in a third of the time. Hence why I fantasise about a VSL notation software: one place for it all!
PS: the parts that are too difficult are usually arrangements of a single line that breaks up into different instruments in a section. For example the bass clarinet begins an ascending line and as it climbs the clarinet and oboe pick it up, then the flutes, the piccolos, etc. All this in the sapce of a beat. Just to give an example. A seasoned player won't struggle with it, especially considering that he/she will be surrounded by the other players doing it. If I have to do it on my own then I have no context except a click... Not the same
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Hi guys, I just wanted to say, don't take your cues, or seriously at all from what 'civilization 3' says. You don't know her as well as I do. Unless you waste your time accessing her "views" on music through posts dating back 3-4 years (to savour all the splendour), you cannot possibly have an idea about them and I won't discuss them with anyone that hasn't done so. Our differences go that far back, so if I appear - or actually am - condescending to her, I have good reason to be so, after countless attempts on my part to argue intelligently, and countless posts where she's just been ignorant and outright dismissive, not just of me, but of titans (like Mozart, Beethoven, Wagner), or even talented gents like John Williams, without once having cited the name of a superior musician to them (you know, for our edification). She has no idea about Stravinsky of course (people were booing even during the opening counterpoint, and NO, it was not the drums per se, but the rhythms/syncopations and their assumption of thematic functions - to put it extremely grossly, and tonality that bothered the audience musically, choreography aside, and don't confuse it with The Afternoon of a Faun).
I am extremely busy this period to accept a dialog with that person now on this thread (I was told by a friend the thread was "open" again), but she's just SO uninformed, probably the person that knows and appreciates the least about symphonic music that I have ever come across. Symphonic music is all I ever refer to in this forum, I'm not concerned about other types of music in this forum, unless they also involve orchestral writing, and then it is about that writing I busy myself exclusively. I couldn't care any less about people creating or using others' loops, arpeggios, sounds, beats, anything really, unless it involves symphonic forces. When it does, I'm all over it!
As far as 'civilization 3' ever having been a concert performer, that brings tears of hilarity to one's eyes... What exactly did you perform concert performer? And why would you perform anything (assuming you could, I bet you couldn't if your life depended upon it), and from what repertoire since you hate it so much? Didn't the entire demographic of "dead white males" (a.k.a. "Straw Men") through the entire symphonic tradition, write "puerile melodies"? Didn't you also imply they all were rhythmically inept until about 1913 (as if you could take down a Beethoven or Chopin rhythm in a 100 years)? I mean, why bother yourself with that kind of repertoire? It's not like you did it for the money, is it?
Finally, the idea of VSL developing a symphonic D.A.W. (with or without a notator) that I came up with, was welcomed by others here that I respect, including these "new" guys who actually seem to know that symphonic music existed before all those current s**t automated software packages allowing the BEAT MONGERS to ever entertain " " " "writing" " " " for a string section. Leave well enough alone. Go vend your "classical background" stories to anyone that will believe them, don't try musicians...
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Errikos--I will certainly stick to the heart of the matter without getting distracted by unrelated discussions that may have been going on long before I even got here. The idea that we are here to discuss has excited me enough to put me in no mood to battle. Instead it has put me in a mood of creative idea-bouncing.
Clruwe--I think I misunderstood one of your previous posts where you seemed to disagree that this was a good idea. You're a wind instrumentalist? So it sounds like you understand pretty much my entire recording method, but I'm involved with music for pleasure so I have no time limitations like you do, and prefer the benefit of that "human feel" that comes from playing the parts in individually enough to invest the extra amount of time it requires. And you're definitely not the only one who needs to play a few takes to get it right, plus some editing after getting a good take.
Hm do you have an example of the kind of musical gesture that's causing you trouble? Without hearing it, this sounds like a ton of "dove-tailing" would be required but I don't have enough experience with VSL yet to be able to give any advice on pulling it off well.
