@Another User said:

... possible to play - say - a sustain patch, and then a legato transition

MassMover is describing a VI feature not available in "multitimbral" synths, since multitimbrality here would mean articulations acting independently. You have to decide if you really want the limitations imposed by "multitimbrality", because if you want that limitation, VI won't give it to you; it gives you options here instead of limitations. VSL has customers who value the ability to legato-transition out of different articulation; they aren't about to abandon those customers in order to gratify one guy requesting vintage "multimbrality". Of course, you can still get the VI articulations you want by setting MIDI channel in Logic, which is a separate issue, despite your conflation.

@BachRules said:

Must be nice, getting that efficient workflow

Yes, it absoultely is.

I'll let your association of Play with "niceness" speak for itself, and a lot of readers are personally familiar with Play.

@MassMover said:

... I would find it VERY useful, if there was a way to switch between more than 16 articulations by simply altering one value which is directly tied to the specific note, just as you alter velocity.

In case this interests you: [url]

This is all getting a little OT now, I think. I'm clear on what the OP wants, but have still not got my head around two things:

1. If you change MIDI channel within the player (assuming that one could) wouldn't that mean that the first note on this channel change would always be a start note, and therefore there would be no transition material heard when using legato or reps?
2. For basic use I can see that using the MIDI channel change might be efficient, but my String template (for example) has 44 articulations loaded. I wouldn't want to be limited to only 16 of these. How would one get around this?

@Another User said:

... For basic use I can see that using the MIDI channel change might be efficient, but my String template (for example) has 44 articulations loaded. I wouldn't want to be limited to only 16 of these. How would one get around this?

One would get around that by using the articulation-change options VI has been providing all along which aren't tied to MIDI channels, as the MIDI-channel specification is a relic designed in 1982 to accomodate slow cables and 8-bit CPU's.

That setting in Logic is for MIDI Channel. There are 16 MIDI Channels, as was decided in 1982. If you use that Logic setting, you get 16 choices, not 44. Logic could add another setting right next to it for Articulation, not limited to 16 choices; but that's off-topic I suppose.

@DG said:

... If you change MIDI channel within the player (assuming that one could) wouldn't that mean that the first note on this channel change would always be a start note, and therefore there would be no transition material heard when using legato or reps?

If you sent a sustain on channel 1 and then a perf-legato on channel 2, the synth could do a legato transition from the sustain to the legato, if the engineers coded it to do so. This would make the synth non-multitimbral, however, and so OP's requests for multitimbrality continue to be a bad idea.

That was my point really. You can't have both if you want to be able to use the fantastic features of the VI player properly. The only way round that I can think of is if it was possible to send a command to force a note with a legato transition, but then the feature of using seperate channels for each articulation is no longer simple and quick.

DG

@DG said:

That was my point really. You can't have both if you want to be able to use the fantastic features of the VI player properly. The only way round that I can think of is if it was possible to send a command to force a note with a legato transition, but then the feature of using seperate channels for each articulation is no longer simple and quick.

If OP was willing to concede his request for multitimbrality, VSL engineers could code it like this: "If you sent a sustain on channel 1 and then a perf-legato on channel 2, the synth could do a legato transition from the sustain to the legato."

I don't recommend that, for reasons I've already stated, but it would be possible. It would give OP the workflow he seems to want, down to every eye-movement and mouse-movement, but it wouldn't satisfy him as long as he remains set on the "multitimbrality" he's accustomed to. He's got two separate issues going on: (1) eye- and mouse-movement and (2) semantics about "multitimbrality". If he doesn't sort those out, there's no hope he'll be satisfied.

It might even work by coding it so that all note offs are passed through to all channels regardless of what MIDI channel the sequencer sends the information on, because the transition + legato sample is triggered when the gap between a note off and a succeeding note on is less than a pre-defined amount. I would want to be able to connect any articulation to a legato or repetition.

DG

There is no transition from any articulation to a perf_rep, as those patches do not distinguish between the starting note and the repetitions, so the only problem would be the legatos. One could solve this by loading a legato in a 2nd slot in each VI instance which is loaded into VE, so that lagato would be the only articulation which has to be selected via a different method.

Anyway, I think, when the OP mentions multitimbrality, he is talking about just what is discussed in the last few posts. The implementation of channel-recognition within VI to switch articulations would meet his demand. He would not miss some "multitimbrality he is used to" as suggested by BachRules, as he is using "multitimbrality" only exactly in that way to achieve midi channel information to patch changing.

@MassMover said:

There is no transition from any articulation to a perf_rep, as those patches do not distinguish between the starting note and the repetitions, so the only problem would be the legatos. One could solve this by loading a legato in a 2nd slot in each VI instance which is loaded into VE, so that lagato would be the only articulation which has to be selected via a different method.

Ah yes, of course. My mistake. However as legato is arguably one of the most important articulations it seems to me that this should be as easy to select as any other articulation. I'm still not sure how one would deal with the 16 channel limitation though.

DG

Well, pragmatically I think there is little demand for making MIDI Channel the message to control articulation switching in Vienna Instruments. I have no idea how much work it would entail but I never heard anyone bring it up before.

George, with respect, you're missing out on quite a lot by being dogmatic. If you're sticking with notation as the [single] way to sequencing maybe you're not as interested in the same things as most everybody here, though. Already said, 'I have a bit more than 16 articulations loaded typically', etc. The score doesn't play itself. Though there is one guy that's posted here that makes fairly convincing music strictly from notation, it's anomalous.

Sticking with PLAY interface and eschewing VI, VI Pro particularly out of this one thing is a bit jarring to people that are interested in it.

As I understand it, Orchestral Tools moved away from their Articulation Performer interface for their strings, stating at VI Control their preference for the old ways (a track for each articulation). IE: instead of crossfading in one instance, overlapping of separate events. Strange argument.

Accessing 192 Articulations with MIDI Channels in Vienna Instruments

Vienna Instruments offers 12 matrices per instance, and each of these matrices are accessible by Program Number or Keyswitch. If each of the matrices could hold 16 cells that are each assigned to unique MIDI channels, that would yield 192 articulations within one instance. Multiplying that by 16 instances within a VE Pro viframe yields 3072 articulations.

16 Cells x 12 Matrices = 192 Articulations per Instance

Here is an example of 3 loaded matrices:

n/m, read it wrong.

@civilization 3 said:

Well, pragmatically I think there is little demand for making MIDI Channel the message to control articulation switching in Vienna Instruments. I have no idea how much work it would entail but I never heard anyone bring it up before.

Another pragmatic consideration is that OP's workflow-request could be satisfied entirely without altering VI, by inserting a plug-in between Logic and VI. OP could work as he wishes in Logic, adjusting Logic's MIDI Channel setting to change articulation; Logic would send the data on to the plug-in; the plug-in would translate the MIDI-Channel data into Program Changes or keyswitches; and then the plug-in would send the translated data on to VI.

The plug-in could be developed by a 3rd-party or by Logic. Maybe it already exists.

Plug-ins are the more pragmatic solution for functionality demanded by relatively few people. Like, if you wanted a ping-pong delay on your Hollywood Strings, you could go to EWQL and request they add ping-pong delay to Play; and you could hold up Omnisphere as an example and say "look Omnisphere has been doing ping-pong delay for years, and it's elegant, so Play is glaringly deficient"; and EWQL would ban you because they are fascist like that; or... instead of all that you could get a ping-pong delay plug-in and use it to add ping-pong delay to your Hollywood Strings.