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Strictly for highly skilled connoisseurs of the art of orchestral writing and rare talents out there who simply refuse to compromise on original thinking (examples as to the latter at 7:13 onwards).
P.S.: As a brand new product, it's not perfected yet. You still have to come up with the chords (sigh). I'm certain version 2.zero is in the works.
Wow! Thanks for the heads up, Errikos.
Well, first I must say I'd be happier if Elon Musk had managed the project (or hey, perhaps he did but modestly declined a credit). If a corporation is to seriously dumb-down a product, it needs world-class expertise to prevent the result appearing dumb or crap - and Elon's products are absolutely top quality and never ever let you down. But I guess EW must have someone almost like Elon on board, cuz surely nobody in their right mind would call this product dumb or crap.
Yes indeed, that stuff from 7;13 on does seem absolutely unique; I've not heard anything quite like it in any film soundtrack. Yet if the user just wants to reproduce something well known by, oh let's go crazy and say John Williams, I'm sure it must also be possible. And then I bet it would sound exactly like the real thing and be totally impossible to tell that the sounds had actually come from a modern, highly automated mighty-Wurlitzer-cinema-organ kind of a thingy.
But, although ostinato seems all present and correct I was disturbed by the absence of Taiko - because prominent Taikos with ostinato strings have been crucial for Hollywood-style originality for at least a decade or two now! But like you said, Errikos, I'm sure v2 will be worth the wait and monthly fees. (And like Rolls Royce car salesmen say: those who ask how much, can't afford it.)
P.S. I'm not familiar with that EW Player. I really hope it has some place where off-grid 3rd-party pythonscript patches can be inserted - cuz any top pro will tell you that inserting code obtained from indie script-tinkers is by far the best way of ensuring their rig will be as robust and dependable as possible.
[N.B. Legal disclaimer:– I may be using wall-to-wall irony, and accept no liability for any consequences of readers taking this post literally.]
Taikos are an important omission which, overwhelmed as I was with the demonstration, did not register in my mind at the time - surprisingly, as I just adore Taikos and their habitual, tasteful use in original film scores.
And another thing. How many more sets of microphones and controllers thereof are we still expecting in the future? This competition among sound library companies regarding microphonal opulence... How much farther can it go? And how much farther can this obsession with orchestral verisimilitude go before even one person bothers to be as judgemental about the quality of the actual music that is channeled through all these plug-ins and filters and sends and returns and dithers and whatnot?
I bet even Hans is vomiting by this time.
Lolol, I'm willing to bet that our chum the dronemeister-narcissist doesn't waste a second of his valuable time listening to stuff by unknown hopefuls. Perhaps he listens to a little of his rivals' stuff; or maybe not; who knows?
It reminds me – many years ago a friend showed me a big rubbish skip in the alley behind Sony Music's offices in London's West End. The skip was full of thousands of brand new music CDs, all different and each with elaborate artwork, titles, performers' names, etc. After sifting through them for a while we concluded they were all demo albums by unknown hopefuls. I was curious so I took a bunch home to listen to them. Jeeeez what dreadful crap it was.
That weird discovery left me somewhat depressed - thinking of the thousands upon thousands of hours of intense work that ended up in the bin; also thinking of those poor buggers in Sony Music who had to deal with these demos that kept flooding in.
But I drew a lesson. In my listening it wasn't long before I just couldn't take more than a few seconds of a few tracks for each CD, because my curiosity had gone into hiding behind the sofa. All I could tolerate was a very quick first impression here and there. And I couldn't imagine the Sony people doing it much differently - cuz they're mere mortals too.
So a strategy for writing music demos popped into my head:– don't do long intros; grab the listener's attention firmly in bar 1 and immediately build up the interest from there. Easy peasy, right? Lol. Oh I forgot the important bit:- don't think you can develop your talent (if you have any) at listeners' expense, cuz they ain't your doting mum and you sure as hell ain't the only unknown hopeful in the world; listeners who find themselves being abused in this way will drop you like a hot brick and shun you forever.
---
Of course my lone voice in the wilderness won't make a jot of difference. The 'Narcissism-Industrial Complex' (NIC) will no doubt continue to dictate what we, the cattle, are to consume as popular and media music. Your point, Errikos, about today's ever more sophisticated "production values" is, IMO, a valid dipiction of the increasingly irresistible cues used by the NIC to convince us that we're consuming the best-produced consumables - regardless of whether or not those end-products in themselves are garbage. And once that sickness catches on, no decent maker of digital means of music production can afford to fall behind (hence I'm not blaming VSL).
Also, today's tiresome emphasis on "workflow" can, arguably, be seen as the latest cryptic invocation of "Scientific Management" and "Fordism"; doctrines that have long ensured the NIC's 'artillery fire' is so rapid and relentless that consumers are left in no doubt about their lack of choice or voice in what's being shoved down their throats. Today and forever, the NIC insists, music production must fall into line and accept the doctrine that individual and original craft (and let nobody dare mention art) is for losers.
I suggest we study the oozlum's antics, which are pretty much a representative example of what narcissism brings to the table in this business. For instance, technical depth:- shallow, incoherent, inconsistent and shoddy; artistic depth:- zero; integrity and morality:- zero; originality:- at best a scruffy jumble of ideas stolen from others. What passes for the narcissist's 'soul' is an abysmal, dysfunctional mess, yet they're absolutely convinced they're entitled to call the shots in what we the consumers are to accept as good music and good practice in producing music. Well we've suffered decades of that dire, vapid, stinking BS; radical change for the better is long overdue.
Lolol, I'm willing to bet that our chum the dronemeister narcissist doesn't waste a second of his valuable time listening to stuff by unknown hopefuls.
I agree, but I'm sure he hears a lot of current film scores and those are pretty much Hollywood Orkestrated. Just last night I saw the 2016 remake of The Magnificent Seven. They saved Bernstein's theme for the end credits. So, the credits were rolling as a new recording of the original theme was played, at the end of which the new, step-sequenced score took over. The juxtaposition/comparison was so jarring that I'd hate to have been this recent film's composer, despite what must have been a financially lucrative contract.
I mention this as an initial comment to your story about Sony's London offices and their garbage bins for CDs. I remember an interview with a studio executive in charge of music in Hollywood (I do not remember which studios). His desk was stockpiled with demo CDs, end-to-end, about 30 to a pile. He pointed at them saying they represented merely that particular day's deliveries (he had received just as many previously and was expecting the same the following day). How was he expected to examine them all? Answer he gave: He couldn't and he wouldn't. The vast majority would be thrown away. There was no return policy and no allocated space for the CDs in the studios' premises.
As far as grabbing producers' and directors' attention within the first few seconds, I must say that I have no idea what is expected these days. My favourite weighty, powerful, arresting opening of all times is that of Brahms' Symphony N.1. I would say Beethoven's 5th and Sibelius' 4th are not far behind, followed by Petrushka, Carmina Burana, Keqrops, Ein Heldenleben, and many others in no particular order of course and, if amplitude is not a factor, who can ignore the haunting openings of Rachmaninov's 2nd Piano Concerto, Music for Strings Percussion and Celeste, Ligeti's Requiem, etc., etc. Would these openings impress the average filmmaker these days? I wish...
And if I have my take on film scores for those arresting first few seconds, would Citizen Kane, North by Northwest, or Vertigo cut it today? I very much doubt it. Maybe Star Wars - A New Hope or Star Trek - The Motion Picture. Maybe... I think they are by now conditioned to only tune in to Trailer (park) / Epic patches and layers.
I know! The next big thing for sample library companies will be 'Openings' (pity 'Big Bang' is already taken...): "In these times of the Clone Wars, you have to impress the filmmakers instantly if you're going to have any chance of securing a contract. 'Openings' is a brand new library, and a fast and sure way of grabbing a director's elusive ear. We have created tons of inspiration patches, lasting anywhere between 4-10 seconds, that will suit all kinds and styles of contemporary cinema. Just select from the Menu - Action, Adventure, Horror, Suspense, Thriller, etc., and the appropriate directory of our headphone-tearing, mind-numbing WAVs will allow you (and countless others) to select the perfect musical introduction that will compel any filmmaker to hear the complete track. Stay tuned, in the next few months we'll be releasing 'Middles' and 'Endings', to complement this release and the complete sham that is commercial film-music composition today.
Brilliiant idea! Absolutely no doubt that "Openings", "Middles" and "Endings" will revolutionise scoring for film, TV and video. I can foresee a headline:– "Deaf 13 year old becomes first billionaire composer while working in mom's basement."
Oh my days, what larks. Lolol
Btw I had a quick listen to the end credits of The Magnificent Seven (2016). Yep - yuck. But as you noted, the new composer was probably laughing all the way to the bank. (The same probably goes for the makers of Orcastrator.)
P.S. Yes, hard to know if today's film audiences - having been extensively conditioned for decades to be most comfortable with crap - would be receptive to scores by great masters. But here's an example of what a truly great orchestral work (Rachmaninoff's sublime 2nd Piano) did for a film made 76 years ago:–
The filmed story is a beautifully understated masterpiece by famous playwright Noel Coward:– "Brief Encounter" (1945). It's very British (with hues of Biedermeier), aimed mainly at middle class audiences and has nothing to do with the war. The music is superbly spotted; score excerpts matching story moments exquisitely.
Today perhaps it's easy to mock this sort of film, and a major specific criticism is that Coward's understanding of heterosexual love was of course somewhat theoretical - hence his frequent invocations of philosophical ideals. And yet the film's current IMDb rating is 8, which tells a story in itself.
Brilliiant idea!Absolutely no doubt that "Openings", "Middles" and "Endings" will revolutionise scoring forfilm, TV and video. I can foresee a headline:– "Deaf 13 yearoldbecomes first billionaire film, TV and video composer while working in mom's basement."And the Oscar goes to... Thanks for the Noel Coward link!
Well... in case one is customer of both the companies (as I am) and one want to make some nice comparison, the Ork-estrator is a lot of fun: it drives MIDI channels to VEP and you may play a full VSL Orchestra with it!
The result is amazing, and despite the fact EW HO with Orchestrator is already fine tuned to get a bold cinematic sound with tons of effects in the chain, still playing "as-it-is" VSL Synchron(-ized) Orchestra sounds great out of the box with Synchron Player default presets! 😉
If you go a step forward instead of using the pre-made scores and ostinatos, and you write your own (few minutes of step sequencing LOL if you know about orchestration and composition of course...) you may have even more fun.
But GOSH YES... you definitely MUST know a bit of chords... 😃 Ah no... in reality you may just take a song book, write the chords into the chord track of the sequencer, set-up the routing, and enjoy the PC producing for you automagically some (pretty bad clichè😉 music(k)... 😃
Well... in case one is customer of both the companies (as I am) and one want to make some nice comparison, the Ork-estrator is a lot of fun: it drives MIDI channels to VEP and you may play a full VSL Orchestra with it!
I'm also a customer of both companies (Symphonic Choirs - since nobody else will release a fully "phoneticizable" choir). Do I understand you correctly? Are you saying the Orkestrator engine will play VSL instruments through VEP? That is, the Orkestrator will apply its patterns and settings onto other libraries' sounds? I don't get the 'as-it-is' in your post.
I'm also a customer of both companies (Symphonic Choirs - since nobody else will release a fully "phoneticizable" choir). Do I understand you correctly? Are you saying the Orkestrator engine will play VSL instruments through VEP? That is, the Orkestrator will apply its patterns and settings onto other libraries' sounds? I don't get the 'as-it-is' in your post.
Yes:
- in VST (e.g. Cubase) you may route the MIDI output of the plug-in to another instrument for real time playback (or to a track for recording the midi data).
- If the instrument is VEP, then each channel of the Ork-estration will play a VEP channel: if they are assigned to the right and corresponding VSL instruments what you get is a VSL playback version of the original score/ostinato etc.
- the instruments of VSL Synchron and/or Synchron-ized collections sound pretty well without additional effects or manipulation (the EW effect chain of the orchestrator is pretty complex with e.q. compression reverb and dynamic/velocity compression etc.) because the Synchron default set up are already including similar (in my opinion more natural and less invasive) effects for a final large Orchestral sound suitable for cinematic effects.
VSL sound is a bit less bold/normalized (sound softer) but a bit more acoustic and less artificial in my opinion. Obviously if you save MIDI data and edit it to best fit the VSL controllers and articulations, the effect is even better, but even without any editing in live playback (that's the intended sense of "as-it-is", without further processing) it's already good.
...anyway out of pure technical curiosity and feedback, and out of easy jokes about the clichè and creativity delegation, I have a serious comment:
- as you all stated art is art, and tools are tools. Without talent there is no tool that can transform you in a genius and if you are a genius, there is no need of special tools to show it. This is the bitter and obvious reality. But...
- as educated composers with technical know-how, we still have to remember that music is made of layers and ingredients, components that target different levels of consciousness, different levels of education and different mixes of rational and emotional stimulations: the pyramid is based on rhythm, then timbral colours, then melody, then harmony and finally counterpoint... so with fine counterpoint you will catch just a few educated or hyper-sensible people, while with good rhythm and emotional sound you will get all...
This is the key to understand the actual industry and the success or failure of different approaches:
- industry is based on success (because success is money...) and even if success is a mass/social average factor, manipulated by the media and a recursive education vs. brainwash process, still success is based on customers satisfaction. So why so often people love crap? That's the question we always ask... and it's misleading.
- because the concept of "crap" itself is subjective and context dependent: here the theory of music and perception enters the game and explains why fake orchestras and AI clichè can be succesful vs. original mastercraft and innovation.
- low education makes the musical perception more basic. People will stop to sound and rhythm, and will be moved by the loudness, the spectral richness, the punchy basses, the martial patterns and exciting ancestral stimulation. They will perceive pleasure and satisfaction, despite the lack of original or sophisticated melodies, and total absence of any counterpoint etc.
- is your audience educated? would your audience listen to Bach's fugues or the maximum they can afford is a popular tune of Mozart? Are they more exposed to rap and disco, or to chamber contemporary music?
Then the paradox is we composers still have to write for an audience. If we don't, we are just selfish idealists, perhaps we will be discovered and appreciated in the future, but it's unlikely... perhaps not impossible, but really unlikely,
If the average and rewarding audience today asks for basic emotions made of timbral hype and rhythmic excitement, "the art" is finding moving and exciting combinations of colours and patterns, whatever the source, in the comfort zone of clichè common language everybody understand... and this is not trivial. It's an art itself.
Perhaps closer to pop-industry than academic composing, but still about music, about audience, and about talent.
edit - I shouldn't be so obnoxious but these statements set me off.
"fake orchestras and AI clichè can be succesful vs. original mastercraft and innovation." - fatis
"If the average and rewarding audience today asks for basic emotions made of timbral hype and rhythmic excitement, "the art" is finding moving and exciting combinations of colours and patterns, whatever the source, in the comfort zone of clichè common language everybody understand... and this is not trivial. It's an art itself." - fatis
- In other words, auto-generated musical cliches are just as good as individual musical artistry if someone likes auto-generated cliches. Like a producer or audience who demand the cliches. So go ahead, line up and supply the cliches. Stop being a stuck-up "artiste" and just do what the audiences and the producers want.
- because the concept of "crap" itself is subjective and context dependent: here the theory of music and perception enters the game and explains why fake orchestras and AI clichè can be succesful vs. original mastercraft and innovation.
- low education makes the musical perception more basic. People will stop to sound and rhythm, and will be moved by the loudness, the spectral richness, the punchy basses, the martial patterns and exciting ancestral stimulation. They will perceive pleasure and satisfaction, despite the lack of original or sophisticated melodies, and total absence of any counterpoint etc.
- is your audience educated? would your audience listen to Bach's fugues or the maximum they can afford is a popular tune of Mozart? Are they more exposed to rap and disco, or to chamber contemporary music?
Ultimately everyone has the moral right to do what they like, whether a composer or listener. So people can make crap music and others can listen to it. But that doesnt mean crap music and good music are the same.
Mind you I am not saying everything has to be a Bach Fugue. As long as the music is well thought through and with adequate knowledge of possibilities I consider it original. Again that's my choice.
Was the Doors song 'The End' well thought through? Perhaps. It just has a drone background and nothing fancy going on from a music theory perspective, but yet it makes a huge impact on me (I am influenced by 'Apocalypse now'). I guess music is highly complex so it can evoke so many reactions in so many ways.
So I am not really sure how to judge music on an absolute scale without ultimately failing.
But then, I can't compare Jim Morrison to someone who simply uses software to make music without really understanding music theory. I guess music could also reflect a life experience. If someone has had a genuine experience that they manage to convey through art that's precludes any technical virtuosity. It is still original music and touches people's hearts.
Your post reminded me of an incident . A person I knew who was not musically trained or knowledgeable was raving about 'Epic' music (which we all know as that horrendous thump thump/taiko/ostinato genre invented by dear Hans). I convinced this person to attend a concert in which they played Mozart, Barber and Rachmaninoff (Isle of the dead!!). He was completely BLOWN AWAY by the sound, the acoustics and the intensity of the experience, He never mentioned Epic to me again,
Its sad that most people who think classical/romantic/orchestral music is either boring or for snooty rich people will never find out how amazing it is, as few will ever attend live concerts. I think that's the key to the survival of this great genre (and by extension good film scores) and I hope it will come back.
Ive made some rambling disconnected points. Will sign off now.
Anand
edit - I shouldn't be so obnoxious but these statements set me off.
"fake orchestras and AI clichè can be succesful vs. original mastercraft and innovation." - fatis
"If the average and rewarding audience today asks for basic emotions made of timbral hype and rhythmic excitement, "the art" is finding moving and exciting combinations of colours and patterns, whatever the source, in the comfort zone of clichè common language everybody understand... and this is not trivial. It's an art itself." - fatis
- In other words, auto-generated musical cliches are just as good as individual musical artistry if someone likes auto-generated cliches. Like a producer or audience who demand the cliches. So go ahead, line up and supply the cliches. Stop being a stuck-up "artiste" and just do what the audiences and the producers want.
Obviously not William.
My point is that there is an art in composing elegant and emotional patchworks, more or less as composing pop songs, that can make common people happy and provide work and money for producers.
If it wasn't the case, we had not big investments in the segment, and if no art/talent was requested to make it properly, everybody should be rich and famous, and obviously it doesn't happen.
So we can keep our choice of being artists, and being the educated and original artists, and I think we can be proud of being, but we simply shouldn't underestimate the talent and the business of clone makers, that are successful in the middle of the crowd and that's because they succeed in making common people emotional 😊
I agree 100%.Its sad most people who think classical/romantic/orchestral music is either boring or for snooty rich people will never find out how amazing it is, as few will ever attend live concerts. I think thats the key to the survival of this great genre (and by extension good film scores) and I hope it will come back.
Ive made some rambling disconnected points. Will sign off now.
Anand
And my conclusion is we should invest as much as possible in musical education. That's what I did at my best during my life, studying, financing, teaching, performing etc.
Unfortunately the pop culture try to keep the educated music away, to manipulate audience for business, but as you mention, if you provide experience to the listeners, they won't step back anymore. So hope never dies...
Back again.
I would like to discuss a few points, cued by some things that were said here.
First of all, does somebody's expression in literature, music, painting, architecture, etc. qualify as high art, merely from the effect it has on the eye or ear of the beholder? Not really... It can qualify as a preference of the beholder (intimating his tastes), but not as a consensus. Now, what if a devastating number of people subjected to that somebody's expression, world wide, agreed that it indeed qualified as a product of high art? Again, not enough. One would have to review what other works these people also consider as high art. If Bieber is mentioned...
Can we make an, as objective as possible, pronouncement regarding this 'so-called' Epic school, as an artistically valid type of orchestral composition? We certainly can:
This type of orchestral composition is exclusively utilised as background scoring for film and video games. There is no way that any orchestra of any note will perform such a work, unless it already exists as a score to something... No one will ever commission orchestral music of this type for its own sake (for a symphony, concerto, opera, ballet, you name it), and I don't know of any 'serious' composer that belongs to this "school" of orchestral writing. Conversely, I know of 'Minimalists', 'Spectralists', 'Neo-romantics', 'Free-atonalists', etc. Enough said. This kind of "music" is dim, and its composeurs are a joke outside of Hollywood, BBC, and Playstation.
Let's now eliminate all other types of orchestral composition and concentrate exclusively on media music and why, Hollywood for example, propagates this kind of symphonic refuse. Is it,
a) Because people like it? Not necessarily. People did not have any problems with the likes of Williams, Shore, Barry, Goldsmith, etc. before this kind of orchestral bile rose inside Hollywood's oesophagus. People are mostly there for the movie. They'll like pretty much anything although, other than Hans, I haven't seen much veneration for any other such composter, comparable to that which say Morricone enjoyed,
b) Because this kind of score suits a particular kind of movie (or game)? Again, no. This monotonous, lobotomous, layered crap has been employed in most genres: Action, Thriller, Suspense, Adventure, etc. I refer everybody to the aforementioned names. They scored such films a lot better, a lot deeper - with real layers,
c) Is it because this kind of music costs less to produce, so in effect it is the product of financial considerations? I am not an expert, but I don't see how this kind of orchestral claptrap is cheaper to record with an orchestra than any other score; and if it is, I have never read it from anyone in recently published books, or relevant YouTube interviews.
So what's the reason for this music's use then, if it's absolute crap and no cheaper than a proper score?
I won't go into that, but I'll just say that music is not the only aspect of film making that has gone down the public toilet. Compare the Star Wars of the '70s to today's as an example. Compare re-makes, etc.
Anand mentioned Jim Morrison. Who is the last 30 years' Jim Morrison, Paul McCartney, Billy Joel, Roger Waters, Benny Andersson, Freddie Mercury, Elton John, Phil Collins, Jeff Lynne, Barry Gibb, Roger Hodgson, Mark Knopfler, Eric Woolfson, name your own... Anybody comes even near?
Back to the software. fatis12_24918 said the pyramid is based on rhythm, then timbral colours, then melody, then harmony and finally counterpoint. This only applies of course to this Trailer park "music" this software facilitates. Music, in the western world at least (and orchestral music was born there), began with melody/rhythm (we'll never know which came first), then counterpoint, then harmony, and finally timbre. And it was always sophisticated; as sophisticated as it could be at any time.
Finally, the orchestra is an instrument in itself. It has developed from the chamber ensembles of the past, to the Classical orchestra, then the Romantics added size and instruments, and so did the Modernists in the 20th century. Its constituent instruments have developed and changed over time from their original forms, much like the development of the piano.
How one composes for this 'instrument' does not depend on the 'instrument'. It is capable of Mozart's 40th, as it is of Lutoslawski's 3rd. Capable of Captain Blood, as it is of Superman (1978). Sadly, it is also capable of Man of Steel (2013).
The instrument does not make you a composer - any instrument. It will however reflect the composer you are, according to how you write for it. And remember: Technique is not a matter of taste, or opinion.
