JWL,

Another great post. I have the Dover and have looked at the section which looks like some splendid music. Would love to hear your results. I know what you mean about using appropriate number of strings in divisi as well as ulimately using what sounds best. I would try the chamber and see if they actually sound more accurate and then go with whatever sounds best in the end: the first law of midi.

Speaking of patches not quite fullfilling expectations, I thought that all legato samples were now looped but find the oboes quitting on sustained notes (just bought the winds to get around this!) so maybe I have to switch to a sustain note but that means another matrix which I don't have room for. Maybe if I load more than my 4.5 gig of ram I'll be okay (I've heard people are able to access it - can you confirm?)

I'm working on a Classical style overture I wrote ages ago just to test things out. Still trying to figure what's best workflow-wise. I agree that between downtime and loading time one could end up consuming a little to much drink for obvious reasons.

Hey Dave:

Didn't get to work too much more tonight, but I at least got the contrabasses in for the few bars I was working on today. For as much as I would love to go further, I can already see an eternity of expression editing with just the little bit I've done so far.

For the moment, I'm going to stick with the 40 violas and 32 cellos for the div.a4 passages for now,and just turn them down a little. I'm sure that I'll swap them out for the chamber tremolos, but I may retain 1 note of the orchestral 10-vla /8-vc for this just to see what happens. These adjustments won't be made until the rest of the orchestra has been programmed. One thing I've been hearing and reading about VSL is the challenge of creating more cinematic string sounds. It may help fill out the middle a bit to keep the tremolos full. It's not authentic, but as you say: rule 1 of MIDI is do what sounds best. I may even try tucking in some violins from "another sample library" to give some of the altissimo passages a touch more substance without losing VI's sparkle, but that will be a last resort.

I am discovering that there are a lot of patches of the same instrument that don't share the same range extremities. The violins are one example, tapering off for the most part at D7, while other patches go higher. Similarly, the legato contrabass patches I've tried drop off after C1 (and the notes don't sustain in the Unversal patches the way they do in the other string parts). But, one of the 'long note' bass patches does play B0. It's not legato, but perhaps a non-legato patch will help keep things clean on the bottom (so to speak).

It may be necessary to take a day (or two) to go through the matrices to take note of which patches drop off at the extremes. I wonder if this was intentional? Doesn't make sense to force the user into an undesired articulation for a note just because it plays a certain note when the patch you want is missing that note. I also noticed that some of my contrabass notes crop off around D4 or E4. Lots of large Romantic era scores will send the contrabasses up a bit higher. But maybe the VSL Team didn't deem these occurrences necessary.

Oh, yeah: there's the concept of mixing in some solo strings. Ducking them in the mix can emulate those players who are closer to the mic's (or closer to the front of the stage, as the case may be).

So many thoughts at once... (so late, too!)...

I've read Beat Kaufmann's site, and one thing that struck me was the notion of adding the sub-bass, meaning some sort of harmonizer that doubles the bass to some small degree an octave lower as a matter of virtaul resonance rather than of the actual sound. Not sure the best way to go about doing this just yet, but lots of people have been talking about this. Gladly, I have a a sub to handle LFE info. This will help for more accurate monitoring of extreme low end.

Workflow!!

I was thinking about this today, more accurately, I was re-thinking this. I took time to load in several matrices into different consoles to save the trouble of having to fish through the folders, wait for load times every time, dump the matrix or patch, then load another and another and another until the most desired one is found. It did save time to be able to just load an '.aupreset' and to get started with a variety of articulations on hand.

For a while, I would just start playing with one sound until I needed another. Then I'd stop, go hunting for the right sound, add to the matrix and play some more until such time a new articulation was needed. It's probably best for the CPU to work that way, but it wreaks havoc on efficiency and momentum. You can spend 45 minutes just getting 2 notes to sound right.

I can't complain about the matrix and patch list. It's well organized, but it's not the fastest way to work. Having a set of 'mega-consoles' puts most everything commonly used on the table at once. Dumping unused samples aftewards may be more of a habit rather than an option.

Currently, I've got 5 consoles, each with 9 matrices loaded-- pretty hefty. Oddly enough, CPU is hitting at less than 10%. Things are look a lot more promising for loading in more consoles for a full orchestra.

One other thought I had was if the VSL Team could give us one or two sizable percussion matrices with no keyswitches, but with the most common orchestral percussion instruments mapped across the entire range of the keyboard. Dunno-- might be a tall order, but it would be a lot easier to deal with in a pinch. Of course, we would have whatever key mapping method VSL chooses.

LOL!! All of this idle thought was inspired by sequencing 10 measures of music! Such is the plight of the April fool. [:D]

JWL,

Couldn't load this page for a while so I don't know what was up with that: tried to respond long ago.

By all means, whatever works for divisi go for it. It could be argued (and has) that a very tight sample of a string section as with VSL is not the real world with various attacks and vibrato etc., so it's hardly cheating to do what sounds best. Strauss loves multiple divis's as in the opening section of Zarathustra. I was thinking of the chamber strings to get that particular sound. I am trying to see how complete I can make my piece sound with VSL only, than as you said maybe layer else in there.

Haven't checked out ranges of VSL VI but I'll take your word for it and imagine that's a little troublesome. Yes the Universal patches don't sustain it seems - I ran into that with the Woodwinds.

You have solo strings? True lot's of folks layer them in for more bite and deliniation of the parts.

Also wanting my lows to sound bigger as well. Let me know if you find out what software people are using for harmonizing .

How much ram does your G5 have? I crashed after loading in some winds and maxing out mu ram. I'm thinking I should add a couple more gigs to reach 6.5? Any thoughts on this.

The old Perc 1 + 2 had mappings of various percussion as a single instrument but you're talking about a lot ,ore. I really wonder how they are going to solve that. A multi tambral VI is probably not far off.

Hey Dave:

Yeah, the site was down from this end, too.

One other little trick with solo strings is to pull the filter down a bit. It's nice to have a little "bite", but for that less obvious "rougue" player or two, a good low pass works wonders on solo strings tucked into the section. If you wanted to get complicated, have two solo instruments per section-- one to add a little "point" where needed, and the other to represent the 7th stand player who didn't do so well in the concert master audition.

My G5 2.5 dual has 4.5 GB RAM. DP doesn't see anything over 4 GB, but I'm not maxing out DP just yet. I really don't know how the Mac actually uses additional RAM-- if having 8 GB will help the performance or not. Clearly, if one is running VI as both a plugin concurrently with VI Standalone, the benefits are clear. You've got 4 GB for each processor with some consideration for the OS to take up some of that. I'm still suffering from the OS9 mindest, and my first instinct for years has always been to max out the RAM. The one benefit is that RAM for older Macs is cheaper than it was. Maybe going full wack is not a bad thing, but the few people I know with max RAM are experiencing other problems which RAM hasn't solved. My Quad friends are asking the most questions about this, although they are experiencing other benefits not RAM related.

I just read that MIR has to process offline because computers are just not fast enough yet to do everything in real time. This is frustrating. I'm tired of buying new computers which can't keep up, only to see a newer computer released weeks later that don't solve the problem either.

I'm seeing a few more "helper boxes" like these:

Native Instruments KORE
http://www.native-instruments.com/index.php?kore_us

Waves Nutshell
http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/APA44/

Muse Receptor
http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/Receptor/

Focusrite Liquid Mix
http://messe.harmony-central.com/Musikmesse06/Content/Focusrite/PR/Focusrite-Liquid-Mix.html

Virtual instruments in general reduced studio clutter, but continues to easily overwhelm computers. I'm still not convinced that AU is as efficient as it might be. I think the VI team has made the best use of AU I've ever seen. But these "helper boxes" might take considerable load off our current CPU's-- moreso than with UAD-1 or TC Powercore. While some are touting forthcoming brilliance with Intel Macs, I've always seen Apple's improvements as being in small increments, however innovative... 1.8-2.0, 2.5-2.7. My favorite was 867 "up" to dual 800!!

Sub-bass:

Beat Kaufmann works on a PC, but posted this on his site regarding cinema bass:

http://www.beat-kaufmann.com/tipspcmusic/vslacoustics/index.php#53248296fa00f2a1e

I'm still not clear on how this is done, but it seems that it's added synthetically. Some type of harmonizer might work best for this instead of pitch shifting an audio track or needlessly boosting EQ on the low in where it doesn't belong. One might make a copy of the contrabass and manipulate it, but that doesn't address the overall low end of other instruments-- tuba, contrabassoon, perc, etc. Not sure what the best way might be, but if I sort this out I'll let you know!

In any case, Beat's tutorials are brilliant-- there are mp3's demonstrating "before and after" effects. You may want to go through all of his tut's because he gets into some serious basics and more with mixing sampled orchestras-- specifically VSL. I love his comments about how something like Altiverb can take the "point" off of the timp when it's placed further back in the orchestra-- and how to compensate for transients lost for the sake of stage placement.

Back OT-- I was surprised to have had a pretty good day, technically speaking. Granted, I was doing projects with Vitous Philharmonik, but I was able to load in a few instances of VI. DP reconciled the bit depths quite smoothly without anything special needing to be done.

No crashes to report, knock wood!!

JWL,

Good ideas on solo string layering. I'll get them at some point but I don't have the processing or cpu's to handle them now.

VI actually runs outside of DP doesn't it? I saw someone post early on that they loaded way beyond 4 gigs with a DP G5 setup. Don't know if that was an inside/outside set up or not. It will be interesting to see what the future holds with quads for processing and RAM.


How will one work with MIR if you can't use it in real time? Wonder what they've come up with reference prior to offline rendering.

I've read a little about Kore and will check out the others. I think hardware solutions may indeed be what's coming for sharing processing. Then again that's what Gigastudio was supposed to be in a sense: a dedicated processor for handling streaming samples. Yeah it's never enough.

My current solution on the piece I'm doing is going to be to finish the strings with VI then Ram save then load the winds and get those working. Can't load hardly anything beyond my 5 string instances so not much choice. I could use my Giga 1st edition winds but that would mean multiple midi tracks and no real repitition since the repitition tool is so unwieldy. Plus searching for patches or presets in VI is so clear and easy.

Yes I studied Beat Kaufmen's tutorials regarding articulations but haven't really looked at the mixing stuff so I will check that out.

Glad you made some progress - same here.

JWL and Dave,

I've been following this discussion with interest, and learnt a lot, which i'll carefully put away for the future.

Thank you to you both.

Regards,

Alex.

Always nice to get a visit from the kind soul Alex.

Thanks Alex. It feels nice to have gotten around a problem or series of problems and to now be actually talking about how to make some music with these tools.

Sometimes I get the feeling that all this comes so much easier for others than it does for me. Before I can type in my authorization codes, someone else has managed to do mock-ups of the complete symphonies of Shostakovich or something, with a Grammy nomination to boot. Of course, I'm exaggerating, but while I'm hardly new to the VSL concept, I am in the process of finding better ways to use VI-- to get better results, to increase workflow, output and productivity.

Dave-- I was checking out the MIR video, which was a glorified teaser. Very informative and very well done. It only mentioned offline rendering, but I'll have to go back to check out what it said ever so breifly about monitoring, without which it would be impossible to use.

Sorting out how to manage virtual instruments is indeed a problem. Aside from CPU resources being severely spread thin, there is the ongoing problem of computer monitor space and a gaziilion windows open at once. DP5 promises a lot of new features, many of which are rather optional, but the Meter Bridge is arguably the most significant addition to become quite indispensable.

We've seen ads with DP running on two large Apple Cinema displays, which alone are quite an investment-- but one would ideally consider having an AGP card with twin DVI outputs. Add a few hundred $$ to the expense. Funny thing is, before I got my G5 (and VI) I was using two monitors, but the notion of using three monitors with VI consoles, etc., is not so outrageous, except that it would be financially impractical and costing thousands.

Ah, what are electronic musicians to do?

JWL,

A meter bridge in Dp 5? How would that differ from th meters in the mix window? Just a friendlier interface for watching levels?

Do you happen to use cuemix? I never have but was looking at it today and it looks like it could be useful but I don't know what the benefit would be except zero latency (which isn't a problem for me now.)

I have two monitors now finally: Dell 24 inch and Viewsonic 20 and it's been very helpful. Now with VI I can relate to a third monitor but from whence would I connect to the G5 and where to put the screen?

Yes, the meter bridge would put just the meters in front of you at a glance when you don't really need to see the entire mixer. It may help save screen space without having to open and close the mixer repeatedly.

If you don't need CueMix, don't worry. It is convenient when it is needed, and it comes in quite handy.

Lucky man you are with two monitors! I had two on my G4, but when my G5 arrived I had to go back to one each because I still use both computers.

The truth is that some of this stuff is going to take require an IMAX sized monitor to navigate all the windows if things keep expanding at the current rate.

JWL,

How are you using cuemix and how are you using the G4? Sorry for 20 questions.

Hows the Strauss coming along? My Orch Strings level 2 license ran out which halted things although I spent the entire day yesterday setting up my pc with VST host for WW's I.

Actually, I'm not using my G4 right now to farm out extra sounds. However, someone on Unicornation has come up with a brilliant process to use a second Mac as a farm slave at zero-latency with some clever hardware connections.

It seems that this guy has connected his second Mac to the same MIDI interface as his primary computer via the USB port. For audio, I think he's routing it digitally out of his second computer into a mixer and then into his audio interface via ADAT or TDIF connections. It's more or less the same way people connect any hardware synth or sampler. I'm surprised more people aren't doing it this way. Another guy who doesn't have the multi-channel connectivity routes his audio into his interface (and hence into his primary computer) by using the stereo SPDIF (again, I don't have complete details on how he's doing this).

If this technique indeed offers zero or near-zero latency, I'm going to have to give this a try.

The Strauss will be an ongoing project. Currently, I'm having to learn about 30 scores for upcoming concerts-- I'll be on the road for a few weeks (I'm a conductor), so my VSL time is limited until the first week of May. I've not really done more with it because it will require using PE in Logic for winds, brass, and perc. That could be very time consuming just to set up. It's an ongoing project that I try to add to a little each day.

As you know, there are 3 flutes plus picc, 2 ob, Eng hn, Heckelphone, 2 E-flat clar, 2 B-flat clar, Bass clar, 3 bassoons plus contra, 6 French horns (in F an D), 4 trumpets, 4 trombones, tuba, celeste, 2 harps, and perc out the wazoo. The setup is so complex that it may be worth replicating much more of the score than what I'd planned.

What a drag on the L2 licenses. I only have L2's for Orch Strings 1 & 2 at the moment. Haven't done much with Chamber or Solo Str-- am saving my numbers of starts for when paychecks are more common! Because I had SE and PE, my Orch Str licenses cost only $65 for L2. Seemed reasonable to get those done right away for the sake of using these sounds without worry. I haven't even installed WW1 yet---

JWL,

I think my next move will be a quad G5 as a VST host. Perhaps MOL and a sound card (or even try the G5 spdif.) Just to keep things simple.

Yes I suspected you were a conductor with your firm grasp of things orchestral. Love to hear more about that. I studied for a year with the Los Angeles legend Fritz Zweig who was Bruno Walter's colleague in Berlin in the '20's and came to LA with him in the early 60's (1982 is when I studied with the 89 year old man.) His credentials are a mile long: a few would be that he studied composition with Schoenberg in Europe as well as piano with Lechetitzky. George Zell was his assitant at Prague for ten years. He was close friends with Stavinsky as they were neighbors in LA and would play cards. Zweig knew every major musical figure practically. When we were studying Also Sprach I asked him what orchestra he may have conducted it with: Leningrad. He toured Europe premiering Elektra - can you imagine? Also premiered Puccini after Walter would do a first performance. This is mentioned in the excellent Walter Bio of a few years back. Zweig taught me what the essence of music is on some almost unconcious level. A beautiful man.

I have level 2 going again and it didn't cost that much: turns out I have a little more time - I have 1st ed complete.

Let's hear the Strauss whenever. Just getting winds going myself.

Best of luck with conducting dates.

@dpcon said:

JWL,

I think my next move will be a quad G5 as a VST host. Perhaps MOL and a sound card (or even try the G5 spdif.) Just to keep things simple.

Yes I suspected you were a conductor with your firm grasp of things orchestral. Love to hear more about that. I studied for a year with the Los Angeles legend Fritz Zweig who was Bruno Walter's colleague in Berlin in the '20's and came to LA with him in the early 60's (1982 is when I studied with the 89 year old man.) His credentials are a mile long: a few would be that he studied composition with Schoenberg in Europe as well as piano with Lechetitzky. George Zell was his assitant at Prague for ten years. He was close friends with Stavinsky as they were neighbors in LA and would play cards. Zweig knew every major musical figure practically. When we were studying Also Sprach I asked him what orchestra he may have conducted it with: Leningrad. He toured Europe premiering Elektra - can you imagine? Also premiered Puccini after Walter would do a first performance. This is mentioned in the excellent Walter Bio of a few years back. Zweig taught me what the essence of music is on some almost unconcious level. A beautiful man.

I have level 2 going again and it didn't cost that much - I have 1st ed complete.

Let's hear the Strauss whenever. Just getting winds going myself.

Best of luck with conducting dates.

Puts my brief sojourn waving the baton at a theatre orchestra firmly in context!
(Good experience though. Going from playing to conducting was an eye opener.)
I add my best wishes for the gigs.

Respects to you both,

Alex.

Hey Alex-- thanks! As you know, anytime you stick your neck out-- or baton, an orchestra can chew you up and spit you back out again if you're not careful. It's an education in more ways than one!!

Dave-- Zweig? Are you kidding me?? You know, I waffled between using 'Elektra' or 'Salome' for this first giant score exercise. There are parts of 'Elektra' that nearly bare my soul. That score is so brilliantly written, but the orchestration alone is simply blows me away. Zweig = pure brilliance. Such ease of command over large ensembles. Amazing!! Nice to sit under that tree, huh? Congrats!

I'll keep picking away at the Strauss. How much of it are you doing? I'd love to do from 314 to the end, but I may stop at 323 for now and then try to tackle some or all of Salome's Tanz. Wouldn't 'Don Quixote' be a fun challenge? Hey you mentioned 'Zarathustra'... but at some point we must get our own humble compositions done, don't we? [:P]

I've got a long list of contenders for future exercises-- Hindemith's "Mathis der Maler", Rachmaninoff Symphony #2. Brahms' "Haydn Variations", and a piano concerto by just about anyone. Ambitious and edifying-- even if time consuming. What I love about doing these studies is that I don't question the compositions the way I do my own work. Nice not to have to worry about such things when dancing with the computer and honing technological skills. Plus, reviewing masterworks always raises the bar for my scoring projects. No shortcuts!!

One question-- I think there's an error in the bar before 324. It indicates the solo violin in pizz, but that should be the rest of the section and not the solo. I really need a better edition of this!! The Strauss Complete Edition is running about $1k (!!), but Boosey and Hawkes' study score may be better than the Dover reprint at a price that will allow me to buy all of my VI Extended codes!!

I cheerfully envy you both, although my study here has been priceless, and is ongoing.
It would be most rewarding to sit down and practise 'sample performance' skills, refining and honing, using the orchestra between the ears to draw nuance and texture into the medium. My picks for this exercise for the future would be Saint-Saens Organ symphony, Beethoven's 8th, and Shostakovich 7 and 11, and then graduate to solo instruments, e.g. Bruch's Violin Concerto, Sheherazade, etc.
JWL, your premise of practising with known works to enhance performance with self written work rings with me too, and i think this method of skill emhancement would definitely raise the bar, and keep the standard up. It would also prove a worthy critique of orchestration versus sample performance limitations. No hiding!
Strauss's Elektra and the outstanding orchestration would be my choice in his work, along with another great test for string performing and interpretation, Sibelius' Swan of Tuonela. I've listened to this regularly once again, and there's a lot to consider.
I also think the Grieg Piano Concerto would be enlightening. (Something i was performing before my accident. A most enjoyable piece to play and intepret, IMHO) Wagner too, with the Prelude to Lohengrin, and Tristan, promises much as a challenge to improve skills.
One thing is for sure, orchestral experience counts for both good and challenging.
We know what we hear, and expect that in the end result. The method of obtaining that will be a reflection of how skillful we are in sample performance.

As a brief aside, the worst piece i ever had the misfortune to conduct was The Gondoliers. Page after page of offbeats and little else. I went home after each night's performance (6 week season) and railed in frustrated boredom to the sounds of Beethoven, Mahler, Wagner and Shostakovich, just to maintain a foothold in sanity!

Regards,

Alex.

Bartok's "Wooden Prince" is one of those scores that doesn't get heard as often as it should. It's also a brilliantly orchestrated work. Dare I even mention "The Rite Of Spring"?!! Talk about off beats...!!!!!! Yikes!!

One finds oneself quickly at a crossroads, deciding if whatever shortcomings exist in an electronic rendering of whether the limitations are those of the library or of the user. One VERY interesting (and often maddening) thing to do is to fly in a live orchestral track as a guide to match the articulations, intepretation, and "human imperfections" note for note (not to mention balance and ambience).

There are just not nearly enough hours in a single day!

Very interesting Gentleman. I don't know that Bartok piece but love his work. Bluebeards Castle is a favorite of mine along with his more popular works. I've done a few sample realizations of things from the literature and always found it rewarding. Currently I'm working on my own Classical style overture since it was done many years ago with wholly inferior samples. It's shaping up alright but is very work intensive as it's pre-existing midi information that's really all over the place on important parameters such as velocity and placement in the track (which is so compensated for slow speaking samples as to be shifted unusably early.)

I love all the works mentioned by you guys. I love Mathis der Mahler and have both the symphony and opera scores. Just picked up Rachmaninov's 2 last summer and need to swing by and pick up his 3rd which I just ordered.

To quite Zweig on his friend Hindimith, "He was a very nice man" which was spoken with an uncommon warmth and depth of feeling. His only comment on my enthusiasm for the Mathis opera was, "It is a very long opera."

I remember that quote from orch lit class!! "Mathis" the opera got a bad rap, as I recall, but I fell in loved with the symphonic version-- such great string writing and a great harmonic/melodic concept. I know more people who hate both works than love it, but it's their loss!!

Other faves:

Barber Symphony #1
Bernstien "West Side Story" Symphonic Dances
Corigliano Symphony #1
Anything by Ravel
Mendelssohn "Reformation" Symphony
Prokofiev Symphony $5
Copland "Quiet City", "Billy The Kid"
Wagner Overture to "Die Meistersinger"
Verdi Overture to "La Forza del Destino"
Schubert Symphony #9
Brahms Symphony #3
Beethoven Symphony #2 (rarely done)

Where do you stop such a list?