VSL Solo Strings Install

My my, this is going to be a fan boy post. Or maybe not, but I'd like to share my experiences installing VSL Solo Strings I last night.

Installation went *very* smoothly. VSL uses the eLicenser for copy protection, and installation of their control center software was a snap.

VSL wise, things were extremely straight forward; put in the license key on the vsl website, and I get an email with the authorization key. Enter the auth key into the control center, and we're ready to install the samples.

Installation was very long, more than an hour for the 4 dvds (damn you crappy mac dvd drive), but it went without a hitch, and the solo strings update also completed with nary a hitch.

VSL's sampler is simply fantastic. Load times were not too bad - considering I was streaming off an external FW drive, and the way the patches are grouped together in matrices make a whole lot of sense. Keyswitching, Velocity, Modwheel, even speed of playback can be used to determine which patches are played back. (videos here)

Going to take awhile to get used to this baby. Maybe it's time to spam the internet with horribly written string quartet pieces lol.

I've always read that the vsl samples are too dry - but after my experience with another library with baked in environment is that I'd much prefer to have my samples dry. It makes it so much easier to blend in a mix.

From my quick tests last night, EOS on the strings was very nice, and that was just using a plate preset.

Oh well, this sample junkie is signing off for today, I'll write more about my ocremix compo piece tonight when I'm back :)

Wallander Instruments next?

Building up my library of legato capable instruments, and the next one I'm looking at is brass for jazz style stuff. (I'm sorted for strings.... for now, anyways).

Just tested out the trial version of WIVI Band, and I must say I do really enjoy the brass sounds. The saxes and flute in there, not so much. Oboe seems not bad but I was focusing mainly on the brass. Pricing is good, but I'm keen to find out how the upgrades work, can I upgrade to the orchestral and big band brass at a special price after getting WIVI Band?

Since I don't really have a budget for that at the moment, I'll pop them an email when I do have the budget. One of the videos they have about divis type playing on brass really intrigues me, it reminds me of the demos for VSL's Dimension Brass.

I am such a sample junkie.

Lips sore, etc.etc

Lips are bloody sore as I type this.... had a great (if short) saxophone practice session today. Due to work/life commitments - the sax has had much less play time. Been plodding along, and I think after two weeks my tone is right back to where I want it to be.

But... the embouchure has definitely weakened - doing some aebersold exercises that feature high notes prominently had my lower lip blister. Didn't want to further injure my lip so I decided to cut it short.

Damn man, it feels so good to belt out some notes at ff :)

Prance In The Meadows: Piano compo

Another one complete, not so sure about the harmony in the last 2 lines, but we'll see.

Dance Among the Tress: Piano Compo

Given the horrendously messy compo previously, my teacher got around revising how to keep things neater. And neat this piece is. Its also short, as I need to do another piece with another way of approaching harmony.

Period of Calm: Piano Compo

More homework. This particular piece I wrote the melody straight off the bat, then filled in the harmony, after which I moved the individual parts. I tried to keep all 4 parts active, so I can try applying some strings on this to explore quartets.

Piano lesson update

Another piano lesson yesterday, progressing now to the ABRSM Jazz Piano book 2... got the book and CD over lunch today, about £16 in total.  Teacher also caught some issues with my playing - not curving my fingers enough. This has been causing me pain on my little finger, and after being more aware of it and correcting it, seems to be better.

Next weekend got a piano recital, playing my original piece as well as To Zanarkand for my fellow students.

Bought a Reverb

Been looking for an additional reverb (or two) and finally settled on EOS from Audio Damage. This is my first* 3rd party 'verb, and limited tests with Finale and applying it to my piano recording in the previous blog post proves that it is well worth the price.

Several other reverbs were considered, SKNote's Verbtone (could not get it to work), Valhalla Room (not my taste), Reverbs from Airwindows (not my taste either)

Price of course, is a big factor. There is no way I can afford a top of the line reverb like Aether or Lexicon's PCM Native. These verbs above ran the ~50 range, affordable.

Soundwise, EOS seems to give a pretty pleasing result, compared to Logic's platinum verb. Side by side, it's less metallic, but then again, I don't really know my reverb settings that well. I'd bet an experienced logic user can make me eat my words.

Another nice thing about a 3rd party 'verb is that I can use it with Finale when I'm scoring (ha, I said I'm scoring. What a joke :P). Space Designer, whilst kick ass only works within Logic. There is of course the AU Maxtrix reverb - which IMO is pretty darned good, but what can I say I'm a sucker for a pretty interface :)

EOS is an algorithmic reverb, one with a modulating tail. I am not sure if the algorithmic reverbs in Logic include modulation, and I think space designer, as a convolution reverb does not. So, nice thing to have.

The one thing I do miss from Platinum Verb and Space Designer is mix controls for the dry sound and reverb. In EOS, it's a straight up Mix parameter. For the moment it's ok as I do tend to send stuff to a reverb bus, but at times it is convenient to have the wet/dry mix on the reverb itself.

Ok back to work, as you may see I just wrote the melody line for my homework, now to fiddle with the harmony :)

*2nd actually, I bought verbtone months ago but it crashes on my system :-/

To Zanarkand

One of the pieces I've been practising on the piano.

Of Monitors and Pianos

Went down to Chappel's of Bond street today to check out Monitor speakers, tested out the HS50Ms and MSP5s. I can't really say which one is better... the HS50s definitely lacked bass, but the rest of it sounded very clear and sharp. The MSP5s on the other hand had a much stronger bass, and a smoother overall sound.

The lady who was demoing them to me also switched on the SW10 subwoofer, dang, that made a BIG difference. Not going to consider that as it's like more than the price of two MSP5s.

So, what next? The HS50Ms are almost a third cheaper than the MSP5s. I guess it's time to save up. I also listened to the MSP7s briefly, but could not hear what's better than the MSP5s.

The thing is, do I actually need a pair of monitor speakers? At the moment, using the VRM box is pretty good on the whole, the main issue I have with headphone mixing is levels. It is really difficult to adjust the relative levels - I rely on a small mono speaker for that at the moment, and would like a proper monitor to at least gauge my levels correctly. Given that apart from speakers, accessories like stands, isolation pads, cabling etc needs to be considered. Expensive hobby, this is.

~ pianos ~

On my way out, I though to try out the Clavinovas. The one I tried was the Yamaha CLPS408PE. And dang, the keybed is sooo good. The sound samples seemed to be very good as well, I thought I was much more expressive on it than my CP33. I think this is because it uses the GH3 keybed, and the RGE sound engine is probably lightyears ahead of my AWM engine. The touch is definitely closer (as I imagine) to my teacher's grand, though probably lighter, and no escapement.

There was also an AvantGrand in the shop but another customer was playing it so next time I visit Chappel's I'll see if I can give it ago.

Keep Moving Forward: Piano Composition.

Again, homework for my compo class. I think I explored too many kind changes to the groove and the changes come upon to sudden.

Finished remix

No audio samples, I'm afraid, but yes I finished up the FF6 remix last night. This little exercise (~40 hours over the last 16 or so days) gave me a lot of though on my instruments, production and composition.


I'll probably write more once we are allowed to post the pieces.

Short summary:
a) I need better melody line instruments - instruments with proper legato for example.
b) I could really do with some monitors and
c) While my harmony is getting up to speed, my humanization sucks bad.

More piano thoughts

Just back from a long walk along the Thames Path. My feet are killing me...

Anyways, I had another piano lesson today, and I'm slowly getting a feel of the differences between my CP33 and my teacher's grand piano. Now that I am quite acquainted with my CP33, I can easily say, it does not feel at all like my teacher's grand piano.

For a start, it does not take much effort at all on my teacher's grand to produce a note, and it is quite difficult for me to play softly on it. The tail end of the sustain on a real grand is also insanely long, unlike the CP33 that tails of pretty rapidly.

I think I'm going to be spending some time soonish looking at Pianoteq, Truepianos or Pianissimo. Pianoteq's sound, from their samples, does not float my boat at all, but I'll reserve final judgement after I've tried it. I like the sound from Truepianos. Pianissimo.... sounds quite clean. Will see how it goes.

EDIT: Pianissimo is out - windows only.

Logic's built-in Binaural plugin - nice!

Been using my lunchtime to work on the my piece for the OCRemix competition, and just used the laptop's audio out for now. Tried the binaural plugin on the master bus today, and once I got in-the-zone adjusting CC values,  I realized with a jerk that OMG, was I working with my headphones unplugged?

Evidently my phones were still plugged in nicely but heck that binaural plugin definitely works. Same effect I get from the vrm box really - obviously without the various room/speaker emulations. Good stuff emagic!

Done arranging, now "humanizing"

I'm using a solo Oboe instrument in Logic to get a mournful kind of sound I feel that is suitable for the start of the song I'm working on the OCRemix compo. Unfortunately, the solo oboe found within the EXS24 is only has two layers (not even velocity layers!), one of which is vibrato and the other non-vibrato.

After fussing around with the sampler - it is actually quite straightforward for the basic needs I require - but I really would not have understood how it work without youtube. Tutorials rock!

In any case, I decided to drop the vibrato layer, and just use one layer, and utilize the pitch shifter mapped to the mod wheel to create a pseudo vibrato. In addition, the default setup only utilizes the velocity of the keypress for the volume over the length of the note; this is not as flexible as I want as I would like to control how the note dies off over time, and not just end abruptly. To combat this issue, I simply remapped the channel pressure to velocity (manually drawn), so I can get a note that I can control vibrato and volume independently. And now I have to go through my other instruments to get custom variants made. GAH!

Don't Look Back: An original Piano Composition

Now, if only I can play it. The section with the chords I can't yet play at speed, but once I can, I'll upload something. My CP33 sounds really good with the pedal down.

Mmm this piano sounds good

I think it's a japanese vsti. Love the tone.

OcRemix: FFVI Compo

http://ocremix.org/forums/showthread.php?t=39840

Oook, looks like I'll take part in this. So I have to finish up my compo home work AND do a remix of one of the tracks. Gonna be busy :3

Saxophone Log: April 2012

Pretty please with this arrangement, I can't believe it only took today an a bit of yesterday evening. I did spend some time waffling about how to arrange this track, as it's kind of.. iconic? For awhile it was a ballad, then blues, then went to bebop, then back to blues again. Gah. I actually set it up so that some bars from the original were removed in order to fit the 12-bar blues feel.

I started recording once I had the drums, pad and basslines down. After recording, I tweaked the bassline to flow better with the melody, added in some tambourines starting from the 2nd chorus, and added a counter melody on top. I'm quite happy with how the counter melody turned out, as I played the main portion just once, and that's what you hear.

Apart from Addictive Drums, all the instruments used were built into Logic Studio.

It is practice, isn't it?

Due to my holidays, and various illnesses (damn you dry cough) I didn't touch my dear alto till today. And damn, it appears that my embouchure has suffered greatly in these few weeks >.>

Apart from tiring easier, I think my articulation and dynamics took a turn for the worse.

On the flip side, I though my improvisation is now much better - most likely due to the piano practice. More ideas, though really, I need to memorize the scales.

Ah well.