Yo music makers! I just bought Finale 2004 and I wanted to share information and get your feedback on what I think is finally a breakthrough in home-based sound design for the average composer.
Finale has always been a notation software program. Getting a score to sound good by using this program has required external sound-font apps like Kontakt or GigaStudio. People were exporting MIDI files created in Finale to Cakewalk (for example) and then using samplers to assign high-end sounds. This required sound cards, manual integration, extra hard drive space…basically $$$.
Finale 2004, released four months ago, has finally embedded good sound fonts within the program. You can now compose and hear quality playback with only Finale, a computer, and a controller keyboard. Also, you can “save to .wav” and directly go to stereo file.
I’ve been a hard core Finale products user because I compose for live musicians and do a ton of studio recording with horn players. Thus, I’ve always been more of a composer/arranger for live groups and less of a digital studio design guy. I believe that F2004 finally gives the home-based composer the ability to get good sounding playback from scores without the need to purchase all kinds of gear.
Since F2004 is a somewhat new release, I just posted at finale.com/forum to see if there are any secondary market sound-font apps developed specifically for F2004. I’m waiting to hear back from the experts on anything brewing there.
Anyway, point here is that I would also like feedback from folks who have any experience in mapping high-end sounds to notation software programs. Is this too good to be true? I got contracted to compose a score for an musical theatre concept and hopefully can create final copy right here from home…
Sammy..
Hey, a problem I’ve noticed with software synths is thatthe live playback is delayed (You press a key on your piano and hear the piano sound a second later) – great sounds for laying down the audio from the MIDI, but hard to use when you’re actually playing the tracks.
So, does this thing fix that? And how are specifically the Horns, Drums, and Piano sounds? FInally, how user friendly is it and what is the price. I’ve thought about replacing my keyboard (the source for much of my audio) for a while to get better sounds, (I dont do any live performances)would this forego that?
And, once again, when are you in MD, dude.
The problem with software synths
Justin,
The problem you are running into with latency on your software synthesizer is due to your sound card, not the software you’re using. Well, OK, it’s a combination of the software & drivers. If you’re using a Soundblaster Live! you can try out the KX Project Driver. It allows you to get down to around 10ms latency on your synth channel. I use it, and although my CPU usage is a bit higher, I can actually do real-time audio transforms. Of course, the larger problem is that I’m using a general-purpose operating system and CPU, rather than something made expressly for the purpose of low-latency audio & video work.
My main problem with computer notation, including the staff mode of Cakewalk Sonar and the score editor I use on Linux, Rosegarden is that although I can write a score with great fidelity to what I’m seeing/hearing in my head, it’s generally a soul-less wonder. It’s difficult enough to capture the expressiveness of live performance in MIDI or CWP, particularly when capturing an instrument with more expressiveness than a piano’s static sostenuto & velocity. Attempting to write this note-by-note in the software makes it even worse.
Don’t get me wrong, you can still do a ton of great work with envelopes, modulation controls & associated notation (e.g. “vibrato”), but the timing and expressiveness of a live performance still remains unmatched for all but the most careful of composers.
This is actually a subject near and dear to my heart. I’m working on the music for a video game called "Void Wars", and a great deal of the passages I’m working on require very specific note sequences in order to work. I’ve gotten far, far away from the “play a chord and a melody on top of that” days with these sequences 🙂 Anyway, my primary problem in writing this notation is breathing life into the performance after I’ve written it out. I’ve been able to do some reasonable work by applying volume envelopes, CAL-scripted randomization of velocities and timing offsets (simulating the slight imperfection found in any live performance), but nevertheless, it just doesn’t quite feel “live”. The way I finally got around many of these things was playing the parts live on the keyboard doing the mod wheel and pitch bend work “live” rather than using envelope-drawing. However, the results still weren’t entirely satisfactory. That’s why it’s a work-in-progress 🙂
That said, Finale was the single-best notation program I’ve ever used. Cakewalk Sonar is rudimentary at best when scoring a part. Rosegarden is much better. Finale is the industry standard, and it’s excellent for the purpose.
If Finale has DXi support, you may want to check out a product called “LiveSynth Pro”. I use a 250 megabyte soundfont for my piano sounds on my new tracks, and it totally rocks. The piano actually has a few “warts” — strings that vbrate a little strangely, a couple of keys where the tuning isn’t totally perfect -7$ cat tmp.html
My main problem with computer notation, including the staff mode of Cakewalk Sonar and the score editor I use on Linux, Rosegarden is that although I can write a score with great fidelity to what I’m seeing/hearing in my head, it’s generally a soul-less wonder. It’s difficult enough to capture the expressiveness of live performance in MIDI or CWP, particularly when capturing an instrument with more expressiveness than a piano’s static sostenuto & velocity. Attempting to write this note-by-note in the software makes it even worse.
Don’t get me wrong, you can still do a ton of great work with envelopes, modulation controls & associated notation (e.g. “vibrato”), but the timing and expressiveness of a live performance still remains unmatched for all but the most careful of composers.
This is actually a subject near and dear to my heart. I’m working on the music for a video game called "Void Wars", and a great deal of the passages I’m working on require very specific note sequences in order to work. I’ve gotten far, far away from the “play a chord and a melody on top of that” days with these sequences 🙂 Anyway, my primary problem in writing this notation is breathing life into the performance after I’ve written it out. I’ve been able to do some reasonable work by applying volume envelopes, CAL-scripted randomization of velocities and timing offsets (simulating the slight imperfection found in any live performance), but nevertheless, it just doesn’t quite feel “live”. The way I finally got around many of these things was playing the parts live on the keyboard doing the mod wheel and pitch bend work “live” rather than using envelope-drawing. However, the results still weren’t entirely satisfactory. That’s why it’s a work-in-progress 🙂
That said, Finale was the single-best notation program I’ve ever used. Cakewalk Sonar is rudimentary at best when scoring a part. Rosegarden is much better. Finale is the industry standard, and it’s excellent for the purpose.
If Finale has DXi support, you may want to check out a product called “LiveSynth Pro”. I use a 250 megabyte soundfont for my piano sounds on my new tracks, and it totally rocks. The piano actually has a few “warts” — strings that vbrate a little strangely, a couple of keys where the tuning isn’t totally perfect — and it breathes a great deal of life into an otherwise dull recording. The world of DXi and VST synthesizers has really opened up in recent years, and with a good low-latency sound card plus the right software to drive them, you can come up with some amazing stuff.
You may want to check out if Finale is compatible with Cakewalk Project 5. Cakewalk Project is basically an assemblage of hundreds of software synthesizers that can be driven via MIDI or by back-channel routing… crap, I forget the name of the protocol, but it’s a standard for multiple musical components to communicate if they are on the same PC. It requires some serious computing hardware or a dedicated machine listening on a MIDI controller, but it comes with some absolutely amazing synths.
I’ve been thinking for a long time that I need to buy a new PC and dedicate my old one to just running Project 5 and my other software synthesizers. With a low-latency-optimized setup, you can do some amazing stuff.
I’ve been using softsynths a ton in the production of my latest album, and also in previewing the “professional” editions of tracks for Void Wars. There are symphonic orchestral works being produced right now that never leave the disk drives of the PC or Mac they were made on until they burn to CD for post-processing.
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Matthew P. Barnson
Well, that’s the goal..
I still need to learn how to use the drum loops I have now, and I really want a good piano sound… I am trying to step back to lass complicated writing and producing when I do my next album. Basically, I am really liking a lot of strummy guitar music and real 4 person band sounds.. that being said, I want the flexibility to do what I want.
As for the piano.. I am running all my sound stuff on an old pentium III, but I do want, when all is said and done to have a good piano synth. The fear is that if I use one, with any latency, I won’t be smart enough to figure out what the latency is, and how to sync it up to the rest of my stuff.
Also, what about a drum synth.. I will use the drum loops eventually, but sometimes you need just the right drum sound in just the right place.
Sonar & drums
My suggestion is to try out the DR-008 drum synth that came with Sonar 2.2XL. Load it up with the “Dry Studio Kit”. It should be in the samples directory. Then go buy yourself a copy of SlicyDrummer and Fill-In Drummer for some of the easiest, most realistic drum patterns you’ve ever laid ears on. They aren’t cheap ($69 each), but the difference in your MIDI-based drum tracks will be phenomenal. Try their free download first to see if you like it — even that much works well. Sonar installs the evaluation version by default, I think. You have limited patterns, but otherwise full functionality. The velocity randomization and timing randomization really help it feel “live”.
I’ve been lusting after Drumkit From Hell for a while, too. 5x, velocity-sampled drums that I can load into VeloSampler on my DR-008? Oh, joy. See, a drum sounds totally different when hit lightly, versus hit hard. It’s not just volume. DFH has this all accounted for, and even distinguishes left and right hand hits so that when you want to play, for instance, that fast snare rattle, you can alternate samples. In the DR-008, you can also set up certain keys to be part of “banks” that only allow one sample to be played at a time, so that you can do things like get a really realistic hi-hat sound because the open hat terminates the moment you play a closed hat. On my Dry Studio Kit, I set up banks for the rides, cymbals, and snare, too. It helps avoid having a bunch of the same sample playing at once cluttering the music. Not a huge deal for anything but the hihat, but I can hear the difference.
I started working with the DR-008 because I was getting sick of not having good drum loops that gave exactly the sound I wanted, and I found that, with some compression, EQ, and reverb, the drums could sound really incredible. The biggest limitation is that lack of velocity-based sampling that hurts the sound for non-pop tunes.
The way I do pianos is pretty simple. First, I record it as straight MIDI and make sure the timing, velocity, and all that is the way I want it before ever trying to get a “finished” sound. Then I load up the piano soundfont into my soundfont bank and enjoy the sound. There are some excellent piano soundfonts freely available on the Net that clock in under the 32MB limit of a SBLive.
Alternately, I really do like the sound of my Yamaha CVP-59S keyboard. The keyboard has a sweet, resonant sound that works well in a lot of tunes, with excellent velocity sampling in the limited memory space. I’ll just plug it in, set up the piano track as a solo, and an audio track to record, and let Sonar do its thing. Then I Archive the MIDI piano track and apply effects to the audio. It’s all good — the only thing that bugs me is the slightly noisy audio-out on the digital piano.
I’m such a geek.
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Matthew P. Barnson
It may just be time..
For us to have one of those phone conversations wher eyou teach me how to do this.
Not as Big As A Geek As Me
Justin, Matt is heavy-keyboard oriented and you wrote that you’re more into actual 4-piece rhythm & rock style. Getting the tools you want for that style is a lot more pricey than going the Matt route.
With today’s technology, you pretty much can do synth programming and output with a small keyboard controller, 1Mhz processor/512RAM, a sequencer software, and a soundfont plug-in or two.
But you’re talking about guitar work and live musicianship. Let me tell you something — it’s all about the microphone. I don’t care what kind of hardware or software you’re running, if you don’t have a phenom mic and decent A/D converter then it’s going to sound poor. You need a solid mic because there isn’t a soundfont sampler for the human voice, and you’re singer/songwriter.
Also, get ProTools or Logic, and then load in Ritmo ($25) to map soundfonts for percussion.
Sam
ProTools etc.
If I recall correctly, there’s a “lite” version of Protools which is more than adequate for most home musicians that is completely free to use. Now I just need to dig up the link.
And yeah, I agree about the microphone. The more I listen to high-quality recordings, the more I realize these old stage microphones won’t do the trick. A few minutes comparison in a music store between a halfway decent condenser mic and a stage mic and it’s all over.
Of course, they start at around $300. I must start saving my pennies.
Justin’s already using Cakewalk Sonar for his studio, which is an excellent audio recording package. It does a heck of a lot more than just MIDI these days 🙂 Really, ProTools gives you two things Cakewalk Sonar doesn’t: compatability with other studios that use ProTools, and the ability to use a lot of high-end hardware that is ProTools-only. The former is important for musicians that don’t work in a vacuum like I do, and the latter is important if you want to blow a lot of money on your rig 😉
Not familiar with Ritmo, though — is it a VST plugin for Logic? Sonar can do VST plugins as well with a VST plugin adapter, although it works best with DXi…
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Matthew P. Barnson
Expensive recording rigs
Want to need an expensive recording rig?
Try setting up a digital audio workstation to mic drums properly. Ugh. I’ve seen it done once. The only lucky thing is that condenser microphones don’t sound any better than a regular baffle mic on the close mics. So here’s the rig you’d need:
Drums are really expensive to do right. Most pro studioheads will do the “mic the heads individually” thing, but normally you’ll just work on getting the mix right and bringing it down to 4-6 tracks rather than 10-15. Snare will usually get its own, bass also, but the cymbals will usually mix down to a common track, and so will the toms. You gotta make concessions to technical reality 🙂
A properly miked drumkit is a huge part of making a “live” sound like a 4 or 5-piece band — plus having good musicians helps ;). Plus building yourself some isolation booths for various instruments, and an iso closet for vocals.
You can blow a hundred grand on studio equipment and buildouts before you know it. My plan for my next home is to build new, and lay out my iso booths and wiring ducts on the floor plan before we ever lay concrete so that I have the ultimate recording workspace for the home musician. This recording in the living room stuff after everybody’s gone to bed, and hoping I don’t wake them, is for the birds.
And I have no idea why I’m rambling on about this. I’d love to have a spare hundred grand to improve my studio, I guess.
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Matthew P. Barnson
Matt and Sam
In return for 13 years of friendship, let me offer you both a hundred thousand dollars for sound equipment.
Wait.. aw shoot.. can’t find the wallet.. Dernit.
Aww, well.. guess not.
Seriously, Sam, you’re right.. I’m much more of a singer songwriter.. although I love that raw “Green Day”, “Ben Folds Five” sound. Well.. soon enough I am going to have to get myself prepped for doing another album.
The next step will to use downloaded soundfonts instead of my keyboard, make the mic hotter, then take out the ambient noise that causes with cool edit, and then improve the sound with Ozone, use drup samples and loops as opposed to my keyboard drums, and improve my 40 dollar mic with an 80 dollar mic. Also, I am using a factory installed sound card.. I will probably upgrade, but not more than 200 bucks. I think Kelly will allow me eventually to allot up to 500 bucks to improve the studio this summer, if I am willing to pick up the extra work hours to pay for it.
I Use Ritmo
I use Ritmo as a drum soundfont mapping application. Much like Adobe ATF manages the use mapping of fonts is desktop publishing programs, Ritmo is a cheap but effective tool for assigning drum sounds to digital tracks in Sonar/Protools/etc. You can have one track with all the drum data sequenced on it and then map to drum sounds embedded on your hard drive with it. Pretty cool stuff. $25.
Sammy G