Hi everyone,

I'm new here at this board.
And registred after reading all this posts.
My question is the following..
I have a DAW station, and recently added an aardvark LX6pro audiocard (really good low latency but no sounds onboard). I couldn't make it work together with my old audigy, so I putted this one into my other internet pc.
I used to play midifiles (xg/gs/gm) with vanbasco together with a good soundfont. And playing live guitar, keyboard and singing. Worked fantastic. No need for launching nuendo. But I can't do this anymore.. No more access straight to soundfonts :-(
I use winXP Pro. After reading these posts, I think a combination of MidiYoke NT, Vanbasco, Livesynth Pro, Brainspawn forte will simulate what I did before with only the audigy..
I can order brainspawn via the net, but can not find Livesynth pro anywhere. Is the support of this program finished? Or does anybody knows where I can order this?
If I understand right, is it possible to select the BS Forte inside VanBasco?

Thanks for answers in advance, regards, Nina

Vquestor, I just got forte 1.3 Beta 3 and tested all the things critical for my application (selfish) with the following results:

Works & Sounds Excellent:

LiveSynth Pro
Kontakt
UltraFunk Sonitus Effects
Audio In
DecaBuddy (fixed harmonies)
Appearance Excellent
Launches quickly
Loads VST instruments in Kontakt fairly quickly - not as fast as in Cubase SX

Nice to have & issues:

Save the Audio In Module settings in the forte Ensemble files.

Midi notes are not reaching VoiceMachine or DecaBuddy.

As far as I am concerned the good people at Brainspawn could remove the Beta designation (once the midi notes to DecaBuddy/VoiceMachine is solved) and call it a day - which is almost a lifetime for an old man. I am happy with the way it is. They plan on implementing further innovations, e.g., MidiFx similar to Cakewalk Sonar. You should know that the guitar guys are very happy with the implementation of Audio In. It significantly enhances their ability to generate noise. Good for them!!! By the way, I got Cakewalk Sonar 3.0 and it still can't do vocal harmonizers - no way of getting midi notes to the effects. It can now play more than one synth at a time without the use of Project5.

Brainspawn forte Ensemble is by far the most effective, efficient and reliable host. Plus it is affordable (relatively).

Finally, who knows what happened to LiveSynth Pro. There are other synths on the market which will play soundfonts, e.g., BS-16, Audio Compositor, Orion Sampler (I think), rgaudio, SeerMusic, Sound Burst, etc. These just do not work as well or sound as well on Yamaha styles or midis. The styles and midis would need to be modified to work with a GM Wavetable. If you are going to make such changes then Edirol's HQ Hyper Canvas is a good option. Also VSampler 3.0 is out and it can handle soundfonts quite well but can't find the Yamaha drums in sYnergi GS.

Hopefully, LiveSynth Pro will come back stronger than ever or in a new incarnation of some kind.

Alternatively, we should convince some of the very talented programmers on this forum to devise a small tranlation program (XG to GM) with emphasis on the individual drum instruments and appropriate note numbers. I would even be willing to pay $30 for this program. I could do this myself with GNMidi but I am an old man and would rather watch grass grow or the weather channel!!!


[This message has been edited by Frank L. Rosenthal (edited 10-11-2003).]

That's fantastic news Frank!!
I'm sure those Brainspawn guys can resolve
the midi note issue you are talking about.
Is your main style player program still
LiveStyler, or OMB or both?

I agree that LiveSynth is just too good a
program to let die.
I wish I had the programming skills and
know-how to make the drum map translator
you describe, but hopefully someone here
will do so. It seems to be the last missing piece in your full-fledged software arranger
system, that will allow loading of standard
Yam style files,so we can just PLAY, and
finally not get bogged down by all this technology that doesn't quite work right.
Kudos to you and your flr2003!

[This message has been edited by Vquestor (edited 10-11-2003).]

Vquestor, you are right the Brainspawn people already know the answer to the missing midi note problem. It is the result of 4 missing lines in the Option.ini file. In fact, this is a temporary solution just for me to accommodate the vocal harmonizers. The future solution (version 1.4) will make it part of the overall MidiFx enhancement.

So again, I am very happy with the whole outcome of this adventure.

I still use Live - Styler as my main style player. I am currently doing some beta testing for it (harmonies, mp3, midi player, etc.). OMB has its pluses too. It plays PSR2100 & Tyros styles without modifications for such things as OTS, etc.

With respect to LiveSynth Pro I plan to proceed as follows:

* Continue to use it for as long as it remains the best option.

* Start planning to use another alternative. If I had to make a decision today I would pick VSampler 3.0/sYnerGi GS Wavetable and modify the styles (change drums from 16256 to bank 127) and do a few each day.

[This message has been edited by Frank L. Rosenthal (edited 10-11-2003).]

I saw that the new version of the Sampletank 2 will respond to the MIDI program changes. Here is the quote: "SampleTank® 2 sounds can also be associated to MIDI program change with one easy one click. This allows for instant recall of sounds during live performance, and makes it easy to build your ultimate General MIDI set."
Sampletank 2 is not cheap but the sound quality should be better than Soundfonts. Maybe it could provide another alternative...
http://www.sampletank.com/Main.html?sampletank2-desc

oleg7, you presented another very good alternative. The same thing applies here and that is the drums will need to be modified either in the sampler or the Yamaha styles. Yamaha has chosen to be unique at the expense of customer satisfaction.

As far as quality goes, you can achieve very high quality by converting premium voices to Soundfont. The drawback is the Wavetable gets very large very quickly. I have done some of it for instruments of critical importance to me, e.g., piano, sax, trumpet, etc. If I wanted to, I could convert my Giga 500 MB GM Wavetable (GM500) to Soundfont (or other format) to use with my auto accompaniment only. I would still keep using my premium voices with Kontakt for my lead/melody parts.

While I have not tested it, Halion 2.0 may present another very high quality GM Wavetable solution. Sonic Reality may be another more moderate quality possibility.


[This message has been edited by Frank L. Rosenthal (edited 10-12-2003).]

"TEST"
Please ignore.

Hi,
I havn't posted for quite some time now,
but I've been reading the posts.

I'm very interested in this software arranger project. My dream is to have "everything" in one box (portable) and upgradable that I can use live at gigs.

I am thinking of mounting a:

76 key controller keyboard
P4, motherboard, harddrive, CD-RW etc...
High quality soundcard
Mixer (doesn't have to be a gigantig one)
Flat panel touchscreen (not so expensive on eBay)
Maybe a midi control surface with touch pads.

I want to assemble all these things in one "box"
All the components (besides the box) should weigh very little. I would take the mixer out of its metal case and attach the pc boards(s) inside my box with the pots sticking through the top and in/outputs
on top and in back.

I can use any software I want and the computer parts are cheap and upgradable.

Also, Live styler 4.0 is available and you can directly load soundfonts (I think this means no softsynth is needed).

My only problem is the "box". What do I use and it must not be too heavy.

I would appreciate your ideas.]
Do you think it's doable?

Hi Jim

This seems to work.
Sony GRT170 Laptop 2.8 GHz P4, expanded to 1G RAM, 60GB HD, 16" LCD. Add Indigo IO card for ASIO drivers and high quality AD and DA conversions. Yamaha UX16 is my MIDI interface which I use with various keyboards as controllers. As long as you have an AC outlet, you are fine. Don't expect much on the internal battery.

I am running, Forte (Demo), Kontakt, Virtual Guitarist, NI Carbon, X-Phrase. I have not tried HD streaming with Kontakt with this system.

If you are going to carry stuff around, there is no more need for a desktop computer.

Jick Duck, I guess almost anything is doable if you are sufficiently motivated and take the time and money to make it happen.

To get everything in one box you could go the very expensive route as follows:

Eko Systems http://www.openlabs.com/
Wersi & others

These approaches my satisfy your objects but it will come at a high cost.

Another approach is go about it with separate modules:

Roland A37 midi controller or other
Shuttle computer with an excellent soundcard http://www.shuttle.com/
Mixer/Amp/Speakers
Etc.

After all this you would need to get your choice of software some of which has been discussed in this thread.

I hope this helps.