Tapas, your analysis of the evolving world of soft synths and arranger systems is right on the money. The advent of more powerful computers has made the improvements in sound quality and effects doable and affordable. This is also true for vocal harmonizers. Antares, the industry standard, has come out with a new set of software for this purpose including pitch. correction.

This evolution will continue into the future. For example NI has added the script feature to kontakt allowing you do all kinds of fancy things to your sound like adding harmonies, special effects and so on. It really is exciting. I note with interest people on this forum getting excited about their favorite arranger keyboard and so it should be. The software solution provides another alternative to the performing or studio musician....you just can't lose!!!

Talking about evolution....there was a company called Evolution before it was bought out by M-Audio. This company produced a software sequencer program called Sound Studio Pro which included an arranger module. I have it and it worked well. The problem was there were very few styles for it. Furthermore, Cubase in it's earlier incarnations had an arranger module. It to had few styles and little interest at the time. It seems that the pros in those days thumbed there noses at such automated things....oh well we shall overcome and have.

Your other question about the quality of Roland's/Edirol's hardware modules (Canvas) is interesting. There is no doubt that in its time these were amazingly good quality for use with midi files....the best. It is even more astonishing that Roland achieved all of this with a 2mb, 4mb, 16mb, etc. wavetable covering all the instruments in the GM/GS standard....yes amazing. There are today, of course, far better sounding software wavetables including Roland's HQ-Hyper Canvas, HQ-Orchestral and so on.

Up until now I have used sYnerGi GS Soundfont GM/GS/XG Wavetable and modified and changed out some of the instruments. This wavetable sits at 128 MB and sounds better than most hardware modules or keyboards. I would think that something like Colossus and Bandstand will be an order of magnitude better than this. Here is the thing....you can modify these wavetables to suit your needs. You can do this far more easily then with any other hardware based module or keyboard.....except, of course, the Muse Receptor.....a hardware VST (or is it a internet free computer running standard software?)....who would have thought.


[This message has been edited by Frank L. Rosenthal (edited 10-09-2005).]

Hi Rikki,

Based on your recommendation and personal experience on OMB and Busker, I am going to go ahead and order both. The combined price of $80 is very reasonable for all the features and functionality they pack.

I have several Hal Leonard Fake Books thicker than phone books. I think I would be able to make better use of them via these software tools.

Tapas

Hi Frank,

Thanks for educating me on the world of software arrangers and software synths. You seem to be on the cutting edge and keep providing us with the latest enhancements in this emerging arena.

I am going to check out the sYnerGI Soundfonts.

The future lies in software synthesis. The Korg OASYS put all doubts to rest on the capability of a well designed software synthesizer. The Korg team have total control over this technology. They coded their own OS, they crafted the modeling engines, and then wrapped it inside their own hardware controller casing.

I have played on the OASYS several times at our local dealership. Each time I came back more amazed at the capability and sound quality. Korg put several years of research into this, and is years ahead of the competition. They have a potential time bomb in their hands.

What is preventing Korg from blowing away hardware arrangers like the Tyros2? Think about this. Dan Phillips, Jerry Kovarsky, Stephen Kay and the Korg Team could get together any time and decide to implement arranger functionality on their OASYS on top of their superb combis and Karma functionality. They do not even have to create another hardware arranger. All can be done with an OS update. Their existing OASYS has all the hardware controls, sliders, velocity pads, rotary knobs and touch screen ready to go.

Ok, so maybe they will not do this right away because that would mean killing their own line of Pa1X arrangers. But who is to say they will not someday blow away every other hardware arrangers and even soft synths like Native Instruments and Spectrasonics with a surprise announcement. The potential is already in place inside the OASYS, and Korg has the technical and intellectual capital within their company.

I think we are looking at a very bright future as competition and innovation heats up in the hardware/software arranger market.

Tapas

oops...

[This message has been edited by Esh (edited 10-09-2005).]

Here is the official Bandstand press release . List price of $229, or $199 online. Features the same direct-from-disk streaming as Colossus. Also noteworthy is a master limiter function which should allow you to add a little punch to the sound. Available next month.

Hi Tapas,
before you do anything about soundfonts, do you actually have a soundfont compatible card in your computer ie audigy or sb live? etc

Frank's soundfont is highly modified, the regular synergi font is not as large as Frank's.

Also there are quite a few free soundfont banks available online.

Not sure if you're aware, but Jos has demo's of his software so you can try before you buy.

best wishes
Rikki

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Tapas:
[

Hi Rikki,

Yes, I upgraded to the Audigy 2 card when I ordered the Dell XP machine. Could you tell me more about the free soundfont banks or where I should be looking for them?

I downloaded the OMB demo and the Busker demo. I think Jos has a winner. He is now the pioneer in software arrangers and made a very clever move by making his program readily compatible to the Yamaha PSR styles. You can get almost any style from any keyboard company in the PSR format. If a style is good, it is almost a given, someone somewhere has converted that to a PSR format.

Tapas

http://www.sf2midi.com/index.php
http://www.kvraudio.com/get.php

Here are some more: http://www.hammersound.net/ http://www.johannes.roussel.com/soundfonts.htm http://www.wstco.com/pianosounds/downloads/?trans-id=700100639838 http://www.personalcopy.com/home.htm http://www.papelmedia.de/english/produkte/index.htm http://www.geocities.jp/shansoundfont/ http://www.sonicimplants.com/productlist.asp http://soundblaster.com/soundfont/ http://www.soundfonts.it/ http://studioax.desertsites.net/home.html http://www.titanicsf.com/ http://www.utopiasd.com/

The following is the sYnerGi GS web site but I can't seem to get on it during the last few days. It could be my browser.
http://www.samplebanks.com

Plus there are many other soundfont sites. In addition you can use programs like CDXtract, Awave, etc. to convert virtual instruments from one format to another. These things tend to have some bugs but with some tweaking you can get the job done.




[This message has been edited by Frank L. Rosenthal (edited 10-09-2005).]

You can use VST or DX synths (LiveSynth Pro, Vsampler, Orion ( http://www.synapse-audio.com/gen-sampler.php ), sfz Soundfont Player, Synthfont ( http://www.synthfont.com/ ), etc.) and a host (forte Ensemble) to run soundfonts if you don't have a Creative Labs soundcard. Also, to ensure optimum speed you may wish to use the ASIO drivers.

[This message has been edited by Frank L. Rosenthal (edited 10-09-2005).]