I’ve had some pretty interesting conversations with a few musician friends lately, and I told them they’re in “Arranger Keyboard Denial”. I left arranger keyboards (and even synth-workstations), and moved over to computer music production. However, I still feel anyone can benefit from having an arranger on hand regardless of what your primary is.

I have a few friends that have looked down on arrangers as long as I’ve known them. They’re strictly into DAW’s and VST’s. Here’s the funny thing...., the way they produce music with their DAW’s is exactly how it would be pieced together on an arranger keyboard. They’ve literally spent thousands on their PC and Mac systems not realizing their end result sounds like it was produced with an arranger keyboard (that’s not a dig at arrangers either.., it’s just that the way they’ve pieced the song together sounds like an arranger when you listen to the bass and drum tracks). It literally sounds like their music moves from one variation to the next with fills because of how they arrange it. They’ll use drum VST’s, not physically play or record a single drum note, but literally drag midi data from preset rhythm patterns (intros, fills, variations, ect.) on to a track and line it up exactly how you’d record it on an arranger.

I tell them..., you could have produced that same song on an arranger keyboard with the same results. Then record the audio into a free DAW like Cakewalk, and save a sh** load of money. As soon as I say “arranger keyboard” it’s like I disrespected their momma. They don’t even use the features DAW’s have over hardware sequencers. It’s very strange. Spend all that money to sound like an arranger. My one friend has at least four grand worth of VST’s, not to mention the monster of a PC he has as well (the thing can probably run 16 separate instances of SampleTank 4, and not break a sweat).., anyone who knows how CPU heavy SampleTank 4 can be knows that’s impressive.

Sqk

Hi Squeak,
So SampleTank 4 would be way worse than Sample Tank 3 ?

Last year I was trying to use SampleTank 3 for the midi tracks in BIAB, I got the odd glitch and thought maybe some of my samples might have been corrupted. Didn’t put it down to my pc maybe not coping. Had toyed with the idea of upgrading to SampleTank 4, but maybe it might make things worse?

SampleTank3 was supposed to be CPU friendly. I think the program was 30 gigs or so. SampleTank4 I believe is 100 gigs. It might have been your system, what are the specs for the computer you were using. IK does have issue with some DAW’s too. I’ve yet to get SampleTank4 to run in MixCraft 9 Pro. It’ll run Philharmonik 2 and MODO Bass without any problems, but not SampleTank4.

SampleTank hits you in two spots. Size of the sound being used, and number of simultaneous effects running. Even running it in a Multitimbral mode within your DAW can still be CPU heavy. I use it with Cakewalk, but one thing I start doing is shutting down SampleTanks effects and replace them with more CPU friendly ones. Even SampleTank3 stacked up those effects per part. If I remember correctly there’s a few nylon guitars in SampleTank3 that uses 4 or 5 effects.

Sqk

Hi Squeak,
doesn’t mean much to me, had it for a few years now
Intel core i7 -4500u cpu@ 1.8 GHz. 2.40 GHz
Ram 8.00 GB
Solid State Drive.

I think it was a fairly good system in its day, but, like everything else, stuff gets out dated.

Probably have to start checking software requirements before I go buying something.
Apart from Biab, I haven’t upgraded or bought anything for pc , in quite a while.

Thank you.
You might have saved me from making an expensive blunder.

Wow, those specs should have handled SampleTank 3. I was going to ask if you have an SSD, but you answered that. Did you have trouble running it in Standalone? What DAW did you use? Those specs should be able to run SampleTank4. More RAM is always better but 8 is the recommended.

Sqk

Hi Squeak,
it was just Band in a Box. I wanted to use something other than coyote that comes with it.
Maybe it was just some of the samples gone faulty. My SampleTank goes back to version 2 . Sounds have been stored on a hard drive for years, Only loaded them back in when I bought SampleTank 3. Probably should have just forgotten about using the old sounds and just used Sample Tank 3 sounds.

Haven’t done anything with it for over a year. I was going to use SX900 with Biab, but something really weird going on with XG mode /Sx900/Biab,
so decided probably better off using a vst, bit more permanent than using a keyboard that I might swap down the track.
Hence I was looking at maybe upgrading to SampleTank 4.
I’ll do some more checking, hopefully it was just some corrupted files, and not my laptop.

Thank you so much, gives me a bit more confidence in regards to my laptop.

You’re welcome, hope you get it sorted out. Your PC’s specs are fine. When you have SampleTank 3 sorted out, run it in Standalone Mode to see how it performs. Your conflict may have simply been between ST and BIAB. You’re the first person I’ve spoken to that tried using ST with BIAB.

Sqk

Thanks Squeak.
Haha, trust me to try something that isn’t the norm.

I don’t do a lot of songs, so had the luxury of picking the sounds I wanted.
The concept did actually work, except for the odd glitch .
Have to try and remember how I actually got it to work, now .
If not, back to coyote or soundfonts.

Thanks again.

For Soft synths, and VSTs, and running plug-ins is a RAM game. I have 32 GB in my iMac 27. No hiccups ever.

Interesting Squeak. I don't know your friends but it seems a matter of horses for courses. If I were going to do large-scale synchronized music production (score a video for example) I wouldn't want to be limited to the tiny display on an arranger keyboard. But for LIVE performance... do these folks actually push pads on a grid controller, etc., in real time? Do they have a MIDI keyboard controller next to their PC? How easy is it to do a live set with a DAW setup?? Not criticising but asking a legitimate question, since I've never tried.

Not much difference to using a hardware module really, it just happens to be a computer.

Bill

I would like to see some videos of folks doing live covers of pop standards with a Launchpad. (And presumably, a compact keyboard controller for melody.) Everything I see on YouTube, etc., is folks making their own "beats": House, Hip Hop, etc., or launching pre-recorded audio samples ("clips.") Not that that's a bad thing. But I play for fun, and I don't write my own music, so I never explored this type of setup because I assumed it wouldn't be useful to me.

I'm not saying that it CAN'T be done. But it would certainly take a lot of preparation. Maybe even a different setup for each song (although that isn't much different than the way we use registrations.)

I also wonder how competitive the ergonomics are (i.e., location of the primary controls, chord fingering and available chord selections, etc.), compared to a pro arranger.

I'm always looking for a better mousetrap, and for a long time I've wondered whether it would be easier to use a grid-type controller to trigger chords. (I don't play left-hand.) But seeing some successful implementations would be instructive.

Here's one

Um, okay. I was hoping for The Girl from Ipanema, Moon River, or maybe even Silent Night! :-D

Here you go https://www.varranger.com/gallery/ with full support for VST.

Bill

Good try Bill, but nope. I saw a Roli Seaboard (i think) and an Orla C465! A couple accordions and one chromatic keyboard controller. But NO Launchpads, Ableton Push, etc. Maybe Dan should raise the price of vArranger so he can pay his web services bill. That page took so long to load, pardon me while I go and shave ;-)

If they are Midi then it can be used with any computer software; however I thought you were looking for The Girl from Ipanema, Moon River etc. which the items you mention are not ideal for.

Perhaps this will be more suited for you.

As to the website loading speed, it is up in a second or so for me.

Bill