Adding Live Players to a Midi Track

[mazz]

Georgie,The thing that many times gives sampled strings their bad rap is the way they sound on sustained notes. A real string section, as you probably know, can't sustain a note as consistently as a looped sample unless they had bows that were 10 or 12 feet long (or more!). Also, a real section will crescendo or de-crescendo (depending on what is written on their parts) during held notes.I can recommend some things that work for me:1. Write crescendos and de-crescendos for your string parts and use CC11 to control them, or use the modwheel crossfade patches.2. Use the EW solo violin as a concertmaster (as well as the other solo strings for their respective sections). Play it's part separately from the first violin section part, don't just copy it over. Some of the sustain patches on the solo strings aren't looped which will force you to re-trigger the note during long sustained notes and will give the illusion that the whole section is doing a bow change. If it's mixed in right, it will add a nice, lively feel to the sections.3. Use a legato patch to play the parts, even the stacatto or marcato notes and then load up the stacatto articulation and create a new track and copy those notes to the new track and trigger the stacatto notes from that track. You'll probably have to do some velocity manipulations to blend it in with the lines but you'll get to know your global velocity editor well and also where the velocity switches are on your patches!! Or, for extra points (I haven't tried this yet) create your own keyswitch patches that include the short notes. This may be moot with the new Play version, I haven't installed it yet.4. On legato lines, extend the notes so there is the slightest amount of overlap. You'll have to experiment with it to get it to sound natural but it really helps to give a more flowing line. Also, I will "play" the CC11 slider as I trigger the notes to give more "breathing" quality to the lines.5. Sometimes the legato patches sound like they're speaking late. If you slide those parts forward in time, you can put them more in the pocket and the music will have a bit more vitality. Late sounding strings can make the music feel like it's a bit sloggy so don't be afraid to mess around with the timing. Also, light quantizing (not all the way to 100%) can be your friend depending on the part and it's function in the piece.Be prepared for a lot of editing after playing your parts. No sampled library sounds great "out of the box", a modicum of MIDI editing is necessary for really great results.You can get a really decent condenser mic these days without spending an arm and a leg. MXL, AKG, Rode, Heil, Nady, and many others have mics ranging from less than 100.00 on up. I'm sure if you ask here (and it's already been discussed if you search) you'll get a lot of ideas.Good luck!!Mazz

[georginasaint]

Mazz, Amazing post - thank you SO much for this. I've printed out your five points to pin up next to my computer - going to work my way through them. I have already discovered sliding notes so that they overlap makes a better legato - actually, when I've played something live legato and then look at the notes, I can see they overlap naturally, even though I think I've left the previous note behind - so yes I've got that, and also that shifting a note a little ahead of the beat can make it sound on the beat for certain instruments in certain situations. Also, EW violins do have a double-bow articulation which I've listened to and been amazed at, but not yet tried to use!! Perhaps I should give it a go...The piece I particularly want to pull together is almost entirely staccato as it happens, but that's just one piece. Thanks again for sharing your expertise - all of you... And I'll go and look for a good condenser mic. I think I'll take a trip down this road and put off the idea of hiring live musicians just for now at least. Georgie

[christig]

Great points Mazz!Thanks for laying it out in simple!Christi

[davekershaw]

Wow Mazz! That's really helped me too!!Cheers,Dave.