OK, now what about Jazz/Big Band sounds?

[edteja]

That was a great review too, Nick. If I had had the money, as soon as I put the issue down (don't want to rush things) I would have bought it. Seriously. The review explained what was good about it very well.

[nickbatzdorf]

Thanks Ed.And yeah, I know it's expensive. What can you do.

[stick]

Hey guys... check this out:It's not samples, but I think would sound mighty convincing. You can control the articulations with a breath controller... Check out the demos.http://www.wallanderinstruments.com/

[nickbatzdorf]

WIVI is fantastic, but it has an orchestral sound rather than "pop" - although the mutes and especially wahs are the best and you can certainly stretch those sounds to work for pop horns a lot of time. I play it with an EWI; before this I had the EWI practically hardwired to my Yamaha VL1, a synth that came out in 1994 - this is the first instrument I've bothered using with the EWI since the VL1, in other words.The problem is that WIVI doesn't sound as good as good samples, so I wouldn't want to use it for an entire ensemble. But for some parts it's just great, in fact I can just play stuff that would take forever to play/program from a keyboard - if I even could pull it off that way.I'd suggest that you download the trial version of WIVI and see what you think. You can buy individual instruments from them for about $80 - $180 each depending on the instrument.

[stick]

Ah good, someone that's used it... I was pretty impressed with the demos, but haven't had time yet to demo it.. Thanks Nick.

[montster]

Hi Chiming in to support Matto's point; success with a real horn or two mixed with the synth sounds. I've had great results with jazz demos using an old Korg Triton and a couple very great players to fill in the "body" of the sound. I would use the real horns for the main parts, i.e., lead/Trumpet 1 for the brass, alto and ten 1 for the sax's and the lead bone. I know guys here locally (Sacramento) who are great players (readers and solo chops) and will work for $25/hr. For $100 if you can get guys to work for that (I doubt there's not a real player and a decent guy who would scoff at work for $25/hr) I'm certain you'll get the results you're looking for! Make sure to have the arrangement they're tracking to dialed and perfect to the charts you give them, and include an audio mix of the arrangement w/out their parts so each player you're bringing in can shed the part a bit. I'm pretty sure you can get a good/great or even decent reader to lay a few takes in an hour if you're prepared beforehand. You might even get fine and even cheaper results by looking into what players might be avail from your local University or JR college big bands or combos. You might even find some kids who can cut it to do it for FREE!!Good luck! I'd like to hear some of the stuff you're doing. Would you be interested in helping with some arranging for a Rock-a-billy / Swing band I'm doing? We're soon be 5 horns and a four pc. guit, piano, bass, drum and singer. If we get our act together I'll be using the original stuff for Taxi submissions........... every so often I notice a shout from a publisher interested in the new "swing" stuff.Let me know how things turn out!!!