I’m primarily transcribing male barbershop music with normally just 4 voices, tenor, lead, baritone, bass. Are there singing voices available as mentioned and can each one be separately assigned to voice 1 and voice 2 on each staff? I’m going to assume that there cannot be any simulation of words also, but having various human singing voices would be nice for playback. If this is not possible, can at least each voice on each staff be assigned to s different instrument if singing voice types are not available?
The available (choir) voices are not clear enough for this kind of repertoire.
I normally replace singing voices with woodwinds. For barber shop you might experiment with horns and bassoons.
To be honest, just choosing the Yamaha piano sound is also a great possibility if you want to proofread your arrangements.
@BobS
You should investigate Synthesizer V (that’s V for voices rather than the Roman numeral) from DreamTonics if you are okay investing in some AI voices. Nothing is like the real thing, but progress is being made.
there are still no VST solo voices which can sing freely assigned text available but if you’re willing to use a choir, the Symphonic Choirs and Hollywood Choirs from EWQL fit the bill-- Symphonic Choirs sound a bit more like solo voices and is what I always use when that’s what I want to emulate. The words are not always that clear but it’s the only real option at present. If you’re not bothered about singing the written text, there are quite a few options for solo voices (VSL for instance are not bad) if not as many as the multitude of choirs available designed for film scoring from all major vendors.
One option is the impressive Catalonian Cantamus – however to use them, you need to submit a MusicXML score which they then process on their website. They’re best for sacred music, though it might be worth seeing if you like what they do to Barbershop. Synthesizer V is only useful for pop music (and Japanese/oriental pop music at that) in my view.
Even apart from sound qualities, rendering barbershop harmony in equal temperament is sacrilege …
I looked up their website, I hope it is allowed to post here, they have some impressive demo files, indeed:
I understand what you are saying and if I were looking to generate a sound file for other than testing I would agree, since the mechanical tempo accuracy for a vocal performance would not be desirable. Just look at how the originally generated drum tracks were terrible because they were too accurate. I was just looking towards the future in case I want to try to generate voices instruments to check the general sound of a song. Maybe unrealistic, but something I might consider as I get further along with learning and using Dorico.
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Not sure how to access the Yamaha piano sound you mention, since I don’t see it on the list of instruments., or any piano for that matter.