to me this sounds really synthey and horrible. Dynamic shape of the notes is all wrong. Some reverb might help a little, but the notes end abruptly, and start slowly. Mozart is supposed to be more crisp at the start, and let the notes ring a little.
What is HOOPUS, by the way?
One of the main problems with the libraries other than NotePerformer (and I have a lot of libraries), is they pay no attention to:
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dynamic between instruments. Violin section ff is different volume to Viola section, and cello section. So you have to manually balance dynamics with CC lane. Any time you want to change the dynamic of one section, you have to re-do all the CC on all the affected instruments. This quickly becomes a ton of work. With NP, you just edit the dynamics on the score and you’re done in 10s.
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dynamic between articulations. Legato is different dynamic to staccato, marcato etc. So, if you’re using keyswitches to change articulations, you also need to go into the CC lanes to try to balance the different articulation dynamics. If you change the score, you have to do this all over again. And again and again and again. It makes composing by score nearly impossible.
So, in the user-friendliness / usability arena, the sample library vendors aren’t even playing. They are about as un-user-friendly as it’s possible to be. This affects the quality of the resulting mix.
There are a ton of other problems with them as well. Wet samples, no support for divisi, bizarre automatic portmento effects etc etc, velocity-dependent articulation selection.
These things aren’t so much designed for DAWs, as designed for a KEYBOARD player to play live. A keyboard is a percussion instrument, and so works great for percussion samples, but lousy for any instrument which can alter the note after it started.
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Maybe Hollywood Orchestra Opus? Just guessing…
I actually am inclined to agree. The only mostly good mockup I’ve heard of this piece is the CSS one which I posted the link to above and if I did things like mock-ups of well known music which I don’t, that’s the library I would probably choose to do it --not the BBC. There are two listed in VSL but the interpretations are terribly mannered at times
why do you have a lot of libraries if you think all, other than NP are useless and user unfriendly? Thousands of composers out there would rather beg to differ, I think. I do agree on one point, though, and that is virtually every library I’ve come across can be strangely poor in balancing out dynamics between articulations. Between instruments is far less of a problem on the whole though issues exist there as well in weaker ones in particular. I actually also agree that modern libraries are primarily designed for live playing but that in no way stops them being programmable.
I guess hope is the thing that keeps me accumulating them. I’m a sucker for advertising, like when NI advertises that their new string library supports divisi (it doesn’t - only a lame one).
I even started writing a shim VST so I could automatically adjust dynamic between articulations etc, but at the time I was working with SSS, and the swell at the beginning of the longs was unworkable - about a 10dB boost 600ms into the sample.
Can’t even trial these things out, so it’s cost me a lot of money in samples filling up my drives which I never use. In the end I just keep going back to NP.
Most libraries also consider that polyphony is mutually exclusive with proper legato as well.
If I had to sum up all the libraries I’ve tried in 2 words it would be
Disappointment
Frustration
I’ve played in orchestras for a very long time, so I am quite sensitive to how things should sound. I think the sample library vendors would really benefit from getting a conductor into their recording sessions and in processing their samples - someone who is trained to know what stuff should really sound like.
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Since I know a lot of users have or are interested in the VSL Synchron-ized SE bundles, here’s a “five minutes tops” version with it. I’m using the Chamber Orchestra samples from the PLUS libraries. Marc’s score is untouched except for splitting the flow off at the repeat to keep the file size down, no MIDI editing, the Dorico mixer is flat, levels and reverb are set in the Synchron player, panning is Synchron default, and there are handful of Playback Options tweaks.
I personnaly prefer VSL wich sounds more natural to me.
In a prevous post, I posted a comparison between Mahler’s second Symphony with Noteperformer and VSL Synchron-ised library.
For those who want to test with another libraries,I can send you the dorico file
Noteperformer
VSL Synchron-ized
Hollywood Orchestra OPUS … sorry i got that term from VI Forum btw …
mine does not have any processing … can you please send the file, i can render it using CSS and HOOPUS …
Since we’re posting playback comparisons, here’s mine using Spitfire Symphony Orchestra, or Spitfire Symphony Complete, or whatever the hell it’s called this week:
Mozart - Eine Kleine Nachtmusik
Like David (@dko22 ), I cheated by adding marcato accents to the parts where every conductor and his dog has had the players play the notes that way, since forever. I also fixed a few of the trills by changing them to major second (whole-step) trills. Everything else is untouched.
It could be way better, but I don’t care. Sound sample libraries are just toolboxes of raw materials, as far as I’m concerned; for my own compositions, I’ve got my raw tools working much to my satisfaction. If I were writing music like Mozart’s, then I’d make modifications to my toolset (and to my notation, frankly).
NotePerformer isn’t so much a sample library as it is an aesthetician. The individual sounds are of significantly lesser quality than those of more expensive libraries, but it “performs” them in accord with modern artistic sensibilities with greater accuracy. When I first heard of it, I thought, “Oh, this thing is going to take my samples and play them better? That’s incredible, their designers and programmers must be genius level!” But then I realized that it works only with its own sample set – which seemed a much more realistic proposition.
Of course, that makes NotePerformer something like a conductor who will work only with one single orchestra – in which case, I prefer simply to be the conductor, myself.
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NP doesn’t really use samples, period. (Well, not quite true…the percussion is sampled, I beleive).
It’s rather synthesis…which is where most of it’s strengths come from - namely TRUE dynamics, instead of crossfading between a few layers, and being able to handle techniques in combination - for instance… most libraries will have at least basic Trombone glisses…but how many have them with mutes? Now fluttertounge that… NP can do it.
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“I’m afraid to say that this is a parody rather than a test.”
Really? Seems like a test to me. I don’t want to spend ANY time tweaking computer instrumentation so ‘out of the box’ sound is important (to me). My music is for living musicians.
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That’s a non sequitur, surely. I mean, if your music is for living musicians, then why is the quality of the sound an issue for you at all? Dorico’s audible output might as well sound like a piano book, what do you care?
Although I write my music to be playable by real instrumentalists, I do so purely out of love for the craft, and respect for musical tradition. My scores aren’t ever going to be played by human beings, so I’m not interested in software that does its best Jascha Heifetz impersonation on a My First Korg or suchlike. Until real-time sound synthesis matures to the level of actual physical representations of instruments residing in computer memory, I’m totally fine with doing my own leg work, given raw tools that are up to the task. As @dko pointed out, once you get everything dialed in, tweaking isn’t even a significant issue, anymore.
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With Noteperformer I have minimal interaction to have maximum results and that’s all I need. It’s not a ‘non sequitur’ it’s just common sense.
And “My scores aren’t ever going to be played by human beings”, makes me wonder why you’re writing music at all.
Lots of musicians, including Frank Zappa and Conlon Nancarrow, have written music not intended to be played by humans. Let’s please keep this interesting discussion on topic, not asking why someone is writing music.
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You’re right, of course, and while I can’t speak to Frank Zappa’s music, Nancarrow’s music leaves me cold.
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“My scores aren’t ever going to be played by human beings”, makes me wonder why you’re writing music at all.
I’ve run into this type of attitude before, and I have to say I find it offputting.
You are of course entitled to express this opinion, but it comes across as dismissive of those who don’t share it.
It’s rather obvious that there are many here, including myself, who make music for the sheer joy and reward of doing it. I guess you find it hard to believe that is a valid pursuit, but I for one can vouch for it motivating me.
Whether you understand it is, at least for me, irrelevant. I do not do it for you, or for others.
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Lots of music I write will NEVER be played by any living musician. That’s not to say that I don’t write for living persons to play the music. People can use Dorico (or any notational program) to write music that’s impossible to play by any human being. That’s not for me. I assumed (perhaps wrongly) that @MiloDC was referring to that type of music. Apologies if that was wrong.
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