Use Sonic SE to turn a 6 string guitar into a 12 string.
First I’ll tap F5 and bring up Media Bay.
I’ll find a standard 6 string Steel Acoustic Guitar.
I’ll double click it so a fresh Instrument Track loads into my project.
I’ll be choosing the [GM026] Steel Guitar for this lesson since I’m pretty positive you get this sound in Artist.
Now I’ve made an Instrument Track with Sonic and the guitar loaded, I’ll close Media Bay, and click the “Edit Instrument” in the project view for my new Steel Guitar track.
This brings up the UI for our HALion Sonic SE plugin.
The first thing I need to do here is click the options tab, and make sure that under Program Changes, that the General MIDI option mode is toggled off.
Next, right click the First instrument slot ([GM 026] Steel Guitar), and choose ‘Copy Program’.
Right click slot 2 and choose ‘Paste Program’
Click the MIDI tab, and change the MIDI channel for slot 2 to channel 1.
Click the edit tab.
Click slot 2 to make it the active slot.
Tune it up an octave.
OK, this takes care of the bottom 8 strings. But standard 12 string tuning doesn’t do octaves on the on the 4 high strings.
So clone the guitar sound into two more slots (since it’s probably still in the clipboard from last time, just right-click slots 3 and 4, pasting it into both), set them both in the MIDI tab to use channel 2, but don’t tune either of these up an octave.
Now you have the framework of a 12 String, Standard Tuned Guitar.
Send notes that use the lower 8 strings to channel 1.
Send notes that use the high 4 strings to channel 2.
From here you can click the EDIT tab and make tweaks to the sound of the guitar slots, such as emphasis, EQ, slightly detuning some things, applying resonance filters, ADSR adjustments, and making the upper set of strings have different characteristics to the lower strings.
When you’re done, save this as a multi instrument so you can call it up in the future!
Don’t forget that when hunting this sound with Media Bay or the Sonic LOAD browser, it is a multi-program preset, as opposed to a program or layer preset, so set filters accordingly.
Experiment and have fun!
Also note, if you want to make a version that guesses and averages out when notes should go to strings with or without out high strings up and octave on their own (without having to use a different MIDI channel), you can use the key board range section in the MIDI tab.
These settings make it so any note higher B2 doesn’t get the high set of strings tuned up an octave.
Don’t forget that Sonic SE also has a nice effects tab where you can do even more with your sound. You can also run effect inserts on the Cubase mixing console. Study the EFFECTS and MIX tabs at your leisure.
I hope this little tutorial has been helpful.