this price is VAT excluded… BTW
Super quick side-by-side playback of a string orchestra in GPO5 and Iconica Sketch (which is included with Dorico Pro and Elements) to…“see how they run.”
GPO5
Iconic Sketch
I realize there’s far more to the decision about purchasing the Garritan Anthology than just strings, but thought a quick comparison of playback and timbral nuances might be at least a little helpful.
For jazz work, I no longer use JABB3 since switching to Dorico two years ago. I wrench reasonably swung performances out of NotePerformers’ horns through a duplicate flow with slurs and articulations and use other VSTs for the rhythm section.
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I still have a soft spot for Garritan – (and I’m really glad that they made an Apple Silicon version of the ARIA Player).
The strings are curiously the weakest point, though; and yes, you’re better off with NP or Sketch.
(However, as my idea of fun, I have been working on “Ben’s Personal Orchestra 6”, which takes the best elements of the Garritan samples, with newly constructed SFZ instrument definition files.)
Here’s Garritan, NP and Sketch.
The CFX Piano is still very good: and various other things.
I’ve also made my own Choir samples, blending some of the Garritan sounds with ones from Logic; and to my ear it sounds the best “impression” of a choir, without words.
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I have bought Garritan Anthology 2 years ago for my Finale 27, and found it useful with the KS. As MakeMusic made this year also the promotion of the Anthology, which have updated librairies, I’m surprised that they don’t had discussion with Dorico team for the integration in Dorico 5 Pro.
Are the libraries updated? Is the GPO5 in the Anthology “newer” than if you bought it separately?
@judddanby
@benwiggy
Based on my own experience (sorry for not posting sound examples) and your sound examples, I would say that NotePerformer is vivid and realistic, but the string sound is very aggressive when softer dynamic markings than mp are required. And the piano sound is a bit distorted, so it is not good for solo instruments. Therefore I would like to buy the Garritan Anthology if it is officially supported with play templates with expression and percussion maps as well as playing techniques, because the price seems to be not expensive compared to other products.
From my personal experience I did not have a good impression of Iconic Sketch. But yours are good enough. Have you used it without sound editing?
Dorico only supports Steinberg’s Halion. NP is a third party collaborator. If Garritan want to do something similar, that will be their choice (I hope they do). Their decision is not within Dorico’s control.
Ah, yes! You are correct! Thanks!
I actually never use sketch, as I have NotePerformer. I just made that quick Iconica/GPO comparison so those moving over from Finale and overwhelmed with all that’s involved could hear what an already-included (i.e., “free”) library might sound like if they’re thinking about purchasing another library on top of the cross-grade expense for Dorico.
And, yes, I didn’t do anything special whatsoever; just keyed in some notes, loaded Iconica, and exported the MP3.
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All three examples were treated in the same way: Playback Template applied. I also used my own Space Template to provide a bit of reverb for Iconica and Garritan. God knows what it did for NP…!
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If Garritan Anthology date is 2016, JBB is at the version 3, COMB at the version 2, GPO at the version 5, that should say that there were improvements.
I know that there are bugs in the French version (not in the English version) with some expressions. We have compare with MakeMusic Support.
MakeMusic does not officially support Dorico specific features:
@benwiggy You are the father of Dorico-GPO5 users!
See makemusic’s answer:
Hello,
Thanks for contacting MakeMusic Customer Support.
Garritan products will not be discontinued and Garritan libraries will work with Dorico working as a host application. Your Garritan libraries come in a VST3 format that Dorico supports, as Steinberg created the VST format.
Additionally, Dorico users have created playback templates for Personal Orchestra 5 and Jazz & Big Band 3 specifically for use in Dorico Pro:
However, since Dorico has its own playback sounds, I would recommend downloading the trial to test it out and see if the sounds are satisfactory before purchasing Garritan Anthology:
Let me know if you have any follow-up questions.
Best,
I didn’t try recently, but I couldn’t get the playback template for GPO5 from benwiggy to work, because the version of the Aria player was older for Windows than for Mac.
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I received an email from makemusic, and read the following section:
The announcement is also online:
http://links.notes.makemusic.com/e/evib?_t=293253e388074932880b8aacd7bd8ac7&_m=a48399870c924feb9a35d9ae61b58473&_e=qtLtZCJ59PfhBO77AhjBhPajIkvMu9Ws4_wzb9jlXaI3ivy3JvP6Qk2E8iZ_Nx5p&_ga=2.221491229.407104046.1724969778-1231936202.1722174143
I asked the following question:
I think that describing it as “useless” is a bit of a stretch.
For starters, the GIFF samples are extremely limited. Most of them have no articulations, so as I said earlier, they will work with the standard Mod Wheel Expression map.
You might have to create the Expression map with the 3 expressions for the Violins. But just because you have to do it yourself, doesn’t mean it’s useless. You can also use the Prrcussion Maps that I’ve uploaded.
There are earlier versions further up the thread that should still work.
Yes, it is not generally useless, and I admire your work in making these files available.
At least for users like me who have not been able to integrate successfully, Garritan cannot be used with Dorico. For users like me, official support from the manufacturer is required to use it.
Also, I do not understand the ethics of makemusic because of the following things:
- You compare the usability of Garritan with NotePerformer.
- They present Garritan Anthology as a recommended product for crossgrading from Finale to Dorico without providing the necessary files to use Garritan Anthology in Dorico without any user-side customisation.
I bought the Finale 27 upgrade a couple months back from the store mostly to aid in converting old Finale scores to MusicXML for Dorico and was recommended the Garritan Anthology then. I think they had programmed their store to recommend Garritan Anthology for anybody buying any product. You could be buying a Finale coffee mug from them (if they sold them) and it would still probably recommend the Garritan Anthology to go with your Finale coffee mug.
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TBH, I can see very little advantage in the GIFF files, compared to the bundled HALion samples; to say nothing of Noteperformer.
There is some utility in GPO5 (though even that has its limits); and the CFX pianos. Possibly JABB and COMB for Jazz and Big Band stuff. The Organ bundle is duplicated in GPO5; as is one of the three harps in the harp package.
But… I’d be very surprised if we see any more updates of ARIA Player, ever.
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How do you load these and other Garritan libraries into Doric? I have all of the Garritan libraries for Finale and I’d hate to lose them.
See this thread for details.