sequencing techniques

[Sam CA]

None of the wood winds, brass string, and percussion instruments can play chords? Exept guitar of course.

lots of percussion instruments are capable of playing chords. For example : Bells, Marimba, .....

Strings can play chords: Violins, Violas...harp...

winds and Brass can't in the traditional way. They can play a main note and a harmonic at the same time. It's called "extended technique", but it's more a solo thing. I knew a guy who plays Tuba. He was famous for his extended techniques. He could almost play a chord with his Tuba. He went really crazy with his instrument. It's not useful in an orchestra, because there's only a few people that can do this anyways.

[Daz]

I record myself breathing as if i'm playing a wind instrument , and i do it in different speeds. Then i import those into the session and add them sparingly and carefully throughout in the proper places. It adds realism to the wind instrument like you can't believe.

Great tip ! Thanks

[Martinkorg]

I record myself breathing as if i'm playing a wind instrument , and i do it in different speeds. Then i import those into the session and add them sparingly and carefully throughout in the proper places. It adds realism to the wind instrument like you can't believe.

Great tip ! Thanks

I loved it too. Do you have more tips for strings? That's the area i struggle the most. I have trouble making convincing string tracks. My percussions and drums are good, but my strings suck. Especially when it's a solo line, it just screams at me. How do you emulate bowing..etc

[mrniceneasy]

Karen,
Thanks for asking this...it is very interesting. I also want to make sequences and new styles too.
In my case I want to use pre-recorded MIDI sequences to build styles and in some cases, like you I want to build sequences from scratch.

Maybe during the holday I will get some time to begin.

Rob, Nedim, thanks guys it helps a lot....when I get into it, I may be calling on you also.

The one thing missing with the Korg is song specific styles..Yamaha has tons of these (lots of third party ones too), so it would be nice for us all to begin to generate a lot of these on our own.

I'm not sure how hard it will be, but if a few start out and share the techniques...maybe we all can do some...then share with everyone??

I hope some at least have the interest??

Lee

Hi Lee. I use Styleworks XT which will convert other makes of keyboard up to and including pa1x. They sometimes need some work on the keyboard to bring them up to scratch, adding voices etc to the sts.

I am willing to convert song specific styles for you Guys if you need any doing. Just provide the styles, preferably from Yamaha as they seem to convert better, that you need, within reason of course, then you can try them out for yourselves. If suitable you can tweak them. Perhaps share the better ones on Site. Just let me know.

I'll be away from tomorrow pm until Sunday but I'll be around after that. PM me if you need anything doing....

Just trying to be helpful!

[Lee]

Keith,
Thanks man, that's good of you to offer...I'll see if I can find a good example to start with. Maybe a Yamaha T2 style for a song I like/
We can work together on it!

I have the older Stylworks 2000 +, but have not had much luck with it..

Thanks,
Lee

[mrniceneasy]

Hi Lee. T2 styles are OK to convert as long as I change any 'mega' voices in the style. No problem. I'm no expert but I'm always learning. Send whatever you like and we'll see what kind of results we can achieve. I'll pm you my email addy.

[pcguy]

lots of percussion instruments are capable of playing chords. For example : Bells, Marimba, .....

Strings can play chords: Violins, Violas...harp...

A violin can play a chord? More than one note at the time, or you mean Arpeggio?

[Sam CA]

lots of percussion instruments are capable of playing chords. For example : Bells, Marimba, .....

Strings can play chords: Violins, Violas...harp...

A violin can play a chord? More than one note at the time, or you mean Arpeggio?

yes it Can. In fact triple stops are very common especially for accompaniment pattern. They can play up to 4 notes at the same time!!!

[Sam CA]

I record myself breathing as if i'm playing a wind instrument , and i do it in different speeds. Then i import those into the session and add them sparingly and carefully throughout in the proper places. It adds realism to the wind instrument like you can't believe.

Great tip ! Thanks

I loved it too. Do you have more tips for strings? That's the area i struggle the most. I have trouble making convincing string tracks. My percussions and drums are good, but my strings suck. Especially when it's a solo line, it just screams at me. How do you emulate bowing..etc

You have to be more specific. There's hundreds of things that can go wrong with String sequences. I don't know what's causing the problem for you. I'll just bring up a few things. I dont' do this on keyboard sequences, because of the limitation, but in pro tools, i use 4 to 8 tracks just to do one string line. Fast runs are one of the challenging ones to sequence. No two repeated notes are allowed to use the same sample, because you wouldn't want to have them sound exactly the same. For non repeated notes, you would want to emphasize on the attack of every note. Add variations to the notes (timbre-length, velocity...) to minimize the mechanical nature of midi.
If you want to make a legato passage, try to overlap the notes. If you want to bring attention to a note, then don't overlap, so it could have a fresh attack.

To emulate bowings, i highly recommand that you use a "breath controller" along with expression and a filter.

[Martinkorg]

You have to be more specific. There's hundreds of things that can go wrong with String sequences. I don't know what's causing the problem for you. I'll just bring up a few things. I dont' do this on keyboard sequences, because of the limitation, but in pro tools, i use 4 to 8 tracks just to do one string line. Fast runs are one of the challenging ones to sequence. No two repeated notes are allowed to use the same sample, because you wouldn't want to have them sound exactly the same. For non repeated notes, you would want to emphasize on the attack of every note. Add variations to the notes (timbre-length, velocity...) to minimize the mechanical nature of midi.
If you want to make a legato passage, try to overlap the notes. If you want to bring attention to a note, then don't overlap, so it could have a fresh attack.

To emulate bowings, i highly recommand that you use a "breath controller" along with expression and a filter.

You covered some of the things i wanted to know. Limited to 16 midi tracks, i dont' think if you can get very far with layering techniques. It can be easily done in a computer sequencer. Another problem i have is the velocity layers even with some sample libraries. I think Lee said something about sax samples in here. Some times the transition between the velocity layers is not smooth. I know i should then move to another sample library that does a better job, but financially not a very easy decision to make.