Does a composition program like this exist?

Vamp · Post by **Vamp** » Thu Jan 29, 2004 10:59 pm

Are there any virtual ochestra programs available? Where writing in either tab or notation format, you can use sounds of guitars, drums, violins, bass, cellos etc to create scores?

Something that sounds good as well...

Anything?

Luteleigh · Post by **Luteleigh** » Fri Jan 30, 2004 3:41 am

Don't know exactly what you mean, but Reason by Propellerhead is like a virtual orchestra sort of thing. And the instruments sound incredible! It'd have to, it comes on two CD's.

Epsilon · Post by **Epsilon** » Fri Jan 30, 2004 8:44 am

There most definately are such programs. I can't of any at the moment, but if they come to mind, I'll post some names of them. John williams and all those other big time composers and orchestrators use hardware and software exactly as you are saying for that reason. Don't expect great hardware to come cheap though.

I get back to you on that.

Rico · Post by **Rico** » Fri Jan 30, 2004 5:07 pm

Sibelius and Overture are two programs for notation... I bought Garritan Personal Orchestra (a complete Orchestra with Kontakt sampleplayer) and it includes an LE version of Overture. I haven't tried it out though.

They usually (AFAIK) use the built in MIDI sounds of Your soundcard or can use Virtual instruments such as sampleplayers.

You can also use other programs such as Cubase and Cakewalk which also have notation capabilities, but are more used as sequencers. They do not usually come with many soundgenerators though...

From what I hear, you usually use a combination of these, so that You (if Your skilled at notation) use such a program for creating a base MIDI-file and then move on to a sequencer like Cubase for touching up the result, and mixing and such...

The integrated software studios (Reason, FLStudio, etc.) typically don't support notation, but rather the sequencer method of making music is used...

Regards,
Rico

stickmurder30 · Post by **stickmurder30** » Fri Jan 30, 2004 6:51 pm

I know a good software ( freeware ) for creating music , its called "fruity loops" but i don't know what is a "tab" so this software may not be what you're lookin' for.

TommyPollock · Post by **TommyPollock** » Fri Jan 30, 2004 6:56 pm

Tab is short for Tabular (sp?), and is guitar notation. Cakewalk can convert and use both forms of notation, along with many variations of base and treble cleffs, so I would assume that any basic MIDI program would also be able to do tab.

Vamp · Post by **Vamp** » Fri Jan 30, 2004 8:06 pm

tabalature...

I3lade203 · Post by **I3lade203** » Fri Jan 30, 2004 8:37 pm

Hey i have fruity loops! Never knew it could make songs LOL i always thought it was for small tehcno loop things, shows how much i suck at making music

Rico · Post by **Rico** » Fri Jan 30, 2004 10:41 pm

FLStudio is what FruityLoops is called nowdays... I use FLStudio all the time, and it is NOT freeware... Though the demo can be downloaded and used, You can't save Your work with it, just export it as wav or mp3. And it doesn't use notation or tabulature, "only" pattern based or piano-roll based...

If I remember correct, Anvil Studio is a free sequencer that supports both piano-roll and notation based composing. It didn't have built in support for virtual synths when I used it a couple of years ago, "only" MIDI (i.e. the sounds on Your soundcard, external hardware or some software MIDI interface to standalone virtual synths)...

Regards,
Rico

I3lade203 · Post by **I3lade203** » Fri Jan 30, 2004 11:22 pm

Yeah i know, my music teacher from school gave me Fruity loops although i suck with it , i dont know what insturments would go good to make a song , im just not good with music

Vamp · Post by **Vamp** » Fri Jan 30, 2004 11:33 pm

What's piano roll?

Rico · Post by **Rico** » Sat Jan 31, 2004 12:28 am

The concept of a Piano-roll I guess comes from old automatic pianos, where You had a roll with a "line" for each key on the piano. Spikes on the roll indicated that a certain key should be "pressed". Sorry that I can't explain it better - my English is not good enough for that...
In a sequencer You have the keys on the left, and then You can mark when a key (or more) should be played, and for how long. You can also specify how "hard" the key is pressed (velocity), and other info about the note. http://www.truespec.com/images/computer ... noroll.jpg shows an image of a piano-roll from some sequencer (just did a quick search on Google images for "piano-roll")

Regards,
Rico

crb · Post by **crb** » Sun Feb 06, 2005 6:40 pm

What about using Finale?

Haydn · Post by **Haydn** » Tue Feb 08, 2005 12:07 am

There are a few (relatively) cheap sampled orchestras which are easy to use.

The two most popular;

Garritan Personal Orchestra - http://www.garritan.com/GPO.html

East West Quantum Leap Symphonic Orchestra Silver Edition - http://www.soundsonline.com/sophtml/det ... sku=EW-161

They work with Midi, play them a midi file (eg. using a software sequencer) and assign the instruments to different parts.
GPO can play directly from notation in Finale (i think you even get finale free with it) but i do not know if EWQLSOSE does.

Feel free to email me if you have any questions about this.

Epsilon · Post by **Epsilon** » Tue Feb 08, 2005 1:46 am

Haydn wrote:There are a few (relatively) cheap sampled orchestras which are easy to use.

The two most popular;

Garritan Personal Orchestra - http://www.garritan.com/GPO.html

East West Quantum Leap Symphonic Orchestra Silver Edition - http://www.soundsonline.com/sophtml/det ... sku=EW-161

They work with Midi, play them a midi file (eg. using a software sequencer) and assign the instruments to different parts.
GPO can play directly from notation in Finale (i think you even get finale free with it) but i do not know if EWQLSOSE does.

Feel free to email me if you have any questions about this.

What? No...

Finale is a composition program for notating music and orchestrating. This is a music library matching program. They are entirely different. These two programs apply orchestral sound recordings to a midi layout for a more realistic sound, but you Still need to create the midi in the first place!

They aren't going to include a $600 Finale program in for free.

Haydn · Post by **Haydn** » Tue Feb 08, 2005 2:49 am

What? what is a music library matching program?

I use GPO and EWQL both regularly and I recommend them both.

I was wrong about finale, its overture that comes free with GPO.