samplemodeling brass test

[kensuguro]

2 trumpets and 1 trombone in a soul horn section setting. I sort of followed Phenix horns with the setup, but after going through this, I feel I might want to do 1 trumpet and 2 trombones instead, or bring the 2nd trumpet down lower since the whole thing sounds too intense without much body. I may be just playing a bit too hard. A sax may also help smooth things out a bit if it stays mellow.

I think the tonguing tends to be a little slow. Still makes for great lines, but hard or impossible to do the super percussive stuff. I probably have to adjust my playing style a bit to liven up the syncopation even more. The last upward unison sounds loose as hell.

I do like the overall sound though. It's as close as I've got to getting the EWF style brass sound. Playing the horn parts was fast too. about 30 min, not bad considering I just installed this thing. Just picked up the EWI and I was recording.

Tiny bit of compression on the horns. Whole thing is going through a tape emu and a bit to much comp.

[Nestor]

For some reason I find broken unions or something like that, between the notes. Probably a release problem, or too much compression, I don’t know. They sound cool when the sound is sustained; the problem is sometimes in the attacks and in between the notes, where I can hear that it is a virtual instrument with some minor imprefections in the sound, but still musical to me if you are not looking for perfection, but music. Now, if you are looking for a replacement of the real thing, this is not yet the effect you are looking for, as you can easily guess it is virtual VST and not a band.

[kensuguro]

lol, the broken unisons are just that.. they're not played right. It's mostly my playing, but strangely the samplemodeling instrument does add in extra passing notes here and there. Mostly due to my bad playing, I think I should be able to tighten up the unison more with practice.

I think for me, I'll have to stick with this 'till I can get a real brass. It's good practice though, since the lines I think of (when the instrument sounds organic) is different from what I think of when it's 400gb worth of samples. Dunno, not sure if the approach of looking for inspiration in the way the instrument responds is a good idea, but generally, for vocalists, that's been my approach and it's worked pretty well. If I get live players I'll probably arrange differently. But either way, this has come a long ways from programming performances with hundreds of CC and a bunch of articulation patches. That stuff is too confusing for me. I just want to sit and play. The output may be mediocre, but the workflow is more important for me. I understand for some that's not the case.

[Nestor]

Dunno, not sure if the approach of looking for inspiration in the way the instrument responds is a good idea

I’ve never wander about being wrong to get influenced by the way instruments respond before today, but for me it is a fact that every instrument models the way I will play it and the ideas I may come up with, musically. Even when playing a guitar or a bass it will happen the same; it all depends on the instrument and the kind of amps used in the chain. Well..., right now I tend to think this is a natural approach to music creation.

hundreds of CC and a bunch of articulation patches.

There I’m with you, I like music to come rather straight out of my own performance, and then, well, ok, using the basic MIDI corrections and implementations, but not more than that. When you get into very complicated stuff, never-ending arrangements, you lose momentum and you get lost, or worst, bored!

the workflow is more important for me

Probably most of us will agree with you, like it is my case, workflow is much more important than the rest of techniques because they translate into “fresh creativity”.