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Anyone know of a good VST general MIDI synth?
Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 6:39 pm
by apalomba
Does anyone know of a good VST GM synth for use with Live? Ideally
something with decent quality sounds. Any recommendations?
Anthony
Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 6:47 pm
by gfea
Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 7:17 pm
by mikemc
Did you mean only free?
how about Operator?
Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 7:21 pm
by gaspode
Native Instruments Band in a Box
Cakewalk Dimension/Dimension Pro I think too...
Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 7:22 pm
by gaspode
mikemc wrote:Did you mean only free?
how about Operator?
Operator does General Midi now too? nice!
Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 8:06 pm
by Tarekith
I don't think the new schoolers know what GM is
Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 10:02 pm
by icedsushi
That's right.
When I heard about the new native instruments bandstand GM instrument, I wasn't sure what they meant. I've heard the term before, but I don't know the meaning...where the sounds are coming from or if it's just a midi spec, or if it's a midi setup with samples to go with it. Manuals will sometimes mention it, but never explain what it is.
Even after reading about it I still don't know. Guess you just had to be there.
Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 10:04 pm
by icedsushi
Is bandstand any good? Is this like nice pleasing generic sounds included in garageband?
Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 10:06 pm
by mikemc
gaspode wrote:mikemc wrote:Did you mean only free?
how about Operator?
Operator does General Midi now too? nice!
ah, ok, my bad-- thought he meant, like, a general midi synth... so what is General Midi?
Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 10:11 pm
by amo
Have you checked that one ? I didn't, but from what I understand, it has general midi capabitlities...
http://www.steinberg.de/ProductPage_sb_hy2_eu.html
Cheers,
amo
Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 11:42 pm
by apalomba
Yes Gerneral MIDI refers to a MIDI standard that includes samples.
So when you create a GM file and play it on a GM synth you will be
sure that your piano/strings/drums/etc. will always be set to the right patch.
I did look into NIs Bandstand, it comes with a 2gig GM sample
set that sounds pretty sweet.
Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2005 2:32 pm
by gaspode
Sorry, I haven't been creating music *that* long, maybe five or six years now... and I just sort of figured everybody new what General MIDI was.
As was mentioned it is a spec for MIDI sound sets... essentially what it defines is I believe 128(possibly 256) different instruments, such as a drum kit, a piano kit, saxaphone, etc... that will always be on a particular patch number.
For a made up example, but to illustrate the point... when creating a MIDI song what you would then do would be to say track one uses pianos, which for everybody using any general MIDI synth would be patch #1 (I made this up, it might be #12, can't remember). So anybody playing this MIDI file in a general midi synth would then hear essentially what you had intended. Now patch #1 for the pianos may sound different from the GM set on your sound card compared to a Yamaha GM kit, or even a Korg or Native Instruments GM kit, but when you program a GM song at least the sax part will be a sax part, the pianos will be pianos and the drums will be drums.
Does this illustrate the idea of general midi? It is just a way to organize a sound bank so that no matter what synthesizer you play it on, you will always be able to hear the song as 'intended', with varying degrees of quality for the sound samples.
Posted: Thu Dec 15, 2005 5:54 am
by mikemc
Does this illustrate the idea of general midi? It is just a way to organize a sound bank so that no matter what synthesizer you play it on, you will always be able to hear the song as 'intended', with varying degrees of quality for the sound samples.
Yes, thanks.