# Marion-a study on portamentos [midi added]



## Rob (Oct 26, 2011)

Sounds like serious roba, eh?  
My main goal here was to try and experiment with VSL SE strings' portamento. Trying to convey the feeling of tenderness that the piece from Hermann's "Psycho" requires... all in all, I think it's not bad, considering it's a special edition library. I think VSL can be very expressive, and love the pianissimo layer, with all that bow... It would be nice if someone with HS or Lass wanted to do the same piece, to compare portamentos and sound...

www.robertosoggetti.com/Marion_VSL.mp3


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## rayinstirling (Oct 26, 2011)

*Re: Marion-a study on portamentos*

Hey! that's my lost chord you've finished on :cry: 

You obviously have too much time on your hands at the moment, producing this to annoy all who blame their tools for poor production :lol:


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## clynos (Oct 26, 2011)

I think these portamentos sound better than the lass ones. And the sound of these strings are beautiful!


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## Rob (Oct 26, 2011)

*Re: Marion-a study on portamentos*



rayinstirling @ 26th October 2011 said:


> Hey! that's my lost chord you've finished on :cry:
> 
> You obviously have too much time on your hands at the moment, producing this to annoy all who blame their tools for poor production :lol:



Ray! Nice to see you, my friend! I had some time this morning, so I said to myself, why not do something just to annoy Ray? :D


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## Rob (Oct 26, 2011)

clynos @ 26th October 2011 said:


> I think these portamentos sound better than the lass ones. And the sound of these strings are beautiful!



thank you, Clynos! Yes, I have never admitted it, but I'm a fan of VSL... we have said it so many times, but it so depends on what YOU do with samples!


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## RobertPeetersPiano (Oct 26, 2011)

*Re: Marion-a study on portamentos*

Damn, I need a decent string library! 

Can you achieve this with Holywood Strings too?


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## Rob (Oct 26, 2011)

*Re: Marion-a study on portamentos*



RobertPeetersPiano @ 26th October 2011 said:


> Damn, I need a decent string library!
> 
> Can you achieve this with Holywood Strings too?



well, I don't have HS but I'm sure you can!


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## noiseboyuk (Oct 26, 2011)

Adored your last piece and lovely writing here too, but honestly not such a fan of the strings. It's that very abrupt snap back that sounds fake to me, almost like an extreme ADSR setting on a synth.

I could give it a crack with LASS if you like - do PM me if you're interested, but might take a few days.


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## Mahlon (Oct 26, 2011)

*Re: Marion-a study on portamentos*

That sounds very good, indeed. I wonder if you masked the portamento (just a tad) with another layer if it might not sound more subtle? Same thing you'd have to do with LASS to get them to sound good, I think.

I'd like to try it with LASS; maybe if I can get some time this weekend.

I'd like to hear HS on this, too, so anyone.... 

Rob, would you consider posting the midi file so we can just concentrate on making the performance and save a bit of time?

M.


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## Rob (Oct 26, 2011)

*Re: Marion-a study on portamentos*

@ Guy _ that's not my writing, Guy, it's Herrmann's, from his music to "Psycho"...


@ Mahlon and Guy - I'm not home now, but tomorrow I'm posting the midi, I'd love to listen to a Lass version!


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## noiseboyuk (Oct 26, 2011)

*Re: Marion-a study on portamentos*



Rob @ Wed Oct 26 said:


> @ Guy _ that's not my writing, Guy, it's Herrmann's, from his music to "Psycho"...



Doh! Well, at least I recognised it was good!


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## Rob (Oct 27, 2011)

*Re: Marion-a study on portamentos*



noiseboyuk @ 26th October 2011 said:


> Rob @ Wed Oct 26 said:
> 
> 
> > @ Guy _ that's not my writing, Guy, it's Herrmann's, from his music to "Psycho"...
> ...



:D I have uploaded a midi of the piece... Mahlon?


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## Scrianinoff (Oct 27, 2011)

*Re: Marion-a study on portamentos*



noiseboyuk @ Wed 26 Oct said:


> Doh! Well, at least I recognised it was good!



Not only that, Guy apparently recognized that the quality of this music belongs in the same league as Rob's. In that respect, I want to repeat Guy's compliment in that I too recognized your quality of writing in it. Please keep sharing, although this place is no longer the 'cosy living room that it once was', as you said something along those lines here before.


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## noiseboyuk (Oct 27, 2011)

OK, I figured I could either do a quick and dirty version now, or wait a few days for a more careful one. I figured - what the hell! Mahlon will hopefully fulfill the "careful" brief anyway...

So this is a version using LASS LS for violins 1 and 2 (sordino legatos) and LASS Lite for the rest. This was chosen for speed really - I have most of this already set up as an old template, and I've found that the sordino violins tend to sit nicely with the non-sordino other patches. There's a little first chair in with the sordinos as well.

I've not tweeked anything beyond forcing a few portamentos that LASS didn't pick up automatically (no tempo or phrasing adjustments). I've not tweeked cc83 (portamento speed) either - this is the default setting. There's also a quick dynamics pass for each section, and it feels a little unbalanced in the 2nd half in particular.... apologies for that. It's far brighter than the VSL too, with less mid. The Sodinos are with default EQ, LASS Lite has my own.

Great arrangement, Rob!

http://www.box.net/shared/fxb770v0xettj6tdifqf


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## Rob (Oct 27, 2011)

*Re: Marion-a study on portamentos*



Scrianinoff @ 27th October 2011 said:


> noiseboyuk @ Wed 26 Oct said:
> 
> 
> > Doh! Well, at least I recognised it was good!
> ...




Thank you so much for the compliment, scrianinoff! You inflated my already remarkably dancing ego o=? ... I'll keep sharing things, as long as there are musicians like you around


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## BoulderBrow (Oct 27, 2011)

Interesting comparison, VSL definately has more of the original's tone but I'm not sure if thats inherently so or due to Rob's fine craftmanship?

Rob - did you transcribe this by ear? Found it really interesting to see the violins switching the melodies, something my rusty ears wouldn't have picked up on


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## Rob (Oct 27, 2011)

noiseboyuk @ 27th October 2011 said:


> OK, I figured I could either do a quick and dirty version now, or wait a few days for a more careful one. I figured - what the hell! Mahlon will hopefully fulfill the "careful" brief anyway...
> 
> So this is a version using LASS LS for violins 1 and 2 (sordino legatos) and LASS Lite for the rest. This was chosen for speed really - I have most of this already set up as an old template, and I've found that the sordino violins tend to sit nicely with the non-sordino other patches. There's a little first chair in with the sordinos as well.
> ...



we enter the realm of personal taste here... the choice of sordinos is good, as the original score calls for sordinos. Lass portamentos are smoother, or at least more quiet, and I'll try to get mine subtler as well, but I like the the overall sound of vsl better... it seems warmer to me, more communicative, if that makes sense. There's something gelid in your rendition, probably due to the use of sordinos, don't know... thank you for doing this, I appreciate it very much!



noiseboyuk @ 27th October 2011 said:


> Great arrangement, Rob!
> 
> http://www.box.net/shared/fxb770v0xettj6tdifqf


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## Rob (Oct 27, 2011)

BoulderBrow @ 27th October 2011 said:


> Interesting comparison, VSL definately has more of the original's tone but I'm not sure if thats inherently so or due to Rob's fine craftmanship?
> 
> Rob - did you transcribe this by ear? Found it really interesting to see the violins switching the melodies, something my rusty ears wouldn't have picked up on



thanks BoulderBrow! no, I didn't transcribe it by ear... I have the score of all the Psycho suite!


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## rayinstirling (Oct 27, 2011)

Hmm, I'm not sure of the usefulness in this offer of " have the midi, have a go".
As long as there are excuses made for not quite getting the best from other libraries, it kind'a points to user skill. Of course I never really thought that would be an issue.

Not much i didn't :lol: 

@Guy I'm just saying, do the best you can or don't bother highlighting that wicked man's skill. :lol:


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## Ed (Oct 27, 2011)

I like it but... the strings sound like synths. Synths with a lot of expression sure and that sound like they have the correct legato, but synths none the less, either synths or real strings that have been destroyed by EQ? Guys version sounds more like actual nicely recorded strings to me.


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## noiseboyuk (Oct 27, 2011)

rayinstirling @ Thu Oct 27 said:


> Hmm, I'm not sure of the usefulness in this offer of " have the midi, have a go".
> As long as there are excuses made for not quite getting the best from other libraries, it kind'a points to user skill. Of course I never really thought that would be an issue.
> 
> Not much i didn't :lol:
> ...



To my ears, my LASS version sounds far better even on a quick mockup, but naturally it's personal taste. And, of course, in the real world a quick mockup is all the time you might get, so this exercise has validity to me. Looking forward to Mahlon's version! (no pressure, Mahlon...)


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## reddognoyz (Oct 27, 2011)

i agree the LASS sounds much realer, and I use lass, but LASS is SO sandpapery for this arraignment. does anyone have eq/ambience setting that work successfully in taming LASS? 

don't get me wrong. I love the LASS sound for aggressive stuff, it's perfect. But it's really tough for me to get it sounding sweet with romantic stuff.


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## dedersen (Oct 27, 2011)

reddognoyz @ Thu Oct 27 said:


> i agree the LASS sounds much realer, and I use lass, but LASS is SO sandpapery for this arraignment. does anyone have eq/ambience setting that work successfully in taming LASS?
> 
> don't get me wrong. I love the LASS sound for aggressive stuff, it's perfect. But it's really tough for me to get it sounding sweet with romantic stuff.



An easy solution are the FORTI convolution filters (http://www.numericalsound.com/forti-ser ... demos.html). Combined with some of the larger hall impulses in QL Spaces, I find I can get a really nice, lush sound out of LASS. Otherwise you really have to go to town on the EQ to tame them a bit. I have a few EQ templates with some pretty severe cuts that I use depending on which sound I want.

If I have time, I'll see if I can cook up a version of Rob's arrangement using LASS and the FORTI filters.

The LASS Sordinos actually also benefit from some pretty drastic cuts in the higher end, despite being muted.


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## rayinstirling (Oct 27, 2011)

noiseboyuk @ Thu Oct 27 said:


> To my ears, my LASS version sounds far better even on a quick mockup,



Funnily enough I disagree, but it has less to do with your samples than the lack of expression you've added to them.

I spent a little time earlier listening to recordings made by a few different orchestras featuring Herrmann's music. The conclusion never changes. The better the sample library gets the more frustratingly obvious the "never match the real thing" gets.
So! I'm slowly but surely getting to a place where, I care much less about that and more about simply enjoying something that sounds musical.

Excuse me but as much as I'm fascinated like most people here about the latest library in both sound and features, I'm opting out of treating them as the most important ingredient when producing great music.


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## noiseboyuk (Oct 27, 2011)

rayinstirling @ Thu Oct 27 said:


> Funnily enough I disagree, but it has less to do with your samples than the lack of expression you've added to them.
> 
> I spent a little time earlier listening to recordings made by a few different orchestras featuring Herrmann's music. The conclusion never changes. The better the sample library gets the more frustratingly obvious the "never match the real thing" gets.
> So! I'm slowly but surely getting to a place where, I care much less about that and more about simply enjoying something that sounds musical.
> ...



Sure - as I already proved I don't know the original, or its tone, and as I said I consciously didn't adjust phrasing or tempo. Obviously this was for getting a simple out-of-the-box demo going, but also cos it would be a closer like for like A/B comparison. It was the extreme ADSR synthy sound I didn't care for in the original, so obviously I didn't over-accentuate those phrases - there's actually an awful lot of CC1 going on in my version, but my preference is not to call TOO much attention to it unless I'm really going for the big swells.

Mahlon will probably make it redundant, but I'd quite like to spend more time on it next week with the phrasing, but it might take it away from Rob's original (and maybe Hermann's too I guess). Personally I like this tone - a tad taken off the top end wouldn't hurt, but I tend to favour a little brighter mixes than some - I remember I was pushing Rob's previous piece for more HF on the strings all the time! I guess I don't really equate "romance" with "HF roll-off / MF boost". I agree with Ed - the OP is synthy which is fine in and of itself, but since the piece is labelled a study in portamentos - presumably therefore with reference to real strings - that did bother me. I know some people aren't interested in realism at all, which is fine, but I'm not one of them.


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## zacnelson (Oct 27, 2011)

I think the LASS one is immensely superior to the VSL one, even though the LASS one was just a quick mock-up which has areas that could obviously be improved. The VSL one was horribly synthy and the unnaturalness of it was distracting so that I couldn't just enjoy the music.


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## zacnelson (Oct 27, 2011)

Alright I just had another listen to the VSL one, and I probably have been too distracted by the note cut-offs in the violins which were just too much for me to handle, that `ADSR' issue Guy or someone mentioned in an earlier post. If that issue was resolved I would be willing to appraise them again with a new perspective. When I listen carefully and try and ignore the cut-offs and only focus on the positive elements of the VSL sound I am reasonably impressed. I'm sure it must be possible to get the cut-offs sorted though.


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## Jeffrey Peterson (Oct 27, 2011)

I don't know, the LASS version sounds like notes keep stopping where they should be stopping...like glitching out and in...VSL version is more smooth....VSL also sounds like its being run through an EQ or old time emulator, emulating old time recordings.


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## Mahlon (Oct 28, 2011)

Thanks, Rob, for the file. Haven't checked VI control in a couple of days, and now I have to go to Nashville this weekend. So won't get to it until Monday. Sorry 'bout that.

Guy, your version sounds excellent. Rob's VSL tone does sound smoother, sweeter, more subtle; but I do like the air in the LASS samples, and the raw realism. For some reason, LASS always has an "older recording" sound to me, which in this case is welcome. Great rendition!

I doubt that I could do any improvements on these at all (yours or Rob's); you guys' skills are far ahead of mine. But I'll give it a go when I get back.

Mahlon


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## Rob (Oct 28, 2011)

Mahlon @ 28th October 2011 said:


> Thanks, Rob, for the file. Haven't checked VI control in a couple of days, and now I have to go to Nashville this weekend. So won't get to it until Monday. Sorry 'bout that.
> 
> Guy, your version sounds excellent. Rob's VSL tone does sound smoother, sweeter, more subtle; but I do like the air in the LASS samples, and the raw realism. For some reason, LASS always has an "older recording" sound to me, which in this case is welcome. Great rendition!
> 
> ...



thank you, Mahlon! I will gladly listen to your version, when you're back home...
meanwhile I've updated my file, trying to get rid of the excessive portamento, please listen if you (or anyone else) want to, and tell me if you find it better...


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## noiseboyuk (Oct 28, 2011)

Oh yeah, sounds much nicer to me now, Rob - good job!


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## zacnelson (Oct 28, 2011)

Well done Rob, that new version is a HUGE improvement!


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## Rob (Oct 29, 2011)

thank you, guys, what I've done is setting a slower attack time and a longer release, so that the connections between notes are smoother...

Guy, I've just listened to a performance of Marion directed by Herrmann himself, and in terms of sound colour it sounds very similar to yours. I don't have sordinos, so can't try it...


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