On 29 Jul 2005 at 20:26, Darcy James Argue wrote: > On 29 Jul 2005, at 8:03 PM, David W. Fenton wrote: > > > If HP works with any GM synthesizer, what's the advantage of GPO, > > then? > > 1) Apparently opinions differ here, but I think GPO sounds are clearly > *far* superior to the Finale SoundFont, especially the wind, ensemble > strings, and percussion instruments. . ..
OK, I would never use the Finale Soundfont, myself, as my sound card's samples are vastly superior for everything I've tested them for (though I'm going by the Finale 2005 demo, so I'm not going to hear what you say are changes in the 2006 version of the soundfont). I've auditioned the GPO demos and can say that the orchestral sounds are superior to my soundcard, which is very limited in that area. But the solo strings are really not much to write home about. > . . . I agree the solo strings are > weak, but so are the solo strings in the Finale soundfont (especially > the awful new solo violin in the 2006 soundfont). I suspect a lot of > people who say the Finale soundfont is just as good as GPO have > terrible computer speakers. (I have a pair of M-Audio BX5 studio > monitors, and the difference is really dramatic.) I can't say I've heard the solo violin that comes with Finale's GPO subset, but I certainly couldn't tolerate the Finale 2005 Soundfont solo violin. > 2) GPO + Human Playback support numerous playing techniques not > included in the Finale SoundFont, including true legato on slurs, > fluttertongue and n.v. flutes, mutes for all brass (except tuba), > muted strings, recorded string trills and tremolos, short bows (short, > sharp upbows and downbows), automatically alternating bow direction, > harp harmonics and sons étoufées, and so on. What if you had a synthesizer, software or hardware, that supported those. Can HP be set up to automatically use those, or is that something only GPO can do? > 3) GPO includes slight variants of each instrument (Player 1, Player > 2, etc) so unisons sound like real unisons and not just like a single > player. It also includes instruments omitted from GM (alto flute, > contrabassoon, bass clarinet, etc). Here my question is basically the same as #2 -- given a synthesizer (software or hardware) that supported these same varieties of instruments, can HP be set up to utilize those sounds automatically? I presume not, and that one would have to do it all manually with expressions. > 4) GPO includes massed string samples for each section (including > discernibly different sounds for the first violins and second > violins), whereas GM just has generic "strings." Ditto on the question. > 5) GPO supports independent volume and velocity, so you can have > sharply accented quiet notes or unaccented loud notes, . . . Er, isn't that just standard MIDI, with key velocity being different from the volume controller? > . . . plus very nice > crescendos and decrescendos, with authentic timbre differences at > appropriate dynamics. (In other words, the pp flute isn't merely a > quieter version of the ff flute, it actually sounds like someone > playing quietly.) But, again, that's not something specific to GPO, it's a feature of the GPO sample set, and surely other synthesizers (software or hardware) offer the same variety. > GPO obviously isn't nearly on the same level as, say, the Vienna > Symphonic Library, but the Finale edition contains a substantial > portion of the full GPO library (far more substantial than I had > predicted, actually) bundled with the 2k6 upgrade. I'm assuming that GPO/NI is compatible with other more expensive instrument libraries. To what extent do you get the same HP benefits with those other compatible libraries? I see on the Finale website a whole list of compatible libraries, yet someone just reported that one of the ones listed there is really *not* compatiable. Is that an HP incompatibility, or a GPO incompatibility? Or was it a Kontakt player version incompatibility? My overall impression is that Finale is tying itself very strongly to a particular technology and vendor for sounds, one that is not cross- compatible with lots of other sounds, and one that cannot be used in tandem with other synthesizer devices (software or hardware). Does this seem like a good idea to you? That is, by offering something quite good as a default set of sounds for playback, but which doesn't adapt very well if one wants to move up to the next level, aren't all the benefits going to the people who don't really *care* that much about quality of sound of Finale playback, while the people who do care need to work harder than ever to get the benefits from HP into their playback? And does anyone fear that MakeMusic may have placed their bets on the wrong horse in the sound samples race? -- David W. Fenton http://www.bway.net/~dfenton David Fenton Associates http://www.bway.net/~dfassoc _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
