On Nov 3, 2005, at 9:23 PM, David W. Fenton wrote:
On 3 Nov 2005 at 19:56, Chuck Israels wrote:
On Nov 3, 2005, at 6:06 PM, David W. Fenton wrote:
On 3 Nov 2005 at 16:13, Chuck Israels wrote:
Well, that is true of me, but Gary is a neighbor (on an island I
see from my window), and I benefitted from that and the fact that I
recorded jazz bass samples for him. Still, I'd have been glad to
get the GPO "lite" that comes with 2006. It's such an improvement
over what Andy Homzy calls "the little kazoo band" we used to have
to hear, and it requires little fussing. What fussing it allows is
pretty transparent in how it works.
I don't understand remarks like this. No one was ever limited to the
soundfont that Finale started providing with Finale 2004. especially
when you consider that Finale *didn't* provide it before then.
We all have different levels of interest and ability at "attaching"
things to Finale. . . .
Decent playback before the inclusion of the Finale soundfont or GPO
required *nothing* to be "attached" to Finale. It just required the
relevant hardware/software to be on your computer. Since the vast
majority
Hmnnn. Not me. Minority report.
of people using Finale would already be people who would
have MIDI-driven sound modules or soft synthesizers available to
them, the only question was how much you wanted to invest in your
synthesizer(s).
To me, any properly equipped computer comes out of the box with the
ability for pre-soundfont Finale to play back in some form, however
poor. So the question is simply what you want to do to get something
better than a "little kazoo band." Nobody was required to wait around
for Finale 2006 for something better than that.
. . . That's what made the sound improvements attractive
to someone like me. Maybe you have to have some empathy for
different experience and "courage" about this kind of thing to
understand the remark. That I am ignorant of some things, or
reluctant to get into the necessary new learning to make them work,
is clear. . . .
So far as I can see, there would have been no learning required at
all for you to have had better sounds before Finale 2006. You'd only
have needed to add a synthesizer that was better than the one(s)
offered by the default configuration of your computer.
Maybe so, but it didn't seem that way to me. I live near a company
(Edirol) that imports and sells Roland sound modules. I took the
trouble to visit the place one day in order to hear what came out of
those "boxes". Admittedly - this was quite a few years ago, but I
was underwhelmed.
I think there may be another factor that was in operation at the
time. The orchestral sounds were better than the jazz sounds (that I
needed). As far as I know, it has taken the entry of GPO into the
jazz sound font field to get decent saxophone sounds - for instance.
. . . That doesn't make me hopelessly flawed because I have
different attitudes and experience than you. I am probably among the
oldest folks on this list and have come to computer work quite late
in life. I have some intuition and am not dumb, but there's a lot I
don't know and a lot that is daunting to me. I do my best.
I don't understand your reaction. I didn't say *you* were flawed or
ignorant or anything. I just took issue with the idea implicit in the
"little kazoo band" phrase that Finale 2006 is some kind of
revolution that makes possible what was not within easy reach before.
That's patently untrue, and it's not at all something that was
available only to the technically savvy.
OK, I was wrong, but that's the way it seemed to me, and I guess it
depends on what's "easy," and for whom.
I don't believe it's Finale's job to provide good playback sounds. I
understand *why* they feel they have to provide good playback, but I
don't support it myself.
I'm OK with that, and didn't care that much when there was hardly any
playback, and it was klunky. . . .
This is where I just have a breakdown of understanding. Yes, before
Human Playback, what you got required some tweaking to make it sound
like an acceptable performance form the standpoint of timing and
agogics, but the pitches and rhythms were always as notated, and the
quality of the sound samples was as good as you provided in the
synthesizer for Finale to use.
Human Playback certainly makes it easier to get something that sounds
better, but it still sounds *nothing* like a real human being, even
the most mechanical of human musicians.
I agree with this - mostly, but I've heard some really mechanical
performances in school!
If Finale with GPO is satisfactory for your auditory requirements, I
just don't see why a decent sound module (not even a very expensive
one) would have suited your purposes before GPO was integrated into
Finale.
It's not like playback was difficult once the MIDI setup was in
place.
. .. Still, easily used integrated playback
improvements are attractive to me, and probably many others who are
not posting to this list.
Finale has *always* had integrated playback, just not integrated
sounds. This is where the disconnect lies for me. You seem to me to
be confusing the inclusion of the soundfount and GPO with the ability
to play back files, which has existed as long as I've known anything
about Finale. The only difference is that you had to provide the
sounds yourself. Since around 1995 or so, every PC has come with
sound support (however poor), and my understanding is that *all* Macs
have always had sound support (though my understanding is that
they've tended to be soft synths like QuickTime Musical Instruments
more than hardware sound cards as was the norm on PCs until the last
5 years or so; after about 1995 or so, wavetable synths on soundcards
were so cheap that you could get reasonable playback for well under
$200 and plug'n'play installation).
There was no reason that you could not very easily have had playback
that would have been of utility to you for the purposes you use it
(which you admit are more on the order of proof of
concept/proofreading, rather than for the production of demos that
aspire to replace live performance).
GPO integration with Finale is a complete non-issue for me -- it
neither makes me want to upgrade nor discourages me from doing so.
But that's because I've had sounds available to me for a long time
that I consider superior to the "little kazoo band."
Good for you, and my bad that I waited for Finale to do this before
doing it myself. I used to like manual transmissions too, but the
automatic in my very good car has improved to the point that it
shifts better than I do.
It wouldn't have been that much of an issue, I think.
And, frankly, I'm not all that impressed with the basic quality of
the GPO demos that I auditioned on the Garritan website back when
Finale 2006 came out. Yes, the integration with Finale makes certain
aspects of creating playback that uses different bowings and
different toungings and the like substantially easier than the
alternatives, but the basic sounds are not that impressive to me --
they'd really have to be substantially better to justify the
investment required for me to be able to use them.
I'd much rather
MakeMusic were investing their time and energy in something else,
but, as with so many things, I'm not the target audience.
OK, and I'm not the target for auto harmonizer. But auto harmonizer
is probably not very useful for many folks, and I believe GPO is.
I'd tend to agree with you that GPO is useful. I'm just disputing the
assertion that it's useful as a huge improvement over the "little
kazoo band" precisely because you were never at any point limited to
the "little kazoo band."
OK, David, I understand this. I am maybe lazy in this particular way
(though I don't think of myself that way in general), and there may
be better sounds out there than GPO, but I remember advice from
people on this list (years ago), when I asked about this kind of
thing (the pursuit of better playback sounds), and that was - freely
quoted, "be prepared to max out your credit card buying hardware or
software and end up frustrated anyway." That may not have been
correct, but it seemed to be the prevailing opinion at the time, and
I accepted it and didn't go back to thinking about that pursuit.
I'm happy there are things that others can use that I don't happen to
need, and that they keep MM in business. That doesn't keep me from
understanding and agreeing that there continues to be room for
improvement in the music prep end (or beginning) of Finale.
As you might guess, the "little kazoo band" remark is what set me
off. Nobody had to put up with that, ever, and the assumption behind
the remark that people *did* have to put up with it just annoys the
hell out of me.
Sorry you're annoyed.
BTW, I'm completely sympathetic with your "admission" that you find
composing hearing the sounds easier than composing in your head. My
reaction is that anyone who claims the opposite is probably lying to
some degree. It seems to me that it's indisputably better to hear in
your head plus hearing through the ears than just to hear in your
head alone. I don't see how anyone with any common sense could argue
otherwise.
Music is, after all, about making the air vibrate, not about sitting
around in solitude and exercising our brains.
Sure - but it doesn't reduce my admiration for those whose internal
musical imagery is better than mine. I'm good at some things - the
sounds of instruments for one - ironic since that's what we're
talking about here - but I can't "read" a score and get all the pitch
relationships in my head. It's just more training and concentration
than I've had. I watched Gunther Schuller read through an hour's
worth of my first orchestral scores (written for the Hannover
Philharmonic) while he ate lunch, and I am pretty convinced that he
heard most of what was there. I'm impressed with that skill, and I'd
be quicker at some things, if I had it. Still I wouldn't trade my
own music for his.
Anyway, I'm off this, and I still want the notation issues repaired
and improved, just as you do.
Chuck
--
David W. Fenton http://www.bway.net/~dfenton
David Fenton Associates http://www.bway.net/~dfassoc
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Chuck Israels
230 North Garden Terrace
Bellingham, WA 98225-5836
phone (360) 671-3402
fax (360) 676-6055
www.chuckisraels.com
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