GPO MASTER CLASS
MAKING GREAT ORCHESTRATIONS WITH GPO

Lesson #1 - STRINGS

 Table of Contents

Introduction

Getting Those Strings to Sing


INTRODUCTION

In this tutorial I will go thru little things I have discovered over time that I have learned about Midi/GPO and Sequencing. This article could also pertain to other sequencers and not just Sonar as it will deal alot with the common functions of the  piano roll.  The aim is to try to make things as clear as possible, and to show  the tools and techniques to aquire a less mechanical feel.

There are alot of things I notice in certain sequences and used to get  very frustrated that everything I did sounded so stale. The truth is, getting a great orchestration from samples is nothing but practice, tinkering (tweaking), and knowledge. The Demos you hear the "pros" do with all those libraries - there are no deep secrets,  just simple things they have learned over the course of time to make things "sing". I find the most overlooked things in sampling and orchestra emulation is the small details.

IMPARTING DYNAMICS

Lets start with one of the most commonly-heard giveaways in MIDI Orchestration, static volumes. Even though a passage may be written at a specific dynamic level, its never going to sound right if you set a constant setting, CC1(MW) for  it will barely waver, nor is a static dynamic level even realistic. The time I meet a real player or ensemble who can maintain a perfect dynamic balance on some sort of graph is the time we all become robots! There are very simple ways to solve this. Using GPO it becomes very simple with a little work with the piano roll or mod wheel.

The example below is simple and can be applied to all instruments as we will find out. Im assuming you already know your sequencer and how to load GPO and assign instruments/tracks.  Were first going to load one instance of GPO and a string section plus a solo of the same family. In strings, especially if you are partial to pre-made sections, the addition solo player can make all the difference in the world.  In a real orchestral concert, you can often hear individual  players rising above the rest then receding. Individual instruments weave in and out of the orchestra. They are not static.

 

LAYERING SOLO INSTRUMENTS WITH SECTIONS

 

Lets go ahead and load a Sustain Section patch Violins 1 Sust + Short and a solo violin of your choice as either a DXi or VSTi in your sequencer. In this case im going to use the Gagliano Violin gagli plr 1 as the solo. Lets go ahead and assign VLNS 1 sust+short to channel one of the instance and Violin 1 Gagli plr 1 to channel 2 of the same instance! Go ahead and load your instance as shown below. As for timing and other issues, lets just forget about that for now.

 

Note: you can assign them to a single channel, however its best to seperate them after recording or inputing. If you want, as I will do , you can route a bit of ambience on a bus to get a certain feel for a room. Personally I like to route an ambience as I sequence so as to get a "play to the room" feel.  Unfortunately with this process your limited to certain reverbs as a convolution will eat up your computer. So for certain things I still prefer software reverb because after sequencing a whole piece to a room you may find changing the reverb might involve changing the sequence. This is just a personal preference and after everything is sequenced I will drop the aux and record each section dry (wind,brass, strings ect) and try to get that "farther back" sound with certain instrument sections. Anyway I stray from the topic at hand

Now that you have your tracks assigned (Vlns 1 Sust+Short on Channel 1, Violin 1 Gagli Plr 1 on Channel 2) lets just put down an A4 for a few bars. Here is a midi so you do not have to fuss with inputing. (I believe Sonar considers this an A 5 andI often wondered about this!)

 

 

I have made the sustain several bars long so we can get a good feel. First off go into the piano roll of your sequencer and choose CC1 and choose your desired sustained volume. Before any changes are made lets mute the solo and just have a listen to the sectional VLNS with no editing accept choosing a dynamic level.

Sustained No Variation or Solo (Strings) MP3

 

 

Sounds pretty lifeless. Lets un-mute the solo.

 

Sustained No Variation Solo + Section MP3

 

  Its getting there, but to me it is still lacking. Its much too perfect.

 

 

VARYING THE DYNAMICS

 

So lets now go ahead and draw some CC1 for both channels (or you can use your mod wheel).

I would personally go for less variation on the Sectional Violins and more variation on the Solo Violin. Experiment with this and see what sounds right to you. It can change the sound of that single note quite a bit. Lets look at the piano roll and see what I did and then compare it to the Sustain with No Variation in CC1 data. Here is a good close up.

 

 

 

   Note the dynamic variation for the Section Violins is green and has a bit less CC1 fluxuations  then the Solo player. Compare this now with the original mp3 of just the sectional with no variation. Adds a bit more life. Try this with all kinds of instrument groups and dynamics.

Though I think it sounds better, I feel its still lacking some life, but give it a listen, compare with just the one setting dynamic mp3, and experiment.

 


Violin Section and Solo Violin - Drawn Variations.mp3

 

 

CHANGING NOTE START & END TIMES 

 

Though it is beginning to sound a bit more realistic it has a few elements that could use improvement. For one, the two channels note duration and start/stop time are exact.  No matter whats written, in real life it will never be as exact as this.

 

 Most likely you will end up with something looking like this. Though the top looks perfect as Sonar's staff is very imprecise and auto puts something on the staff that is closest to that beat most of the time. After playing the notes in with the sequencer metronome going, the top start/stop time is actually a bit off. This would be more apparant with a good notation program.

 

  With this in mind lets go ahead and make our sustained note a litte bit "off". In the piano roll you can do this by using the draw tool and selecting the track and the note you want to offset. You then can drag, extend, shorten, or lengthen the duration of each note. I know there are many functions that are "quick" fixes in these sequencers to do this for you, but I prefer to have complete control over single notes.

 

   Here we have moved both the start and end times of each track. But lets go a step further and adjust the ending a bit more. Go ahead and drag each note slightly over the the ending bar line (in this case 5). I do this often to eliminate the "abrubt" ending. Though Tom has helped improve on this with the update (Length control), I still fall upon old habits.  Make sure each instrument, the Solo Violin and VLNS 1, do not end exactly the same after moving them slightly over bar 5. Now were gonna change the CC1 data at the end by backing off each channels notes rapidly. This gives a more natural "release" effect. Also make sure the CC1 fall is not exact with each channel.

 

 

 

IMPARTING VARIABILITY

 

One final thing, I would like to do is to use the tools in the GPO player VAR1 and VAR2 on the Gagliano Violin. You can either use CC22 (random intonation) and CC23 (tone variation) in the piano roll and draw it out, use an assignable midi controler, or set it within the player itself. For this we are just going to go ahead and manually set it in the player. What I like about this is you never quite know exactly how it will sound each time you hit play!

 

Go ahead and set the levels you find desirable. Note you can in Sonar or your keyboard/midi controller, and most likely all sequencer programs, use the pitch control in the piano roll to accomplish intonation differences, but you have more control as this will not be random, so VAR1 is by far a superior choice. I actually prefer to keep both VAR1 and 2 set on a constant throughout a piece particularly on individual solo players, but this is a personal preference. I like it because I never know when that clarinet or bassoon or other instrument will be slightly off, or when its timbre will change everytime you hit play.

 

 Anyway after doing all the above mentioned I have ended up with this.  If you listen carefully and compare this with the first mp3 of the page you can also notice the difference in overtones as well. Also notice the cutoff is not so abrupt by adding that extra little data at the end.

Note Move Variation 1 & 2 MP3

 

 

Lets Get Those Strings to Sing!


We have covered a pretty basic but I believe essential part of creating a more realistic rendering of a single note. Now lets get down to making those strings sing and deal with a series of phrases. In this we will deal with all of the above mentioned and more. As we have discovered just simply using CC1 for a specific dynamic at a constant just sounds awkward. If your dealing with melodic content that has shifts in dynamics it will also sound awkward just to input the notes and have static dynamic changes, for example simply moving the wheel from p to mf or higher. Not everyone will make that change exact, and to top it off these dynamic markings are really just references as its probably near borderline impossible to have a set forte dynamic in an entire piece. Listen to your favorite CD (unless its normalised or compressed) with audio meters like in Sonar or whatever and you'll discover what was forte in one section minutes ago may not reach the exact meter display the next forte part. It might be a smidgen softer or a smidgen louder. It can hang around the same area, but its never the same, atleast with a good recording.

With the GPO strings, once again if your particular to the pre-made sections having a solo instruments really helps in this area as well. That solo instrument can be the one who rises just a bit faster in a swell, or that solo could be the one who is late. In addition, the solo instrument can help in all aspects of the phrasing from staccato/legato ect. If you use just a section your stuck with that one staccato you inputed, however adding that solo and changing its parameters to differ slightly from the ensemble will make have a much better effect.

INPUTTING WITH NOTATION

In this example im going to borrow something from Tchaikovsky. The reason I choose this is because it involves quite a bit of expression and articulations. Were going to go ahead and use a midi file where everything was inputed via notation. Why I choose to do this is to show that notation inputing can produce good results as well as a Keyboard/Controller. It just takes a bit more tweaking, however you can get good results with practice. This might be especially helpfull for people who like to input via any sort of notation program such as Overture, Finale or Sibelius.

NOTE: (For Sonar user's who like to use the limited notation abilities of that program, or do not have a midi keyboard here is a workaround to getting odd groupings per beat such as quintuplets(as this example will have) or other odd groupings to fit.) Lets have a look at what were going to use and the problem we will face in Sonar. All looks fine till we get to bar 7. It appears that on beat 2, the notes Eb and F are sounding at the same time. This is not the case however as this is how Sonar deals with odd groupings in its notation display.

Go ahead (Sonar or sequencer users) and go into the piano roll and lets work around this input problem.

Next choose the draw tool, and choose a note duration as it doesn't matter (note in the example below I chose 32nd notes). Go ahead and input one note at the beginning of the measure/beat desired. At this point you can shorten or lengthen to fit to the bar with the draw tool as needed. Input till you have the desired amount of notes and try to get it as symmetrical as possible, though in my experience I find slightly odd symmetry to sound much better. The picture below shows a group of five notes fitting in one beat. Its not exact(and for a good reason as exact is not real!) but it produces the desired effect. What you will get when you then look at the staff again is something similar to the picture above.


One thing to note while inputing in Sonar's staff mode or piano roll is that the velocity will be the same each note. If you change a notes velocity in the piano roll, you can then "borrow" this velocity by clicking on the note that was changed and inputing a new note and vice versa. For example if you input a note, change the velocity to produce a strong attack, then input another note for a softer attack, you can borrow between the two by clicking on them and inputing a new note. However, this is just "sketching" and will most likely be edited later when your ready to add some "life" to your lines.

After a some manipulation I did this little example using quintuplets as a "fluttery" trill effect I might use in strings. Sometimes you just want to stay clear of "normal" symmetrical things! Here is the result after some quick inputing and editing.


Quintuplet Input Via Piano Roll & Staff MP3


Ok now back to the Tchaikovsky example were going to do. Below is a "basic" midi file. Everything is pretty static and lines up. The instruments you can load(inserting a kontakt instance ofcourse) after opening this midi in your sequencer are 1st Violins Sust + Short Mutes patch on channel 1 and 2nd Violins Sust + Short Mutes patch on channel 2.


Here is what your going to get when opening this sequence in the piano roll. Note the quintuplets are the only thing that really look out of the norm as they were hand drawn in the piano roll with the method above.

 

When we listen to this we can feel or hear that it is just to static. It does not sing even though it follows the dynamic curve and note values of what Tchaikovksy wrote fairly close (minus adding legato feature for note connection).



Arabe basic draws CC1 VLNS 1+2 MP3


LAYERING SOLO STRINGS WITH SECTION STRINGS

It goes without saying that we need to improve upon this. First let's and take the second Violins Sust Short Mute patch and unload it. Let's then re-load it to channel 3. Remember to assign the right channel to it now that it has moved channels. Why did I do this? Well for organization reasons. I want each soloist that will follow each section in channel order. This is just a nitpick thing really, but it does help to keep things organized. Now we need to copy VLNS 1 and 2 to seperate midi tracks so we can add a soloist to each line. There is an edit feature I'm sure you are all aware of where you can clone a track (also in other sequencers as well). Lets go ahead and use this feature (if your sequencer does not have clone use copy). After VLNS 1 + 2 have been cloned they should appear below their respective master tracks, unless you used the copy feature. In that case you will have to move (drag) each below its original.

Now lets load a solo violin into the Kontakt Player in channels 2 and 4 (remember we moved VLNS 2 Sust Short Mutes to channel 3). In this case im going to again use the Gagliano and Stradivari solo violins (gagli plr 1 and strad plr 1). Again you can choose in this to use midi controllers for variation 1 and 2 or set them at a constant. In this case again ill leave them at a constant. Remember to assign them in your sequencer to those channels as well since after the clone it will most likely be set to the same channel as the original. Now we should have a track order and Kontakt instance that looks like this after renaming the cloned tracks.


TWEAKING THE SOLO STRINGS TO BLEND WITH THE SECTIONS

Now were going to go ahead and go into the piano roll and make this come alive. First thing you might notice is the solo velocity will probably react differently then the sectional, so special care has to be taken when sharper articulations come into play. You will probably have to find a balance between CC1/velocity to keep them "fairly" equal, but don't keep them too equal!

The first step I did was adjust velocities after the copy as you will notice the solos suddenly blaring on the staccatos. Back them off a bit in the piano roll to what you feel is balanced. I will give out the end result midi but I encourage you to try to make "your own" version. Here is what the final looks like with all tracks in the piano roll in regards to velocity. Note this is the end result view!

Varying Velocities


The second step I did was to change note durations, start stop times, and lengths. There are many functions to do this for you in Sonar as im sure there are in other sequencers. You can choose the humanize CAL, random time CAL, or the slide function on each track, however I prefer to do these by hand as you can get more of a result you want as opposed to just random results. So if you prefer to have complete control use the draw tool and change notes around as you see fit. Secondly in this step I messed around more with CC1 for each channel so none is exact and often one of the solos will peak its head out! Here is what the part of final result looks like after doing these two things.

Varying Note Starts, Dutations and Lengths

 

Finally after finding a satisfying blend between the solos and the sections I worked on the Legato aspects . There are two ways you can do this in Sonar. One is thru the piano roll. The other is in the staff mode. Note if you use the staff mode to input the pedal(legato mode) make sure snap to grid is off. In either case make sure your Kontakt player is set to the proper function under the options sustain/sustenuto pedal mode for the legato feature.

Here it is in the piano roll view.

Blend Solos & Section

 

Here it is in the staff view.

Finally when you feel satisfied with all these aspects lets go ahead and listen to what we have. Again I encourage personal experimentation on this (you do not even have to follow the pieces dynamics to experiment, make up your own just for practice!) I will supply the end result midi anyway. Here is the mp3 of the final version (note: I have redrawn this quite a few times and each one sounds different!) Compare this to the original mp3 of just the sections with static dynamic changes.


Arabe FinishedVLNS1+2 plus Solos MP3

As a guidline here is the midi file(though I cant stress enough that it should be done every step of the way for practice!!).

SOLO LINES - EXPRESSIVE PLAYING

Often I have noticed very static solo playing. Sometimes I think its best to think of a solo line as akin to a vocalist. We are often doing these sequences on keyboards (and it shows that were thinking in an almost vertical like sense instead of individual lines as the layout of a keyboard seems to promote this). I try to treat solo parts as expressively as possible, almost like a vocalist. This involves alot of CC1 in GPO.

In this example im just going to hand over the midi file as it contains alot of CC data to explore(CC1 is all over the place, pitch bend, legato, ect). I originally reduced the backing to piano but then later changed it to full strings sust+short for a different reference as the solo Violin was the main concern of the whole project. Note that this isnt the exact phrasing of the original source in the soloist as I tried to explore different ways of making it "sing". The end result, after I had inputed quite a few different versions or tries, is what I was seeking. Just as a quick reference this is what the CC1 data looks like(you will have the midi anyway and can look there!). Its all over the place. These little dips and dives give the GPO solo instruments so much more expression IMO.

 

This midi is just two patches. Solo Violin 2 Strad Solo(full solo patch) on channel 1 and full strings sust and short channel 2. You will most likely have to mess with the strad volume to adjust it a bit higher and maybe mess with the full strings patch volume on the player as well to get a decent balance(reason was that I originally used the piano and velocity to compensate for crescendo and didnt take the time to do much adjustment adding the full strings sustain since the solo was the main concern, the backing being just a reference).

This might be helpfull when playing around with solo lines for any instrument. Just something to remember is when dealing with wind and brass solo players, remember to give them some time to catch their breath!

Here is what I came up with after lots of CC1 attempts, pitch bend, and setting a Variation 1+2 to a setting I liked. Remember this is just an experiment at trying to get as much expression from a solo instrument in GPO. I chose the Violin because solo strings seem to be much harder to render convincing solo lines.

Solo Stradivari - Lark Experiment MP3

Here is the midi. Explore all aspects from velocity/pitch bend/CC1. Erase the data and try to create your own expressive interpretation!

STRING EFFECTS (Glisses)

Its probably well known by now how to create rapid gliss effects but I though I would share my experiments with this. First off I do have to say that solo strings combined produce better results IMO when it comes to this as you have more room for timing variation. Using solos for these kind of things seems to yield better results for me atleast. Lets just compare the same example using sectional violins in divisi/gliss and then the same with ensemble building. Nothing was changed in the two accept for loading sectional strings and playing it back using the same sequence and one channel. First here is the sectional version.

Gliss Pre-Made Ensemble Build Divisi MP3

To be honest it sounds more like a whale call using the sections and this sequence. Though it can be tinkered with by adding an additional solo or short bows(see the examples on the site regarding fingered glissando with GPO) im not gonna bother since I have found combining solos for using this type of effect to be much more flexable. Here is the same sequence based on ensemble building and a bit more realistic divisi(meaning not having pre made groups which really doubles or triples ect the size of your string section depending on how much you divide). Not only is the attack sharper in spots , the blur is more apparant.

Gliss Effects Ensemble Build Divisi MP3

This was just an experiment as most things on this page have been as im prone to experimentation. At times im not concentrating on the musical factor as im trying to achieve an effect I desire to "use" in a musical setting. So the examples may just be stale musically, the whole issue being trying to find what tools will work when your ready to put these to use. With this particular experiment you deal with the pitch bend. Depending on the direction(climbing up or down), the pitch data needs to follow like such:

Note in this I offset the groups quite a bit to blur. This is the main reason I prefer the solo strings for such ideas as you have more room to offset such things. Also its helpful to implement the variation controllers in such rapid things.

An alternative I have played around with is using the KS solo strings grouped and the trill KS. Using the half step key(keyswitch) combined with the solo strings that have the KS alternative can produce a "blur" type run. However since the trill option in KS only strings only has the option to "release" to higher intervals, this works more effectively running up, but not down. In this case I used all the solo violins KS that are available. The trick here is to use the half step keyswitch in this case. Offsetting each channel's timing when using this trick is important. Just load all the KS solo violins and do a chromatic run upwards rapidly after having hit the Keyswitch for half step trills. This picture shows one of the violins in the piano roll.

Here is an example of using all the KS Violins together. The timing of each was offset quite a bit to really blur the run.

KS Solo Strings Gliss FX Chrom MP3

Experiment with the KS solos and you can find all kinds of fun tricks with the release triggers.

PIZZ! LOOSEN IT UP AT TIMES!

When using the ensemble pizz I often like to have a solo for each section double parts, and sometimes I do not(laziness comes to mind!). The reason is that with the ensemble pizzacato your stuck with that one "pizz". You can have a bit looser feel by offsetting/playing the parts with just ensembles, however your still only stuck with that one note of the ensemble patch you inputed. Adding a solo you can further loosen the feel. Sometimes this is handy for a really loose feel. This is simple and doesn't require much explenation. Just simply play your part twice, once with the ensemble, and once with a solo for each section. This is also handy as well in terms of velocity differences. Sometimes the part your inputing/playing may peak out a bit(the solo). As an example I used this short segment from something im doing, however the other parts are muted so we can just hear the pizz.

Loose Pizz MP3

STRING STOPS

Often there are small things that are overlooked. This section will deal with those and all the examples are really simple.

Many times you may run across something that looks like this in the strings (in this case its going to be VLNS 1).


This is a quadruple stop. Though it "looks" lined up, in reality it will be arpeggiated rapidly and will sound more like this.

Strings Quadruple Stop MP3

To achieve this with GPO strings is simple. Either you can use your keyboard(if you have one) and rapidly play from bottom to top. If you do not own a keyboard you can notate this as above then go into the piano roll of your sequencer and draw it in. What you want is sorta like a staircase look. Here is the screenshot of the piano roll from the above mp3.


Here is the midi file that goes with this. Note depending on the tempo of your project the note spacing may have to be adjusted as at a slower tempo it will sound funny.



STRUMS (chitarra effects)

This staircase technique can be used for many instruments in the GPO pallette to get that "strum" effect on pizzicato strings or other instruments. For instance on the harp as follows.

Harp MP3

You can use it as an effect on the piano on the piano as such.

Piano MP3

I hope all the examples above help. GPO can sound excellent when you practice at such things and experiment. Whether you own a keyboard or use notation, I think the important thing is to really get into that piano roll no matter how you input. If you do not use the bundled sequencer and use just notation I suggest you do install and learn it as it will open up more flexability and control over your works. If you do not own a Keyboard and have no other choice to use just the sequencer/notation then all the tools are available to you. Its all just practice. There are no secrets!

Back to top

http://www.garritan.com/
All logos are tradmarks of their respective companies ©2005