Starise

or this......

Better than this.....

For Notes- Other descriptions for the Sax.......

Just updated Melodyne from version 2 to version 4 editor. I hardly ever use it but wanted to have it because when you need it nothing else works as well. Thanks for the info.

"How do I make my acoustic sound professional?"....................drum roll...........get someone else to play it. *ducks and runs*

Yes always smoke vegetarian cigarettes.

Cancer seems to happen with cells that begin to replicate into cancer because they somehow lose their DNA instructions. If cells don't get the right amount of oxygen,aren't fed correctly and never rest they can go awry. The body defends against it to some degree until it gets out of hand. There are lots of factors that can contribute to this. RF is one possibility. The main difference between a few magnets around a person's head and something like 5K Wifi is the Wifi is generating a more powerful signal through the air at higher frequencies. I once carried a cell phone in my pocket all day. My leg tingled in that place even when I removed the phone. So did my ear when I used it for a long time.The jury is indeed out on most of it because any admission would mean law suits out the wazoo. A "little" RF is like a "little" sugar. You don't pay much attention to it until you consume so much of it that is begins to mess with your cell function. For RF distance is the main thing. Don't carry a phone in your pocket all day, keep it about 2 ft minimum from your body. Use a speaker phone whenever possible. When I worked with two way radio I still remember being burned because I was holding a police car antennae when someone transmitted. Imagine what a radio station antennae could do. Sitting next to a wifi transmitter at close range is probably a no no, but I'm doing it right now. Bluetooth is a fairly weak signal in comparison to smart phones and computer wifi. I personally think it would take a LOT of up close exposure for a long time for it to make any huge difference. There is a long list of things that can cause cancer and there are so many different kinds of cancer that it would be difficult to specifically say what might have caused Neal Pearts cancer. Here are just a few- Genetic disposition, weakened immune system, Ingesting large amounts of sugar. There is something to making sure the cells have enough oxygen. I wear a c-pap for that reason.Many people don't realize how much sugar is in a glass of soda. Carcinogens of any kind. Not drinking enough water.Chemicals in your food from pesticides, Exposure to radioactivity.... too much exposure to the sun . Radon dust, close proximity to nuclear waste of any kind. We don't always know this. It could blow over you as a cloud or be in the water and unless you happen to have a detector with you you won't know. It's invisible. Nuclear power plants don't always inform the public when there is a minor mishap. Sometimes it's a combination of these things. Neal was in his 60's . Things just begin to slow down . Something is eventually going to get everyone. All we can do is to be careful about what we eat, try to stay away from anything that has the potential to cause harm....maybe prolong the inevitable.

I can see why you disagree since a lot of good music was written by only one or two people. I've seen the whole band work on stuff as well. Depends on the group I suppose. No two bass players would play a run the exact same way, no two drummers would play it the same, so I see that as a part of the composition if all they had was a chord chart or some kind of an idea of what was wanted. Until you have all of that you don't really have a composition. Unless a person steps in with very strict ideas and maybe even some notation that are to be followed the band has some creative input into the composition which is part of the composition.. This is why I always thought session players got a bad deal...feel free to agree to disagree. I always favored the more open democratic band as opposed to the closed minded few. Both have been successful. I was once in a band with a guy who was always quick to enforce that this was HIS song. Fair enough, but that same person just did whatever he wanted to do with others work without any regard for anyone else. It wasn't he didn't care. He just didn't think because it was about him. In some ways DAWs are a way to get away from all of that crap. In other ways it can be negative because so much more could happen with a team of real people. I have co written with people from all over the world using a DAW. That can be a really great thing, can also be frustrating. It's an nice solution though to writers block when you put two or three minds together on something.

I see what you did there....or did you?

I love this synth. Works best for me in combination with other synths. It is still one of my "go to" synths for certain kinds of material. Has an amazing wealth of presets and customization. If it were ever to come back as an item in Cakewalk I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it.

Aside from that "sunset sound" it's a convolution reverb with what appears to be a plate reverb added on. Convolution reverb loads IR. I have like three of those already. Heck I think you can get one for free on the web. Plus my GAS budget needs a rest. A bunch of other stuff just jumped into my shopping cart recently.....so yeah. I'm waiting on this one. If I can't make music with what I have now I should be banished to an island full of head hunting savages, possibly forced to listen to Lawrence Welk until my ears fall off or forced to work as a deodorant tester...or....never mind Choosing a reverb is a 3rd world problem. But thanks for the FYI just the same.

People like titles for some reason. He's a "composer". She's a "producer". I don't even think that way. I simply look at where I am, where I want to be, and what I need to do in order to get there. If I need help in an area I will look for it. It's a lot the same as cars are extensions of us to go somewhere. You get in it and make it do what you want it to do. You have a plan and the car is a tool. The car doesn't make anything for me, it just gets me there. I understand there are people here who take this stuff way more seriously than I do. There are the people looking to get "hooked up" with other people or a record company to try and make something happen. There are plenty of services offered to the wanna be professional musician for a fee. I never had a direction other than I like to make and play music. Never cared where that took me. I remember sitting in my garage with a guitarist, a bass player and a drummer. I had some weird lyrics ...but I thought it sounded cool. When you're 27 the world is your oyster. I would play a melody and someone else would throw something else into it. Pretty soon we had a song. The hardest part was remembering what we did so we could play it the same every time and trying to make something in a group of 4 with 4 different opinions on how it should be. As seen by a professional composer we would just be a bunch of kids playing around in a garage. Like when you were 5 and pretended to be Batman. That process is still technically composing even if it rubs Mr. Grey Poupon the wrong way. Probably most of the best rock and roll came about like this. A few guys throwing ideas together. No notation. Maybe a few lines scrawled on a napkin. No DAW for miles. I had a multi track. Our production was US. If we sounded good we could take it to a studio and any decent engineer could obtain a reasonable facsimile of us. If we didn't sound good, nothing you did in the studio could help. We liked playing and just doing that was enough then.....oh sure we had aspirations. Don't we all. Get a group of guys like that together now. If one or two of them own or can use a DAW and knows how to mix....to heck with the studio. Most decent bands have their own studio rigs now. If you go somewhere, save the stems for a larger studio. Production in the classical music scene is a lot different. For one thing they are funded better at the higher levels. A 50 year old who has played violin since they were 4 doesn't even think about a DAW. They make a decent salary to play. Let someone else worry about that. They bring in an engineer who makes the recordings. Someone else sells the music. Composers don't usually play in the orchestra, conductors conduct, promoters promote, accountants crunch the numbers. We aren't talking about 4 guys here we are talking about 50+ musicians who are very good at what they do. It's a whole different ballgame.

I keep forgetting this isn't a serious discussion lol.

I see your point here. The classic definition probably no longer applies. It's funny. Depending on what hat you wear you might see it differently. A couple of things come to mind. Just stuff that has accumulated in my grey matter over time from various experiences that probably form my opinion. Here are just a few- Someone on a music writing site is looking for someone who can either take their music and make it sound better or "audio engineer" it. These people clearly don't even know what a DAW is. They just want someone to "do that stuff". Make them sound good. One person I worked with didn't really have any talent...sorry,. the truth hurts. Someone who attended college and graduated with a degree in music theory and has dedicated themselves to write music to be published for orchestras. These dudes are up on music theory and they at least see themselves as professional score writers. Some of the stuff they write is admittedly "out there" to anyone who has been trained in the western music system. This is often because they are attempting to make some kind of statement. They often use free programs like Musescore and their material has that clunky midi feel to it when you hear it. These guys are an eccentric bunch. They don't know a DAW from their butt though. Another person grew up on computers and took to software like babies to milk. They know every single thing you could imagine about some DAWs and a few things you can't imagine. Most of these types can't write any kind of music that stands out. Me? I do a little bit of a whole lot of nothing but it's all fun. I like to work through problems in software and come to solutions. I can often hear music in my head or construct music.....I'm not a computer expert, but I can usually make it do what I need it to do. I have a computer related day job. I am a musician using a computer to assist me in making music not a computer user trying to produce music using a computer. Make sense?. So yeah, I admit I'm biased to some degree. I don't think someone with no musical talent is really capable of composing and I don't think many talented musicians can produce music. In between there somewhere are those who can effectively wear both hats to various degrees of success. Others who are talented musically in a technical way but can't make anything anyone wants to hear to save their life. It's easy to import a midi and work it into something for me but I don't do much of that because it isn't as fulfilling as making something from scratch. Often it isn't nearly as good as borrowing loops/midi. That's just a personal thing for me...I could give a few examples of music I did like that. You can wear both hats if you have the aptitude to do it. I think we have a lot of guys here who can.

This looks like the "year of the build" for you. Congrats Simeon! I'm on the 3rd year? of my last build. It's always fun to select the parts you want and do the build. I only have a few common sense comments. I wouldn't progress so slowly on it that the warranties expire on return options for the vendor in case there is a problem. There has never been any harm in slightly overclocking for me. I managed to get 4.2ghz from a chip that usually runs in the 3s. Never had an issue and keep it OC'd all the time. Not sure how all the hoopla was started over ram. When I built my system I only added 16gb thinking I might need more later on. I never did and have ran some heavy Kontakt unfrozen mixes with nary a hiccup.....so while lots of ram can't hurt I don't think it's necessarily mandatory unless you're running boat loads of plugins. 32 would probably suffice even in that case. I would load winpro 10. I didn't. I wish I would have. They make great studio heaters in the winter months...can get toasty in the summer without great A/C. If possible I try to locate the computer portion outside of the studio. Just an opinion take it or leave it. People like to see the pretty lights in the case now. I like to be cool in the summer. Buy a UPS backup if you don't have one. You might thank me one day for suggesting it. If things die or brownout and you don't have one.........let's just say it's the kind of thing that keeps places like Newegg in business :0)

Thanks Matt. I downloaded both the VST2 and VST3 versions. I have recently gone to only downloading VST3 thinking it might avoid issues. I seen it is sandboxed because I haven't checked use VST2 in VST preferences. So far so good- knock on wood. I tend to gravitate to certain programs that work well for me and that have the features I like. I don't see myself using Sampletank a lot in the future. I could be wrong. Their concert grand piano in the 77 pack is one of the hands down best pianos for recording and playing I have ever used. It's just fun to play and fits right into recordings well. I have all of the pianos in Kontakt, Addictive keys and others. Sometimes it isn't about how real something sounds. Has more to do with if it sounds good and works well in the context of a recording....that one is a keeper and made it worth the effort to get ST4 working for me.

Thanks Matt. I found the issue. I was looking at the middle box for my presets. I didn't see meta data so figured something was amiss. Must have rebuilt my data 5 times. I happened to go to load instrument on the first track and there it was! All of the meta data. Duh..... I thought I pretty swift on learning new software. I will say that I'm still not sure why a few programs show up under the middle drop down box. If nothing had showed up at all it would have been better than seeing a few sounds there and wondering why they all weren't there? Once you get to know the way it all works it's pretty nice actually. Seems way more intuitive in that respect than Kontakt for multis. I'm not usually a multi person, but this makes building one look tempting to me. Looking through the presents I didn't see a solo violin. Might have missed it....or they save that for their orchestra package. Max is a monster! I especially don't understand lines and lines of drum kits/sounds, but that's me. I guess they get loaded across the keyboard and you can mate them or map them to a kit? Using a drum program seems more intuitive in that respect. That's the thing though, all types of musicians are using it who do lots of different stuff. Laying out an instance, mapping the different parts to different keys, Adding movement to it using loops has a lot of potential. I think ST4 is a vast improvement over ST3. It is tough for me to move from Kontakt, but I could see only working in this world and never using Kontakt for some people. I would give it a 4 out of 10 for intuitive use for first time users of ST4 like myself. Those earlier versions undoubtedly didn't give the product the best rap. An 8 out of 10 for the SE version. I would take that higher for the more equipped versions. The middle version seems to have almost everything the Max version has. ST4 also uses my ST3 sounds. I have heard comments on the samples not all being the best. The vast majority of the ones I played were nicely done. So far as I know most of the samples don't use the same kinds of techniques used by Spitfire or similar. The stand alone cello sounded good to my ears. I would probably use Joshua Bell violin instead of their violin anyways. The acoustic guitars are pretty impressive for sampled guitars which are mostly on offer with the higher versions...This is another thing that can be covered by others in Kontakt for not a lot of $$ if you have the SE version. Only Max version covers these bases completely. I seldom if ever use sampled electric guitars because I just can't make them sound real. I have acoustic guitars in my studio and I SHOULD be using them.

Thanks Matt for sharing the preset list. I guess I'm not finished yet. I have nowhere near that number of presets. I set all of my sound files in what is D drive on my computer. I made a folder for it called Sampletank Sounds. I unzipped everything in all of the folders. I pointed ST4 to that folder. I'll let you know what I find. I am admin on this computer. Shouldn't be a factor but I've been wrong before. This is the kind of thing that absolutely KILLS any creativity I had in trying to work out these kinds of issues. I know a certain amount of it is inevitable.. I'm just ready to be playing instead of looking for more boo boos lol.

The thing is.....I have heard some great composers who didn't have mixing/production chops. So no, production is not composition but in this day and age composers need either someone who can do it or they need to learn to do it. Makes all the difference online (where most music is heard nowadays). Also, it is possible to change composition with production now.........they pretty much go hand in hand IMHO.