NI Meet Session Guitarist – Acoustic Sunburst Deluxe

[Larry Shelby]

$129 Intro Price - Kontakt Player

https://www.native-instruments.com/en/products/komplete/guitar/session-guitarist-acoustic-sunburst-deluxe/

[Sander Verstraten]

With the amount of new stuff NI is pushing out, I suspect there will be a gap between Komplete 15 CE and the highest tier of their upcoming Subscription scheme...

[PavlovsCat]

I'm a power user of guitar vst instruments  / libraries  and effects, so I thought I'd share my experience / review on using the Session Guitarist line.  

I own guitars, but due to very bad tendinitis,  I don't even attempt to play anymore and guitar is very important to my productions. For loop based rhythm guitar instruments, I find NI's Session Guitarist line is the cream of the crop. They have a fairly well designed user interface, and a dead simple  workflow. The sound of the included loops are very good. I don't always love the preset amps and effects and will instead use other plugins, like Guitar Rig and Ampliitube, for that. I find, when I'm feeling inspired to record a song and need a basic rhythm guitar strumming pattern, I'll go through my Session Guitarist and Evolution strumming presets and use the one that fits best. I have no patience to create my own strumming patterns when I'm feeling inspired or have a musical idea in my head I want to lay down. 

The downside is that after you record a track with Session Guitarist -- or any loop based VST instrument -- you can't customize it, because it's a loop pattern. You can't make the strum on the and of 4 be muted or whatever you like. Either you accept the loop as is or you use another loop with a different pattern. 

Session Guitarist's single guitar notes (solo player) are nowhere near the level of realism of the Evolution guitar line (due to the result of detailed sampling and  sophisticated scripting combined with physical modeling), so Session Guitarist is relegated purely to the role of rhythm guitar strumming when I'm in a hurry and need something fast and it has a pattern that does the job. Often, I'll replace it with something I can make my own, so I'm largely using it as a sketching tool or placeholder. But it has a place among my tools. 

Edited May 24 by PavlovsCat

[GoncaloL]

5 hours ago, Sander Verstraten said:

With the amount of new stuff NI is pushing out, I suspect there will be a gap between Komplete 15 CE and the highest tier of their upcoming Subscription scheme...

You’re completlely right. Ive been thinking about that aswell… finding it kind of strange that there isnt a bunch of Komplete 15 iterations yet.

considering what was usually the scheme and NI pricing, i think that it is almost impossible that the next Komplete Ultimate Ce will include everything that they have been putting out since KU14CE

at least at a similar price as previous updates

… times are changing.. unfortunately

[kitekrazy1]

I'm done with NI libraries.

[PavlovsCat]

5 minutes ago, kitekrazy said:

I'm done with NI libraries.

I take it you mean libraries specifcally made by NI, as I think,  like me, you have a lot of Kontakt libraries, right? So what's the issue?

I love Noir to the point where it's my favorite piano library (it's made by Galaxy Instruments). I think some of their other piano libraries are pretty nice.  I rarely see anyone praise NI Studio Drummer or the Abbey Road Drummer series, but I think both are good to excellent if you work with them to create your own presets.  My go to for acoustic drum kits is Superior Drummer,  but I prefer those NI libraries to AD2 and I own all but 4 or 5 kits for AD2. As I mentioned above, I like Session Guitarist line, which is made by e-instruments, for looped strums. 

[kitekrazy1]

Anything to do with the NI eco system.  Plus disk space is becoming more limited and I rarely touch a lot of stuff.

[Billy86]

On 5/24/2024 at 5:29 AM, PavlovsCat said:

The downside is that after you record a track with Session Guitarist -- or any loop based VST instrument -- you can't customize it, because it's a loop pattern.

With the latest Session Guitar releases, this one and Mint, you can now drag the patterns out into PRV and manipulate them. What drives me crazy is the keyswitches for ending strums. Sooo tedious to get them to work, if you ever can. So many times, in my experience (and I have every NI guitar), you can’t find a way to end things, as in smoothly stopping the instrument to transition into another song section. 

 

[dumbquestions]

20 minutes ago, Billy86 said:

With the latest Session Guitar releases, this one and Mint, you can now drag the patterns out into PRV and manipulate them. What drives me crazy is the keyswitches for ending strums. Sooo tedious to get them to work, if you ever can. So many times, in my experience (and I have every NI guitar), you can’t find a way to end things, as in smoothly stopping the instrument to transition into another song section. 

 

Seconded, i’ve had to bounce, chop, crossfade, & time-stretch clips of a NI session guitar sequence sometimes, just to make it fit/stop “naturally” when i need it to. Not all the time, but enough to make me just want to replicate it in an orange tree lib to keep moving. That’s my only gripe with those, but they sound great otherwise imo.

[PavlovsCat]

55 minutes ago, Billy86 said:

With the latest Session Guitar releases, this one and Mint, you can now drag the patterns out into PRV and manipulate them. What drives me crazy is the keyswitches for ending strums. Sooo tedious to get them to work, if you ever can. So many times, in my experience (and I have every NI guitar), you can’t find a way to end things, as in smoothly stopping the instrument to transition into another song section. 

 

I compeletely agree and I bet every regular user of the library can relate. I largely use keyswitches, automation and editing my midi notes until I get results I want. I suppose it's the result of using a loops-based approach, but I think NI could do a bit better than the present system. I only use Session Guitarist for strums and really wish they wouldn't put licks and riffs in. I use Evolution for any single notes, riffs, and licks, and most of the rhythm guitar parts. I don't to use stock licks or riffs, I have my own ideas. How about you? How does it fit into your workflow?

FTR, I'm so hardcore at using this stuff, I have given input to several different guitar developers of libraries I use. But Orange Tree Samples' Evolution even has a good deal of my input in it. 15 years ago, I went to this young Kontakt developer, who just came out and released a few libraries -- I think two bass libraries (one electric, one acoustic) and one electric guitar library. He had been working doing Cinesmaples libraries before that. I sent him an email with my bio, telling him that I was a former musician, but my work is marketing and business strategy and includes product development work, and that I have some very strong ideas on how to make the ultimate guitar vst. The result was the Evolution line. So that's pretty much, my ideal guitar library/vst and I'm incredibly picky about guitar libraries (drums, piano and electric too, as I was trained on piano, organ, guitar and drums, and have experience playing glockenspiel back in Jr high!).  If I had more patience I would create 100 strum presets in Evolution -- I've been begging for more strumming presets! But until I spend the time to make those, I'll be using Session Guitarist. It has the instant gratification factor, but I loathe that I'm using loops that I didn't create and can't edit to change it to exactly what I need. But it does fill a role. When I'm eager to put an idea down, a use one of the basic strum patterns and work on the rest of the song. 

Edited May 26 by PavlovsCat

[Billy86]

Evolution Steel Strings was my very first guitar VSTi. Mostly because of the raves about its sound quality. I’m picky as well. I play guitar, piano and drums, but don’t have the recording environment to make them sound studio quality. I agree, NI sound quality is great, with a good selection of useable patterns  

I use VTS almost exclusively for strumming parts. Unfortunately, I found Evolution  GUI/workflow really daunting when it came to strumming patterns, whereas NI seemed much easier. Maybe because I was so new to the basics of Midi.  Now, it’s like sticking with what you know in terms of NI line. 

LOVE Evolution’s tone and would pay you for usable strumming patterns for Steel Strings! ?? it’s been collecting dust on my VSTi shelf. ?

[PavlovsCat]

1 hour ago, Billy86 said:

Evolution Steel Strings was my very first guitar VSTi. Mostly because of the raves about its sound quality. I’m picky as well. I play guitar, piano and drums, but don’t have the recording environment to make them sound studio quality. I agree, NI sound quality is great, with a good selection of useable patterns  

I use VTS almost exclusively for strumming parts. Unfortunately, I found Evolution  GUI/workflow really daunting when it came to strumming patterns, whereas NI seemed much easier. Maybe because I was so new to the basics of Midi.  Now, it’s like sticking with what you know in terms of NI line. 

LOVE Evolution’s tone and would pay you for usable strumming patterns for Steel Strings! ?? it’s been collecting dust on my VSTi shelf. ?

Did you watch a video for Evolution that shows you how to use the strumming engine? If you commit a solid 20 minutes to watching the video where Greg shows how the strumming engine works, you'll understand it. It's definitely not as easy to figure out as Session Guitarist, but once you understand it, you'll retain it. Basically, go to the screen, put your left hand on the appropriate keyswitch and your right hand on a chord and it plays a pattern. 

I've definitely given Greg (the owner of Orange Tree Samples) my feedback that if Evolution contained more patterns I wouldn't bother with Session Guitarist.  But even when I do use Session Guitarist, I use Evolution for single notes, riffs and leads. If you click on my SoundCloud link, all of the songs I share use Evolution for single notes, leads, riffs, and strumming, but some do have a section where I left a Session Guitarist pattern strumming in. Cover songs like "Can't Get It Out of My Head," "I Am the Walrus," and "Video Killed the Radio Star." I'm pretty sure that my cover of Lennon's "Cold Turkey" is just Evolution played live and the strumming was done in real time by using strumming keys. If the strumming pattern is pretty simple, I like using the strumming keys so that I can change up chords,  throw in single notes or whatever I like in real time.  

[Billy86]

On 5/26/2024 at 10:41 AM, PavlovsCat said:

Did you watch a video for Evolution that shows you how to use the strumming engine? If you commit a solid 20 minutes to watching the video where Greg shows how the strumming engine works, you'll understand it. It's definitely not as easy to figure out as Session Guitarist, but once you understand it, you'll retain it. Basically, go to the screen, put your left hand on the appropriate keyswitch and your right hand on a chord and it plays a pattern. 

I've definitely given Greg (the owner of Orange Tree Samples) my feedback that if Evolution contained more patterns I wouldn't bother with Session Guitarist.  But even when I do use Session Guitarist, I use Evolution for single notes, riffs and leads. If you click on my SoundCloud link, all of the songs I share use Evolution for single notes, leads, riffs, and strumming, but some do have a section where I left a Session Guitarist pattern strumming in. Cover songs like "Can't Get It Out of My Head," "I Am the Walrus," and "Video Killed the Radio Star." I'm pretty sure that my cover of Lennon's "Cold Turkey" is just Evolution played live and the strumming was done in real time by using strumming keys. If the strumming pattern is pretty simple, I like using the strumming keys so that I can change up chords,  throw in single notes or whatever I like in real time.  

I did watch those back in the day trying to get the program figured out. It’s a deep program and top-notch sound. I just rewatched them and, for me, the patterns are very, very limited compared with others in the same space. More patterns I could drag out and tweak would be a game-changer for me.
I’ve never been able to get a realistic sounding performance using strum keys, not just with this, but with any of the guitar VSTi.  Maybe it’s the feel of my keyboards? I can’t seem to finesse it very well with the various strum articulations. Creating patterns from scratch and getting them to sound good is just so tedious. Again, just me. Maybe I shouldn’t be so lazy and should have more patience with it! ?

[fret_man]

14 hours ago, Billy86 said:

Creating patterns from scratch and getting them to sound good is just so tedious. Again, just me. Maybe I shouldn’t be so lazy and should have more patience with it!

Yes, it IS tedious. But if you want a realistic guitar strum, that's the way it is. I do my edits in PRV to get the strums sounding right. it IS possible to get a very realistic guitar strum from OT and AmpleSound, but it helps to be a guitar player so you can know some of the nuances and detail.

[Billy86]

On 5/26/2024 at 10:41 AM, PavlovsCat said:

Did you watch a video for Evolution that shows you how to use the strumming engine? If you commit a solid 20 minutes to watching the video where Greg shows how the strumming engine works, you'll understand it. It's definitely not as easy to figure out as Session Guitarist, but once you understand it, you'll retain it. Basically, go to the screen, put your left hand on the appropriate keyswitch and your right hand on a chord and it plays a pattern. 

I've definitely given Greg (the owner of Orange Tree Samples) my feedback that if Evolution contained more patterns I wouldn't bother with Session Guitarist.  But even when I do use Session Guitarist, I use Evolution for single notes, riffs and leads. If you click on my SoundCloud link, all of the songs I share use Evolution for single notes, leads, riffs, and strumming, but some do have a section where I left a Session Guitarist pattern strumming in. Cover songs like "Can't Get It Out of My Head," "I Am the Walrus," and "Video Killed the Radio Star." I'm pretty sure that my cover of Lennon's "Cold Turkey" is just Evolution played live and the strumming was done in real time by using strumming keys. If the strumming pattern is pretty simple, I like using the strumming keys so that I can change up chords,  throw in single notes or whatever I like in real time.  

Let me ask you this: if a person was to pick up something like the Jam Stick MIDI guitar and record strumming and picking patterns, could they then be used to “play” Evolution Steel Strings?

[PavlovsCat]

28 minutes ago, Billy86 said:

Let me ask you this: if a person was to pick up something like the Jam Stick MIDI guitar and record strumming and picking patterns, could they then be used to “play” Evolution Steel Strings?

Yes. There have been users who've posted in this forum about using Evolution with MIDI guitar.  If I didn't have tendinitis that makes playing the guitar painful -- also, if I didn't suck at playing guitar! -- I would absolutely be using a guitar MIDI controller with Evolution guitar and bass libraries.  You should reach out to Orange Tree Samples to find out more. It sounds like it might be a much more enjoyable way for you to record your guitar parts. 

Edited June 2 by PavlovsCat

[fret_man]

5 hours ago, Billy86 said:

Let me ask you this: if a person was to pick up something like the Jam Stick MIDI guitar and record strumming and picking patterns, could they then be used to “play” Evolution Steel Strings?

Yes! You need to search on YouTube for how to setup your DAW to accept multi-channel MIDI inputs. Also, be prepared to edit the result afterwards.

[Vernon Barnes]

9 hours ago, PavlovsCat said:

Yes. There have been users who've posted in this forum about using Evolution with MIDI guitar.  If I didn't have tendinitis that makes playing the guitar painful -- also, if I didn't suck at playing guitar! -- I would absolutely be using a guitar MIDI controller with Evolution guitar and bass libraries.  You should reach out to Orange Tree Samples to find out more. It sounds like it might be a much more enjoyable way for you to record your guitar parts. 

It would be worth checking out Amplesound too. I notice they have a MIDI guitar mode where each string has a different MIDI channel which I assume would be the best approach. 

Their Riffer strum sequencer feature uses the different MIDI channels to specify what string each note is played on.