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Synthesizers
Overview
I would be difficult to match the info and links
from
Synth Zone.
So, there's that. There's no intention, here, to get into
sampling, synth specific features, design, construction,
boards and effects boxes, and all the rest, save by some
passing reference, or where it seems relevant.
Or here, for example, is someone's opinion if you're
new to MIDI hardware.
As mentioned elsewhere, here, one finds either
your hardware synthesizers, or your software synthesizers.
The software can emulate various hardware, or strike
out on its own.
The hardware can come in the form of a PC sound card
or daughtercard, MIDI module (no keyboard),
or a synth built into a keyboard, a guitar, or whatever.
The 'soft' synth is dependent on processor power,
nowadays seeming to work best with MMX to get the
most out of it.
But some don't require it (the earlier version of the
Roland 'soft' synth doesn't need MMX).
But as the hardware might be limited,
and assuming the PC can keep up, then the emulation of a
hardware synth by a software synth might be preferred -
allowing more simultaneous notes to sound,
providing more instruments, and other things.
On the other hand, some may swear by the sounds of their
expensive studio equipment; and then it becomes
even just a matter of taste.
And if the hardware is just a lot more capable and sophisticated
than curent soft synths, then, there's your answer, as well.
Along the player piano, punch card, metaphor of before,
if the MIDI is like the roll for the player piano, then
the piano can be most anything, and sound like most anything.
Instead of Scott Joplin, it might try to groan and whistle
playing some 'new age', or spacey 'ambient' sort of thing.
It might have amps and boosters and try to belt it out
like Van Halen.
Same 'piano roll'.
If it sounds good on an inexpensive upright, who knows
how it would sound as saw waves coming out a synth.
But that's sort of what you have with such a number of
different types of synths that can play MIDI files.
In order to sound half-way decent on a synth for which
a MIDI file wasn't intended, and assuming
it just doesn't by chance happen to sound good,
a MIDI might not only have to be revoiced with different
patch/instruments, but tracks might have to be softened
or amplified, settings might have to be changed, and much
else.
The difference in equipment can be that noticeable.
The instruments used,
and the way they are generated,
by each manufacturer, even from model to model, can mean
the difference between a 'sweet sound' and little more
than mush, depending on what the MIDI was specifically
set up to play on.
But this has already been covered.
Again, in short,
if the MIDI is even half-way well produced, you can probably
get a relatively pleasing version if you just spend a little
time to work with it (maybe using one of the little mixer board
PC programs that seem to come with various equipment).
If a PC can't keep up with the demands of a particular
MIDI playing out a soft synth, or if you need better quality
or just something different, then it's off to hardware as an
external synth, or module.
And that generally is what people buy, and what people talk about;
the bread and butter of the industry, I would suppose.
And perhaps even compared with the alternatives, these external boxes
are still the best solution for pro-quality.
It just might be expensive.
What you get for it, in the latest modules, is a lot of polyphony,
and hundreds and hundreds of 'wavetable' or sampled
instruments, effects, and other things.
Perhaps in the context of 'the net', the hardware might just be
a
PC card or daughtercard
(attaching to standard, even cheap, audio cards
with an FM chip, but a 'waveblaster' connector for a daughtercard,
not all have them (but most should)); 'baby brothers' (sisters?) of
modules or synths costing much more.
But the cards might suffer from a background noise level
you wouldn't get with the external modules.
On the other hand, they probably cost on the low side
of $100-$200 US, and can provide something awfully close
to the more expensive hardware.
And then, as mentioned, there are the newer and latest
software synthesizers;
pure computer programs that emulate whatever synth they are
trying to emulate, and then some.
These might not be much less in price than the lower end PC cards,
but given the power of the computer you have, they might
offer rather high-end capabilities found only in otherwise very
expensive external modules.
Another sort tries to emulate old, legacy synths, because some
like the sounds or effects they can generate.
Another sort emulates more a trailing edge GM sort of wavetable,
whether as a stand-alone program, or a plug-in to a browser.
There are basically three ways a MIDI can control the various
effects and specific capabilities of each synth - the 'effects
boxes', if you will, of the particular synth, and much more:
The System Exclusive messages suggest messages which are
exclusive to one synth, not to another; that
these codes will be recognized and acted on by one synth,
but ignored by others.
The command strings, which comprise these messages, use
different headers and data depending on the general sort
of synth.
As of now, along with other proprietary SysEx from certain manufacturers,
one may find GM SysEx strings, GS SysEx strings for Roland
and compatible GS equipment, and XG SysEx for the Yamaha
XG equipment.
GS equipment may be able to recognize GM SysEx.
But XG may first require a separate XG SysEx command, for ex., to
be able to read and act on GS strings.
And even if one finds, say, a GS synth, it may not
recognize all the commands that another GS synth might,
as technology moves on rapidly, and not every model of synthesizer
is ever designed to be equally like others in the catalog.
The controllers
Controllers deal with what might be called effects box settings,
and control pedals on various instruments, and so on.
These are generally recognized by various synths, but not
all synths will recognize all the available controllers;
and maybe only just a few.
This includes pitch bends, volume, aftertouch, modulation,
chorus and echo, and so on.
These can often be essential to making a MIDI sound
well produced, and 'live' or realistic.
Parameters
Parameters can be used to control the same sort of thing
as SysEx, in some cases, and controllers, in others.
But there's just no consistency.
The parameters may take precedence over the others, perhaps.
And typically, there are a few parameters that can be sent
out in the manner of a controller, rather than SysEx,
and instead of SysEx.
CONTINUE
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