Sample Modeling VIOLA

[Piet De Ridder]

From the mail:

"We are happy to announce that The Viola, created by Stefano Lucato & Emanuele Parravicini in collaboration with Giorgio Tommasini & Peter Siedlaczek is out!

The newly developed Viola, exploiting a further development of our proprietary platform, namely the SWAM Engine S, and including all the features of previous SWAM-based instruments, plus a completely new set of incredible features, can now be purchased and downloaded from our website.

Virtually all the elements contributing to the sound of the real instrument have been introduced in this virtual viola. Bow speed, pressure, direction and distance from the bridge are under player's control. One can also control the resonance of the played string, that of the open strings, the amount of rosin and bow noise, the sharpness of the attack, the bow lift (on the string vs. off the string) on both attack and release, the preferred finger position, and many other parameters. Each parameter can be assigned to any MIDI CC, allowing real time control.

For a detailed description, please visit the Viola page on our website.

The Viola includes several "instruments" with a different timbre which can be loaded via the main GUI.

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[Lawrence]

There goes my resolve (sigh)

[Guy Rowland]

Oh God. 28 controllers.

Honestly don't like the demos much either, which surprised me. Neither the tone nor the realism.

[Lawrence]

Havent listened yet- later. I hope I feel the same.

[Guy Rowland]

28 controllers.

Apologies for quoting myself but.... seriously.

It's a little like the discussion on the guitar thread. What is effortless on the real instrument (well, to someone who can actually play it) can become so cumbersome on a keyboard it really isn't worth the bother. I might be unfairly judging this in that perhaps there's some auto-clever stuff going on. Because gadzooks it would need it.

[Guy Rowland]

28 controllers.

Apologies for quoting myself but.... seriously.

It's a little like the discussion on the guitar thread. What is effortless on the real instrument (well, to someone who can actually play it) can become so cumbersome on a keyboard it really isn't worth the bother. I might be unfairly judging this in that perhaps there's some auto-clever stuff going on. Because gadzooks it would need it.

EDIT - but I suspect the unweidly nature of it is behind what I don't like about the performances either. They feel very disjointed to me.

[Lawrence]

Now I've listened and watched. Here's the thing, Guy-I'm not so sure about the tone either, but I'll definitely give it a try, because as a player, I will be able to get a performance in one pass as seen on the video. Like most SM instruments, the other 25 controllers are fine tuning- the three that will allow a realtime performance are expression, mod and pitchbend. That realtime feeling is paramount to me.

[kpc]

Hey Larry (do you go by Larry or prefer Lawrence? I don't remember - if its the other, I apologize)

Curious. Why not just record yourself playing the Viola? Even if your room and mics and tone.... don't match that of the pristine sample/virtual - isn't a live performance better? I have always been of the mind that a less than stellar live recording of a live musician beats a better sounding but still sample performance? No? Unless of course, like me, you don't know the first thing about playing a Voila - but didn't you mention you were a voila player? Maybe you don't have a viola to play - and just played it long ago?

Maybe a subject for another topic - I'll go start one.

Kayle

[Lawrence]

I'm a terrible violist, and it's been about 15 years since I've even owned one.

[kpc]

I'm a terrible violist, and it's been about 15 years since I've even owned one.

Ok. Thanks, I mis understood (mis remembered) your post in the confessions thread.
Cheers
kc

[Raymond_Kemp]

Well Piet, what's your early impressions of said instrument? I'm sort of balancing on the edge here and I know I don't NEED it.

[Piet De Ridder]

Don't like the tone in the first two demos at all. Sounds like a filtered accordion most of the time, doesn't it? Or a strange sort of melodica with bowed attacks. In any case, difficult to imagine a viola when hearing that timbre.
The Mulava sounds a bit better though. And the Reger has a few semi-good moments, but also several which makes resisting a purchase very easy again.

I may be sick, but not *that* sick.

_

[FriFlo]

Bam! Piet said it and nobody dares to continue with the discussion! :-) seriously, I agree with the sound not being one of the better ones of sample modeling. Also, since the whole installer (including Mac and PC 32 and 64 bit!!!) is only 18 mb, this seems to be the very first non-sample modeling release. When you just play a plain note with a static dynamic, I admit the SM Viola sounds awful, but when in motion, it is just amazing how flexible this instrument is. And it does everything a real string instrument does, sometimes quite convincingly, sometimes less. For the price of roughly 130€ this seems to me totally worth it, oven if it means to just have one truly playable instrument which almost never makes it to a published track. But I see a lot of promise there! If they could manage to improve on the sound and get that a little bit more towards where the brass instruments are, this will definitively be the only solo string I would ever need. Primarily, because this Viola is really alive! You can get those ugly, scratchy things out of it, you can get the gentle sul tasto or flautando and you can morph between those as you play. Some things are really bad, especially the pizzicato, I admit! But that is actually my last concern in this case!

[Lawrence]

I'll be buying it. Ain't not 'fraid o' big bad Piet!

[Raymond_Kemp]

Although I agree with Piet's observations, for the moment I'm keeping my powder dry. When visiting Italy next year perhaps I will meet Giorgio for a dram or two. To do with coronary care of course

[Piet De Ridder]

Fri,

I don't doubt the amazing and truly unique abilities of the instrument. Like I said on VI-C, I am extremely impressed with the achievement and I welcome this release with opened limbs. Not so much for what it is, but for the future that it announces. The day that this software is wrapped around better sounding source material — or the day that they find a solution for the strangely 'filtered' sound (that synthy, nasal, notchy thing that seems to affect just about every note) -- will be a most joyous day indeed.

What I don't understand however about the almost irrational (and certainly illogical) enthusiasm for this violaïod, is the fact that it often comes from the same people who dismiss algoritmic reverbs because they're 'not real', who discard Pianoteq for sounding artificial, who are unable to take Wallander WIVI, Synful or AAS Chromaphone seriously as musically valid instrumental solutions in mock-up productions (and always for the same reason: because these instruments lack the realism of samples) and who will invariably say a thoughtless "No!" to anything that they think might compromise the so-called 'realism' of their mock-ups.

(There's is, I believe, something utterly ridiculous in embracing this SM Viola, and then insisting on spatializing it with convolution reverbs because these reverbs sound more 'real' — or so these people believe anyway — than algorithmic ones do.)

Another mistake these people make — in my opinion anyway — is that they disconnect 'performance ability' from 'timbre'. You can't do that, I think. In any genuine, authentic musical statement or expression, performance and timbre are one. (Understanding that, is the secret of good orchestration, in my opinion.)
Part of a (good) performance — of expressing precisely what you want to say, musically — is getting just the right timbre at just the right moment. If that timbre isn't there to begin with (as is the case with this viola), the whole idea of performance-ability becomes instantly quite absurd, in my view. It's like speaking a language with words that have no meaning.
Not to mention the fact that a timbre might be so flawed (or let's call it: un-idiomatic) that it simply ruins the possibility to create — or, during the listening stage: recognize and enjoy — a musically convincing performance to begin with.

(This, by the way, was never the case with the SM Trumpet, the tone and timbre of which rises *far* above the threshold which separates expression-ability from expression-inability. The SM Viola however, doesn't even begin to come close to that threshold, to my ears.)

But I'm thinking of buying it anyway. To express my support, sympathy and admiration for the company.

_

[Lawrence]

I think it can be made better, Piet. Far from perfect, but better.

[PhJ]

Isn't there a large proportion of strings / viola players in those showing the most enthusiasm ?
I wonder if it's not a case of listening to 'how it reacts' more than 'how it sounds' in the same way that, if you're a pianist, you'll marvel at pianoteq's (or truepianos, which is the one I have) feel when you play them (no velocity layer jumps, so that you can shape chords and musical layers so much more like on a real piano than on most sampled ones) but will be disappointed sound-wise compared to the best sampled pianos ?

[Lawrence]

The way I see it- whether sampled, modeled or synthesized, there are ALWAYS compromises. Writing with virtual instruments is often about how you feel playing them, or at least that's true for me.

[Piet De Ridder]

(...) Writing with virtual instruments is often about how you feel playing them (...)

Well, that's precisely it. Some people never feel at home on Pianoteq, not because for its lack of playability, but because the peculiarities in its timbre keep distracting them to the point of not being able to concentrate on the performance or to enjoy the act of playing ...
I don't have that problem (with Pianoteq, or The Trumpet) most of the time, but I certainly will be having it with this viola: always getting pulled out of the 'performing zone' because of this constant need to regulate/neutralize my apprehension regarding its strange sound. I won't be be able to think 'viola', or to think like a viola player, when that completely un-viola-like timbre keeps appearing from under my fingers. Unable to become one with the instrument because the sound of the instrument doesn't belong to the unity I'm imagining.

But again: I really do consider this an important release. A release which, in a few years time, might very well be looked back on as the real birth of a whole new generation of virtual string instruments. (Not that "next-generation" nonsense which some developers keep tagging their old-fashioned-as-ever sample libraries with, but truly forward-looking, pioneering stuff. Like, I always believed, Pianoteq, Wallander, Synful, and the entire SampleModeling range is.)

_

[Guy Rowland]

Did anyone try those free Reaktor sample modelled solo strings? From memory it sounded vastly superior to this. Haven't got the time to look it up at the mo, but it's well worth a search.

[Lawrence]

Hard to control.

[FriFlo]

Happy to see, you are still going to buy it, even if it might just be to support the cause, Piet! :-) I actually bought it pretty much for the same reason, maybe also to enjoy playing it. We are pretty much on the same page, then! The only difference is, my dislike of the timbre is little less. If ind it actually quite warm compared to the embertone violin, which has way less performance features and real time control. Both sound kind synthetic in certain situations, especially the vibrato. But the SM Viola is IMO a big step forward, that is why I found all the bad comments a little to harsh for what it is. And to compare this with the Nocturne Violin or similar candidates with lots of prerecorded dynamics is a joke! The whole purpose of this instrument is to be fully controllable, while those more traditional libraries just enable you to make something sound good by combining all those. That is far from what I consider composing or playing ...

[Lawrence]

Here's a fun thought- what if it was called a SineWaveovia- could it be something that might be musically useful if it wasn't called a viola?

Wish I had had time to buy and try tonight . Ah well.

[Piet De Ridder]

Did anyone try those free Reaktor sample modelled solo strings? From memory it sounded vastly superior to this. Haven't got the time to look it up at the mo, but it's well worth a search.

Wasn't it called Serenade or something? I thought that sounded pretty bad too, I'm afraid. That same toyish, plastic, whining baby "neu-neu-neu" sound ...

Considered a big, game-changing thing the day it appeared, I recall, but never heard anyone talk about or use it since. Which is the inevitable fate of all these bad-sounding emulations: after a few sessions, the flaws in the sound — that artificial, synthesized flavour which some people can, at first, convince themselves isn't there — become unbearably obvious, exasperating and frustrating, making any sustained work with these instruments henceforth a rather depressing undertaking.)

(Oh ... I found it: It *was* called Serenade, and it appears I wrote the exact same thing about it as I wrote above about the SM Viola ...)

We'll no doubt be hearing plenty more short demo-snippets done with the SM Viola in the next few days, some of which might very well succeed in containing the odd second or two which doesn't sound too offensive, but the real test would be a more extended piece, specifically written for this virtual viola: a piece the content of which assumes the instrument to be a truly serious instrument, capable of more than a few superficial effects and tricks. That, to me, is the only way to evaluate the (current) musical value of the SM Viola: present it with a serious musical challenge, and see how it responds.

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