Anyone have any success with horn loops? If you did or even if you did not please share your experiences and include your source for the loops if you don't mind.
Painstaking way to assemble a song if the goal is to duplicate an already existing horn part or the likes. Unless someone has gone to the trouble to make a horn loop that targets the song or hook or whatever in question, which would be a "one trick pony" sort of horn loop, something that would not represent a good value to the average consumer of such, you will find yourself locked in to whatever notes and phrases are available in your loop collection.
Again I have to show my ignorance and ask a newbie level question.
When I see the word "loops", my brain says "A prerecorded sequence that can be chained together into a number of measures. Normally I hear them applied to 4 measures of some drum beat that is used as a bed for other stuff to be layered on." If that is an accurate definition, that brings up a question as to how useful they are. Unless that canned "loop" is the measures of notes in the exact phrasing that I want played, how do these have value? If I need a horn part that I am writing, it is highly unlikely that there is a prerecorded loop somewhere with the horn part I need.
So the question is really "What are loops?", if my previous perception of them is incorrect?
Your perception is correct as to what loops are ... however new releases of BiaB and RB now handle loops with the same engine they use for Realtracks, so they can be pitch shifted, etc, if the correct info is in the file header. Maybe some people want to tinker with this new feature.
Just realize, as mentioned above, they can be quite limited when compared to realtracks (which have more 'intelligence' built in), and can be just as costly if not more so.
I do not work here, but the benefits are still awesome Make your sound your own!
Even at that, my point is more that someone who have had to know when they created the loop what my brain is hearing months or years later to create what I want. See what I am saying?
If I need a line that is
boooomp bomp a bomp bomp bomp booooooomp
someone would have had to know what I needed months or years later in order to create that exact phrase.
I just plug in my EPS16+ and play the "pop horns" sample and play my phrases in. Once they are in waveforms, I can cut and paste it as needed. So in essence, I guess I AM looping. And since every song is different, there's not even a reason to keep a library of phrases.
As someone who grew up on AWB, TOP and EW&F, horns are A-OK with me!!!
Quote: As someone who grew up on AWB, TOP and EW&F, horns are A-OK with me!!!
I agree with Eddie. If you listen to the music from these guys, the brass has so much variety that it would preclude the use of pre-programmed loops. Better by far to play it in from the keyboard using some decent samples.
Quote: Even at that, my point is more that someone who have had to know when they created the loop what my brain is hearing months or years later to create what I want. See what I am saying?
If I need a line that is
boooomp bomp a bomp bomp bomp booooooomp
someone would have had to know what I needed months or years later in order to create that exact phrase.
I just plug in my EPS16+ and play the "pop horns" sample and play my phrases in. Once they are in waveforms, I can cut and paste it as needed. So in essence, I guess I AM looping. And since every song is different, there's not even a reason to keep a library of phrases.
As someone who grew up on AWB, TOP and EW&F, horns are A-OK with me!!!
when you get a library of loops, each instrument has hundreds of commonly used phrases which can be snapped together like musical legos. Each phrase can be individually pitch shifted, so a single note of a certain duration could be every note of that same duration
Loops aren't for everybody. People like you who already have a convenient way to get the sound you want may not choose to use them. But, like real tracks, they differ from MIDI in that they are real instruments played by real musicians. As such, all the natural nuance, tone and variability of the real instrument is inherent in the loop
Quote: Loops aren't for everybody. People like you who already have a convenient way to get the sound you want may not choose to use them.
Very astute comment. Not everybody has a sampler with THAT specific really good horn sample and one step further back, not everybody plays keyboards and sax to know how to play what the line should sound like.
A few of years ago 'Computer Music' magazine included some great horn loops on their free cover CD and I've used them quite a few times. They sound great as they're real (obviously) and even include the odd performance imperfection here and there. The collection included chords (trumpet, trombone, sax) in all keys as well as individual 'toots' in soft, medium and hard blows. Like all loops you can manipulate keys, if necessary, in your DAW, Sonar in my case.
As they were issued free I'm happy to send a CD copy of them to any of my friends here; just PM me.
I have been looking into the idea of loops and people have pointed me to Garritan, but as I just bought BIAB I don't want to spring for something I may not know how to use. My interest is as a trumpet player to create backing MP3's that I can use as a soloist at gigs, but my favourite style is Big Band and the "brass hits" in BIAB sound awful.
That was a long way to say, yes, if you could send me the free loops that you have I would welcome them. I presume you will need my email address - it is DocGrovesTpt@gmail.com
By the way, I live in the USA but I come over and visit my Mum in Warwickshire every year - so like the area quite a lot. Many thanks, blessings, Michael
I've had success with using loops in the past, and picked up Brass Elements and Phantom Horns a while back. They're grouped "James Brown", "Tower of Power", "Earth, Wind and Fire", "Reggae" and "Rock and Roll." Riffs are labeled along the lines of "R9B160EB" to indicate the tempo (160BPM) key (B Major) and style (Rock). Each is a small phrase that can be linked to other phrases. The assumption is that you'll be editing and transposing them in your DAW.
Most of the riffs in these collections are short little stabs, and there's not a lot of variety available. But for their purpose, they're a lot better than anything that I could come up with.
There are also segments to build solos from. There's not a huge variety to in the collections, but what's there can be used to really "sell" the part.
But... I haven't really had any call for using them... yet.
You might want to check out Greg Adam's Big Band Brass - it's the only "Big Band" set of loops that I've found, and it sound pretty good promising.
I put together a demo using the JB_BRASS_JB style. The drums are RealTracks, and the bass is MIDI. The loops from Zero G's Phantom Horns loops in the style of James Brown. I edited in Reaper and added reverb and some effects:
There are up to three loop tracks, mostly to stack up chord tones. It's not a great demo, but I think representative of the sound you can get using loops.
Michael you will be amazed at what can be done with these programs. The thing to understand is they are simply tools. Pretty much everybody has an idea of what a van full of carpenters tools does but unless you're a journeyman carpenter with 20 years experience it doesn't mean you can buy that van full of tools and the next day go out and build yourself a house.
Same thing here with all these digital music programs. The more you learn how to use them the better the end result will be. It doesn't happen by itself. Buying Biab is like buying that van with ONE good tool in it, there's still other very useful and compatible tools you need to get plus put in the time to learn how to use them. Then you can start getting the pro level results you want.
Like everything else in life that you consider valuable you can't pick it up in a day or two. If Biab was so simple that you could learn it in a week, what's the point? Two weeks later you're bored and looking for something else.
Biab is incredibly deep if you're willing to dig. If all you do is pick a style, put in the chords and hit play well, you're taking about 95% of it's capabilities off the table. Style>Chords>Play is just to get you started. You can write your own styles, you can use the harmonizer to create horn sections, you can edit individual parts and then freeze the tracks so you don't lose it later, you can plug in audio loops to mix with other tracks, use different VST plugins and there's so much more I won't even go into here. If you run out of tracks, you can move the whole project into Real Band and continue there. RB adds a whole new and higher level of edit, plugin and mixing functions.
There's four year degrees in audio production and they all include software integration in a studio environment. Biab is in more studios than a lot of them are willing to admit.
Most of us are like you, experienced musicians who want to have some fun in a home studio and maybe use some of it on a gig. Think about how long it took you to get proficient on your horn and that's about how long it will take you to get proficient at digital audio work. This is what makes this such a worthwhile hobby, you're always learning new stuff and as soon as you do the wizards at PG come up with a new version that does all sorts of cool things. Just take it one step at a time, it will come.
Use of Loops still locks you in to whatever lines were played when the loops were made.
Sometimes it can come up with something that works, more or less, but we are not able to actually write or otherwise simply define the notes being played or how they are played.
In other words, "no custom stuff".
Still, the Loops may be preferred simply because they are not MIDI horns.
In my experience, the Live Performer using backing program or backing tracks, may be trying to have too much in the backing when dealing with this issue.
A Strong Performance can easily do more to create the feel, intensity and dramatics of a tune without resorting to trying to mimic every single instrument and part on the original recording track.
Audience won't even notice that there are no horns at all when the Strong Performance aspect is at the fore.
This is why I encourage performers to work up the performance of each song accompanied only by the instrument they play, by itself, until they have a Strong Performance.
At that point, adding a simple Bass and Drum part that fits can go further and get better audience response than a backing track that has the entire Studio Orchestra on it.
Eva could have killed 'em with just her voice and guitar. And often did.
Take away her backing band and you've still got Strong Performance.
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