I would suggest Native Instruments Session Horns for $99 or Session Horns Pro for $299, but you need the full Kontakt at $99 to use it. If you can afford it, however, for $599, you can get Native Instruments Komplete 11, which includes Session Horns plus a whole bunch of other good stuff. Session Horns Pro, however, only comes bundled with Komplete 11 Ultimate, which would push you over $1000.
Session Horns has a smart voice split, so if you play a chord, it will split the sounds between up to four different instruments (for example, two trumpets, a tenor sax, and a trombone), and it can even drop the octave of the bottom instrument.
If you want to hear and see how it works, there is a great video tutorial on Groove3 (which is not free, but not expensive) where Eli Krantzberg does a great job of demonstrating how it works and you get to hear the results.
Others may have better suggestions for brass libraries, but I've been pretty happy with the sounds from Session Horns (I have the Pro version, well actually both, since I started with the basic version and then upgraded to Pro).
Additionally, once you have the full Kontakt player, there are a number of free and low cost orchestral instrument libraries out there that sound pretty good.
John
Laptop-HP Omen I7 Win11Pro 32GB 8TB SSD Desktop-ASUS-I7 Win10Pro 32GB 11TB SATA
Kontakt is a VSTi. You would assign a track to the Kontakt VSTi. Then when the interface opens, you would select the Session Horns instrument. Make sure to match the channel from the track to the channel in the Kontakt interface. Then the MIDI data gets sent to Session Horns and you hear the output. Session Horns has a lot of tweaks you can make. I generally then save those settings in the Kontakt Player (although in theory they should be saved when you save the song). I usually just go ahead and render the track to audio once I have it the way I want it, at which point I don't incur the overhead of using the VSTi with a fairly large sound library.
John
Laptop-HP Omen I7 Win11Pro 32GB 8TB SSD Desktop-ASUS-I7 Win10Pro 32GB 11TB SATA
Also, I just looked and see there is a new video tutorial on Groove3 called "Creating Realistic MIDI Horns". I haven't seen it yet (but plan to), but it might be something to check out.
John
Laptop-HP Omen I7 Win11Pro 32GB 8TB SSD Desktop-ASUS-I7 Win10Pro 32GB 11TB SATA
Wow - just went to Groove3 where there was one tutorial that was free - "stacking instruments". I'm starting to feel like I will need a post doc degree in engineering to even begin to understand all that is out there! Bernie
Since I plan to do a lot of Chicago tunes, I think I'm going to invest the $200 for Kontakt. I have been reading lots of tutorials lately. As I understand it, a VSTi (plug in) is something that modifies a track, with effects or different instruments, is that correct? Thanks! Bernie
Since I plan to do a lot of Chicago tunes, I think I'm going to invest the $200 for Kontakt. I have been reading lots of tutorials lately. As I understand it, a VSTi (plug in) is something that modifies a track, with effects or different instruments, is that correct? Thanks! Bernie
1. If you find Kontakt for $200 you may want to post that sale link for others! (it's usually $299 unless on sale, or crossgrade from various products for $249 - go to Native Instruments site for that info) and the Kontakt horns (that John mentioned above) Session Horns is $99 and the Session Horns Pro is $299 (or upgrade from Session Horns for $199) again unless on sale. So it will be a bit more than $200 to get both Kontakt and one of its horns packages.
BTW until Jan 4 you can get a $25 eVoucher off on anything there.
Don't initially get "target fixated" on amassing plug-ins or Kontakt, Kontakt is not the ONLY game in town. However, Kontakt, at some point, will probably wind up in your tool box so not a bad way to start if you have the scratch.
No matter what go ahead and get the FREE Kontakt player - ditto the free Sampletank 3 Custom shop at IK multimedia (and check eSoundz for sales on Sampletank and MAKE sure you check these two PG forum links (the first one has another link that is little dated, in that only one of the free soundfont players mentioned can still be found, the SForzando player, but good stuff anyway)
a. instruments: piano, guitar, drum kit, four piece jazz band, or entire orchestra AND
b. effects: delays, compressors, reverbs, eq's, etc.)
3. And these plug-ins can come in multiple "types" (code specifications) I will only list TWO here, the two that BIAB, RB and PTPA can use:
a. Virtual Studio Technology (aka VST)
b. Microsoft Direct X (aka DX)
They call a Virtual Studio Technology "instrument" (see #2a above) a "VSTi" (i=instrument) and effects only plug-ins (usually only effects) "VST"
DITTO Direct X forms - ALL DX instruments (see 2b above) are called "DXi" (i=instrument) and all FX only, usually "DX"
As to "modifying a track" with these plug-ins (I like to think of it as sending the track data to the plug-in - not the other way around).
If you have a MIDI only track (MIDI only data: note on, note off, note number, note velocity, MIDI channel, et./c) you would send that to a VSTi or DXi (instrument) to generate some kind of sound.
If you had a Audio only track (actual sound) you could send that to a VST or DX to add eq., delay , compression, etc.
That's the SIMPLE version.
Larry
Last edited by Larry Kehl; 12/30/1609:35 AM. Reason: soem typos and clarifications and my usual dylstic typing
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Can I use the free Kontakt player with purchased session horns in Power Tracks or do I need something else? Thanks - Bernie
The answer depends on the purchased Session Horns requirements. Typically the instrument patch advertising will include a minimum Kontakt statement. The statement may read something like "This requires the full Kontakt player", "Kontakt 4.2 or higher is required", or "This works with either the free or full version of Kontakt".
Since I plan to do a lot of Chicago tunes, I think I'm going to invest the $200 for Kontakt. I have been reading lots of tutorials lately. As I understand it, a VSTi (plug in) is something that modifies a track, with effects or different instruments, is that correct? Thanks! Bernie
1. If you find Kontakt for $200 you may want to post that sale link for others! (it's usually $299 unless on sale, or crossgrade from various products for $249 - go to Native Instruments site for that info) and the Kontakt horns (that John mentioned above) Session Horns is $99 and the Session Horns Pro is $299 (or upgrade from Session Horns for $199) again unless on sale. So it will be a bit more than $200 to get both Kontakt and one of its horns packages.
BTW until Jan 4 you can get a $25 eVoucher off on anything there.
Don't initially get "target fixated" on amassing plug-ins or Kontakt, Kontakt is not the ONLY game in town. However, Kontakt, at some point, will probably wind up in your tool box so not a bad way to start if you have the scratch.
No matter what go ahead and get the FREE Kontakt player - ditto the free Sampletank 3 Custom shop at IK multimedia (and check eSoundz for sales on Sampletank and MAKE sure you check these two PG forum links (the first one has another link that is little dated, in that only one of the free soundfont players mentioned can still be found, the SForzando player, but good stuff anyway)
a. instruments: piano, guitar, drum kit, four piece jazz band, or entire orchestra AND
b. effects: delays, compressors, reverbs, eq's, etc.)
3. And these plug-ins can come in multiple "types" (code specifications) I will only list TWO here, the two that BIAB, RB and PTPA can use:
a. Virtual Studio Technology (aka VST)
b. Microsoft Direct X (aka DX)
They call a Virtual Studio Technology "instrument" (see #2a above) a "VSTi" (i=instrument) and effects only plug-ins (usually only effects) "VST"
DITTO Direct X forms - ALL DX instruments (see 2b above) are called "DXi" (i=instrument) and all FX only, usually "DX"
As to "modifying a track" with these plug-ins (I like to think of it as sending the track data to the plug-in - not the other way around).
If you have a MIDI only track (MIDI only data: note on, note off, note number, note velocity, MIDI channel, et./c) you would send that to a VSTi or DXi (instrument) to generate some kind of sound.
If you had a Audio only track (actual sound) you could send that to a VST or DX to add eq., delay , compression, etc.
That's the SIMPLE version.
Larry
Larry, although I already knew this, I found your explanation quite impressive in clarity. It's really a good first step explanation to get folks started.
Hey John - just purchased and installed session horns from Kontakt. All,I can say is wow! Awesome sound! When I open the dialogue box there are 2 choices. One looks like a full horn section, and not sure what the other is. Do you know? Also, this is obviously a very memory intensive app. I have not been able to get through my song without an out of memory error. I have 4 GB installed but just ordered more so I'll have 8GB. Will that be enough? I did purge the samples too. I also plan to convert that track to audio as soon as I can Thanks again - Bernie
Well, after upgrading from 4 MB's to 8 MB's (the max my laptop can hold) still getting out of memory errors. Changed the VST in the track I had assigned to Kontakt back to Juno, and still got the errors. I ended up having to uninstall Konkakt 5 player to stop the errors and shutdowns. I guess 8 MB's of memory is not enough. Any suggestions? I did go through ms config and disabled every startup app I could. Thanks- Bernie
Below is an approach to using Kontakt that might work...
Rather than try to play everything at once, first convert the midi track with the Kontakt plugin into an audio file.
To do this...
1. Right click on the track and load select "Specific VSTi/DXi synth for midi track" (#1 on the upper image below). Choose "Kontakt" from the list shown by #2 or add the Kontakt plugin if it's not on the list.
Note: do not use the FX button to load the synth intitially. This can be used to access the synth once it's been loaded as described by the above dot-point.
2. Set the track's midi channel if required.
3. Press CTRL+A to select the entire track.
4. Right-click on the track and select the "Auto convert" midi to audio option shown as #1 on the lower image below.
5. Enter the destination track (#2 on the lower image). (Depending on your computer's processing power, it may take 30 seconds or so to generate the audio.)
Doing the above, should, in theory, assign most of the available computing power to Kontakt and to creating the audio file. The computer is no longer multitasking by trying to work with everything at once. Also, it might be prudent to close other programs when you do this as they will also be drawing on the computer's resources.
Once the audio track is generated, mute the the original midi track that has the Kontakt plugin (or, if need be, remove the Kontakt plugin).
The audio track that's created might need to be boosted in volume using PG Music's Gain Change audio plugin.
Thanks Noel! It turns out I didn't have one of my memory dims pushed all the way in so my system was only seeing half of my upgraded memory. Have not tried Konkakt yet with new memory I'll let you know. Bernie
I guess I will have to render it to audio. I am still getting out of memory errors. I like midi because I can adjust a notes duration, etc. Thanks! Bernie
Yesterday rendered the midi file with Konkakt loaded to an audio track. Many of the notes in chords drop out. Today, I tried to record audio form the midi track with Kontakt onto a different track. The midi track plays while recording, but nothing shows up on the audio track, and the input meter does not move. help appreciated! Bernie
Yesterday rendered the midi file with Konkakt loaded to an audio track. Many of the notes in chords drop out. Today, I tried to record audio form the midi track with Kontakt onto a different track. The midi track plays while recording, but nothing shows up on the audio track, and the input meter does not move. help appreciated! Bernie
Bernie,
It sounds like you need to set your soundcard to record what it's hearing (or equivalent; the actual name of the option depends on the brand of soundcard).
To set the soundcard settings...
1. Right-click on the speaker icon in the task bar.
2. Select "Recording".
3. Follow the 1, 2, 3 on the image below.
Also, when I render to an audio track, the midi file does not play. When I select the options to create an audio (as described above), the process simply renders directly to a track without any sound. I solo'd the track that I converted to audio. I had also saved the file as an SEQ file before rendering. (Did you follow my above instructions exactly as written? I don't know why you hear the midi when rendering and I don't. I'm using PTPA 2017.)
Another thought.... have you tried converting to a wav file rather than an audio track. The wav could then be loaded back in.
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