PG Music Home Forums General Discussion User Showcase Like Cinderella (Eleanor Forte AI)

Like Cinderella

Female:
The night is calling
I hear the wind that whispers through the trees
Somebody's out there
Somebody who's a dreamer just for me

I will appear
Like in some fairy tale
Waiting to be
Swept off my feet

Like Cinderella
But no fairy godmother
And no glass slipper
Well, maybe
Not much like her at all

Every night
I chase the same siren call
Looking forever for that damned ball

Male:
The night is falling
I hear the wind that's calling out to me (Where can he be?)

Guiding me somewhere
Somewhere that I'm supposed to be (How should I know?)
Will she appear like in the fairy tale? (I'm no princess)
Wish I could sweep her off her feet (My aching feet)

Like Cinderella
And I'll be her Prince Charming (My poor feet)
In shining armor
Not really,
I'm not like that at all (I hate these heels)

Every night
I chase the same siren call
I bet I'll never find that ball
I bet I'll never find that ball


Instruments
1569:Bass, Electric, Soul60sA-B Ev 110
1578:Piano, Acoustic, Rhythm Soul60sA-B Ev 110
1572:Guitar, Electric, Rhythm Soul60sHighA-B Ev 110
1575:Guitar, Electric, Rhythm Soul60sLowA-B Ev 110
3773:Guitar, Electric, Background FunkyGroove60sSoulRiff Ev16 095
~425:Organ, B3, Background Blues Sw 120
Soul60sEv^3-a:Snare, HiHat , b:Snare, Bass Drum, Ride

Signal Chain
Master: Lurssen Mastering Console, Finsher Retro (Vinyl History)
Female Vocal: Greg Wells VoiceCentric
Female Alt Vocal: Sunset Sound Studio Reverb (Plate 2)
Male Vocal: Greg Wells VoiceCentric
Male Alt Vocal: Sunset Sound Studio Reverb (Chamber/Studio 2)
Drums: Finisher Retro (Too Old Tube), Vulf Compressor (Old School Crunch)
Bass: RBass Mono
Piano: EZMix (Piano 2)
Rhythm Guitar 1: TrackSpacer, Retro Finisher (Soul Signal Chain), EZ Mix (Bright Spring Reverb)
Rhythm Guitar 2: TrackSpacer, Retro Finisher (Duo Vibe)
Rhythm Guitar 3: TrackSpacer, Retro Finisher (CEO Chorus)
Organ: EZMix (Organ 1)



The Back Story
For those unfamiliar, Eleanor Forte is a synthetic voice for the program Synthesizer V. The "AI" refers to the use of neural networks to generate the vocal. The harmonic resolution isn't as good as their concatenative synthesis method they have for some of the voices, but I think the synthetic vocal is quite good in other respects.

Fortunately, you don't actually have to understand how any of that works to use the software - you just type words in onto the piano roll notes, and it's sung back in the voice you choose.

I'd pre-ordered the Eleanor Forte AI voice when it was announced back in July, and the vendor sent a download link for people who had pre-ordered this week. I haven't done much songwriting lately, so I figured it was time to have a go at it.

The style _SOL60S2 is the backbone of the song, with rewrite of the chords and the addition of two more guitars. The style of the track reminded me a lot of The Eagles, although the song doesn't. I wanted to keep it short, so I kept it to two verses. I really like putting holds in songs, so I added a couple of those, along with a long hold to end the song. BiaB added an ending tag with an organ glissando, so I knew I had to work that in somewhere. (I ended up using it twice).

I've been intending to write something completely frivolous for a while, so I started with the idea of dancing, with the singer comparing herself to Cinderella, only to realize she had nothing in common. That got the first verse written, but having blown my only idea on the first verse, I wasn't sure where to go. I didn't want to extend the song with a third verse, so having the second verse echo the first verse from the male perspective seemed like a good way to solve the problem.

I don't have a male English voice for SynthV, so I pitched the voice down an octave and adjusted a number of parameters. I wasn't thrilled with the results, so I ended up doubling the vocal with a "Lite" version of Eleanor Forte (the non-AI version). I ended up doing that with the female vocal as well.

I had written the melody so that a counter-line could be added, which I did on the second verse.

A bunch of rewrites later, and the vocals were done. Everything went into my DAW, where I removed chunks of instruments so everything didn't happen at once. I also used TrackSpacer to perform ducking on the guitars so the vocals would be more clear.

Normally, I spend a lot of time manually balancing the vocal, but I wanted to get the first version done quickly, so I didn't sweat it that much.

Since I was going for a '70s sort of vibe, I chose a number of low-fi effects from UJAM's Retro Finisher so I could justify having purchased it.

I'm likely to go back and adjust the mix and even the vocals, so as usual, feedback of any sort is appreciated.

I hope you enjoy it!

Hi David ...

Very interesting! I really enjoyed my listen.

There aren't many songs written specifically for duets these days. That was a nice surprise! AI voices have really come a long way the past few years and you seem to have a mastery of them. Ah ... if only I could have such good pitch! I like the song a lot. I particularly like these lines:

Every night
I chase the same siren call
Looking forever for that damned ball

You are very creative! I read the back story. Although I didn't understand everything, I got a sense of how you approached and structured the vocal elements. Ya did good!

Thanks for something new and different that was enjoyable. best to you.

Alan

Hello David
Good Song
I think the singing is very well done
But it seems to be very complicated
I really have no idea about it
didn't know it works so well
maybe this way I will get a good hard rock singer one day ;-))))
Really cool made song
Many greetings
Andi ;-)

Tight, pleasant and very successful at catching the 70s vibe! I can hear Bowie doing this in his hammy, retro way.

When you say Eleanor "arrived", do you mean the vendor had to create something for you? I was looking at Synth V but was frustrated by the difficulty figuring what was available and how to buy it.

My first impression of Eleanor is that she sounds a little congested, as in, has a cold (hopefully not COVID!) I don't know how to translate that into a useful observation, it's just something I kind of feel in my own chest when listening, you probably understand what I mean better than I do. I want to say she needs more "mouth", but I do not understand the levers here.

Hi Dave,

listening to the song without having read the info I was somewaht irritated by the female voice. But then I read that it was artificial - wow, I had nnever heard of Eleanor Forte AI or the like before, simply amazing! After I had read your info I thought that the software must cost a fortune, but on the Taewanese website they sell it for about 110 bucks - well worth considering a purchase.

Whatever: Thanks a lot for your extensive descriptiom.

Ah, yes, the song : Sounds really good to me, and I think it was the perfect choice for your first go at ER AI.

Thanks a lot for everything,

Stefan

I'm glad to hear that!


Well, it was a surprise to me, as well.

On a forum like this where singer/songwriters do all their own work, there are only a couple people who are able to do duets.


Pitch correction software has come a long was, too. There's a lot more effort being made to make it more transparent and subtle, although people generally don't use it that way. It's really tempting to overdo it!

As vocal synthesis improves, people will first think "That's a over-corrected vocal" instead of "That's a robot singing".


Thanks!

I initially edited that line out because of the (mild) profanity, but eventually put it back in, because it's key to her character. That, and it made me laugh.

Thanks for stopping by to comment! I'm glad you enjoyed the song.

Hi, Andi.

Thanks for the kind words!

It's not that complicated, although Emvoice is easier to use. There are a lot of controls in SynthV. Most of them can be ignored, but they're good to have when you need them. Singing isn't that simple!

There's no English male voice for SynthV yet, although I know they're working on it. From the little I've heard, it's more "pop" than "rock". There used to be an option for adding vocal "growl" as well, but that was removed because it was hard to use and didn't sound that great.

I'm looking forward to hearing what they come up with.

Thanks again for stopping and commenting!

Thanks!


Sorry, I've updated my post to (hopefully) better explain it.

Dreamtonics, the developer of SynthV, have a really awful website.

You can download the Basic (free) program from there, as well as the Lite (free) voices. Just change the language to English and scroll to the bottom of the page to find the download links. In super-tiny letters under the big DOWNLOAD buttons for the Basic version of the studio, there's a link titled Download Lite version Voices. Click that to download the voices.

Once you've installed the Basic Studio, you can install a voice by dragging and dropping it onto the Studio. The Eleanor Forte (Lite) voice is the only free native English speaker.

There are a couple Japanese voices that support English, but they've got heavy accents. They're aimed at Japanese speakers who typically only want to be able to sing short English lines in mostly Japanese songs, and don't care too much about pronunciation.

You can also find the same free program and voices on the ANiCUTE website.

If you're interested in buying SynthV, you'll need to do it from the ANiCUTE website. It's a bit confusing because they have multiple copies of the same item for sale, because the listings are in English, Japanese, and Chinese.

The Eleanor Forte AI voice is still in "pre-release", and I don't know when it'll be "officially" released. At that point, the price will go from $88 to $97.


I'm guessing you're referring to the "male" version of the voice, which does a lot of tweaks to the original voice. The position of the formants have been moved down, and in addition to giving the impression of a different sized oral cavity, it's shifted the position of the nasal anti-resonances, which are usually at a fixed position. So that's going to sound pretty unnatural.

I really wish they'd hurry up and release a native English male vocalist.

Thanks for giving this retro song a listen!

Hi, Stefan.

Thanks!

Since your first impression was there was something wrong with the voice, and not to immediately say it was because it was a robot, I'll call that a success.

I think of these as "demos" anyway - I try to do the best I can with them, but as long as the artificial voices don't detract too much from the song, it's all good.

The voice is pitched a bit higher than I'd usually take a female voice, partly because that was the initial key (although it's trivial to change that in BiaB). But it also seemed that a light, higher voice was a better fit for this style of music.


I'd suggest trying out the free Basic version and voices first.

The Pro Studio is currently $89. Eleanor Forte AI is at the pre-order price of US$ 88, and will go up to US$ 97. There's also an Anri AI voice for pre-order, but it appears it can only be purchased with Eleanor or the Pro Studio.

Keep in mind, if you buy only the Pro Studio, you'll still be able to do additional things like use alternate takes of phonemes in the non-AI Lite voices. The AI voices use a different technology, so that's not an option.

There's also a native American English AI voice coming out in January 2022 called SOLARIA, so that'll be cool.

Now they just need an English male voice, so I don't have to keep morphing the female voices into male vocals...


I'm glad to hear that you liked the song!

Thanks for commenting, and good luck with SynthV if you decide to go that route!

No, I meant the female. She sounds... I don't know, she sounds... plump. She sounds to me like an alto singing a soprano part.



Arggh. Now I remember, this kind of cryptic product status was part of what settled me on Emvoice, even after I figured out how to download the free Synth V voices and played with it a bit. The idea of selling "pre-release" software is a contradiction, unless we're talking about black market leaks. I do want Synth V, but I think I'll wait until Synth V decides it's really for sale before investing the time in learning it.

Thanks for all this info.

It's not that they're selling beta software, it's that the software is being sold before it's available - that it, "pre-release" means that you're buying something before it's been released.

It's pretty common in the virtual instrument world to do this, as it gives developers some cash to work with, and typically rewards buyers with a modest discount.

In this case, they're also rewarding early adopters with copies of the software before it's generally available. That's not a big incentive for me, but apparently it's enough of a driver that they've made it a point of there pre-sales campaign.

If that doesn't float your boat, that's fine. I've also purchased the "pre-release" of Anri and SOLARIA, but that's just because I'll get them anyway, and who knows if I'll have the spare cash available when they are released? Plus, I want to support the development of more/better SynthV voicebanks.

Your preference is to pay for things when they're ready, and that's sensible. Plus, you've already got a pair of voices with Emvoice, so you're only only talking about adding yet another synthetic vocalist to your stable of singers.

Fair enough, David, I don't mean to imply anything shady. I guess I was looking for a sign to tell me what singing synth to get, more as a matter of conservation of mental resources than money, and Dreamtonics' confusing offerings made it harder to choose them.

I liked the song and its structure. The lyrics were good, clever in a few spots. The male voice sounded more natural than the female voice to my ears. But the female voice wasn't bad. So you did a great job reworking the female voice to get the male voice!

David

These voices are getting better. As a backing vocalist they would I assume sound very realistic in a mix.

Interesting technology - the song was a pleasant listen.

Peter

I'm happy to hear the song worked for you. Some things are really obvious (like using a mirroring structure) in retrospect, but sometimes it feel like I blindly stumble on solutions. Songwriting can really feel like fitting in a puzzle - especially when it's setting lyrics to a preexisting melody.


Thanks!

I think I pitched the female voice a bit out of a comfortable range. and it's a bit thinner than I'd normally use. On the other hand, there's only a small range of parameters where the "male" voice seems to work.

Hopefully I'll learn how to create a better performance with the female voice in the future.

I appreciate you listening, as well as the feedback!

Hi, Peter.

I'm pretty impressed with this iteration of Eleanor Forte. While there are some demos that sound very "Vocaloid", I've heard a couple that show what the voice is capable of.


I'm glad the song worked as more than just a tech demo.

Thanks for listening!

A quite cool song, deliberately corny lyrics aside, it's hangs together really well and the drum treatment works really well - though the slap kick isn't improved by it.
The voices - well you did a cool job tweaking them to get a great result. That mob should be paying you demo fees.

First, the song... Love it, David. Cool bass! A very clever write, and the perfect vehicle to use the AI voices. You're right, I don't understand it, but it sounds good. Really well constructed production.

well heck i wasnt expecting this.
us vocallists are gonna be redundant...lol.
great job with the backing band too.
I MEAN IT SINCERELY MATE. this must have been a lot of work. also what i like bout it is, it has some lovely
song "hooks" in the arrangement.
ive only got two words BLOWN AWAY.



best to you.
om

It's good to see you got the ladies together again, and a gentleman too this time. Your work is brilliant, not just because you know how to program the Synthesizer V so well, but because the lyrics and music fit the AI gang very naturally. The only thing you are missing with this production is a animated video of the girls (and guy) belting the song out.

Bravo!

Hi, Ray!

Thanks! I'll admit to being lazy with the mixing on the drums. I have a listen to the drum and see if there's anything I can do to improve it.



Thanks, but I'm nowhere modern enough to be a good demo. I'll see if I can get closer to something contemporary in my next song.

I appreciate the feedback.

Thanks!


I wish I could take credit for that, but it's all BiaB. I threw RBass on it to boost it, because it sounded so good.


It's good to hear that it all fit together. When assembling a song, it's sometimes hard to tell if it works or not.

Thanks for the comments!

Next time, I'll put up a big warning sign.


Thanks! There are some really nice '70s RealTracks in BiaB, and I intend to use as many as I can.


I'm glad it worked! Sometimes the problem with BiaB is that there's so much good stuff, it's hard to know what parts to take out of the arrangement.

I was (and still am) a bit worried that the arrangement is a bit overdone.


That's nice of you to say, thanks again!

Yeah, I hadn't expected him to show up, especially since the initial tests with the AI "male" voice wasn't that promising.

But I found out I just couldn't do without him.

I really with the SynthV people would hurry up and release a male English voice. It would make my life that much easier.

Then again, my son has offered to sing lyrics for me, so maybe next time I'll take him up on his offer. The main problem with using "real" singers is that I get obsessive about editing, down to the syllable level.

Plus, having synthetic vocalists means I can made lots of last-minute changes to the lyrics, which is quite handy! I did a lot of tweaks to the vocals even after posting to try and make some bits more intelligible.


Hehehe. At one point, I wanted to be an animator. But I don't have the patience for it, or the drawing skills!

Plus, there's a licensing fee involved if I use the Eleanor Forte image.

But now you've got me thinking about it...


Thanks!

Wow, this is one of the most interesting things I've heard on the forum.
First up, the band sounds great and the production is top notch.
The voice technology is amazing. I can see this progressing very quickly, giving hope to us non-singers.
Your light-hearted and clever song worked a treat.
Thanks also for the detailed production info.
Cheers,
Mike

Hi, Mike.

Wow - I'm flattered. But I think there are certainly some more creative things happening. Your "Time To Say Goodbye" and Mark's "Song My Mother Taught Me", for example.


That's the most important bit, so thanks for that.


Yeah, as I was listening to your "Time To Say Goodbye", I was thinking the same thing.

If you've got a MIDI track of your song, you can send it to me, and I'll see if I can get a vocal track for your song put together. Text me and I'll give you my email address... if you're interested.


Super - thanks!

I really, really enjoy pretty much anything that has themes linked to fairy tales and fables! No matter how the times change, some stories simply continue to persist, and I love seeing how people continue to immortalize these things. Thanks so much for sharing!

Thanks, Ember.

Good to hear you found something to like in it!

Hi David,

Amazing - I didn't know this vocal technology existed.

You have clearly done a great deal of work on this song - well done.

Best Regards
Nigel

Wow, voice technology has certainly come a long way. I get what Mark was saying about the tone of the female vocal. My first thought was it sounded like a a Barry Gibb falsetto which is never a bad thing. That aside the band sounds great and the lyrics are clever without being silly. Clearly a lot of work went into this and resulted in a great listen, Tom

David,

Love that opening. Grabs the ear nicely.

A clever write.
"Every night
I chase the same siren call
Looking forever for that damned ball"
That's strong.

BAND is nice. Good mix.

For my money, the shining star is the melody. Excellent.

The duet aspect is a nice touch, too...

The sound of this is stuck in my head long after listening...

fj

Hi, Nigel.

While it's not quite good enough to be convincing, I think it's at the point where it's useful enough to be able to demo a song without being too much of a distraction.

It's especially useful for doing things like complex harmonies, or reworking lyrics - a good singer will be able to make anything work, but if the lyric is a clunker, you'll know right away when the computer sings it.

And importantly for me, it takes me as a singer out of the equation when writing, which is helpful.


Thanks, I appreciate that.

Hi, Tom.

It apparently is a falsetto register for the voicebank. Yes, that's a thing with women singers, and SynthV recently added support for it.

I'll confess, since the working title of the track was "Discoland", the Bee Gees weren't far from my thoughts - even though the harmony is nothing close to their style.

A lot of Vocaloid songs are in the upper register, so I thought I'd leave it there. In the future, I'll probably pick a more sensible register, since changing keys in BiaB is pretty trivial.


It's good to hear the song worked! Honestly, I think the BiaB style did most of the heavy lifting here, but I'll be happy to take some credit.

Thanks for stopping by to listen and comment!

Hi, floyd jane.

Glad to hear it!


Great to hear, especially from you.


It's good to hear it works. I think I mentioned elsewhere that I tend to overdo my arrangements. This part of the songwriting business is especially a work in progress for me.


I really appreciate that. I'd been working on a song off and on for a couple months, and started it again. The melody was pretty, but not compelling. So I finally dumped it and started this one from scratch, and tried to come up with something more melodically interesting.


That's one of the nice things about having multiple singers - different registers really show off counterpoint nicely, even if (as in this case) it's pretty minimal.

I got a bit silly with the stereo panning in the second verse, but no one's complained yet. Maybe they're just being polite.


Well, that's the gold standard for me for melody. That, and a positive floyd jane review!

Cool song David!!! I really like the concept, and you executed it very well!! Love to hear some real singers on this! Nice work!! Take care. Greg

Thanks, Greg!

My intent was to have a go at some of these songs with actual singers next year.

I'll see how that works out.

David,

It is a wonderful duet song that reminds me of one song of the some musicals.
I think it was difficult to use male and female voices properly with the same character of Synth V.
Also, I think it's difficult to compose a duet song, but you've succeeded in doing so.
Enjoyed my listen a lot.

Best regards.

Shigeki Adachi

This sounds really cool man!!

I'm always curious enough to give a listen when I see these vocal products. I'm usually met with what I'm expecting; and that's a pretty low bar. Not that I dislike it; it's just not...you know, all that good. I enjoy hearing the progress; even if it is slow.

Then you came along, as someone I know from the forums...not some unrealistic demo the company put out...and blew me away. Obviously it's not a perfected science yet; but what you did was damn impressive!

Thanks for the surprise today! Now the bar has been raised. It makes me more curious even for the near future.

You really did a great job my friend!

That was great! What a nifty production.

Loved the tune and harmony and instrumentation. Good work with the AI.

David,

I remain amazed at what you can do with these AI vocals and how well the vocal can flow—technology is a wonder. The write is wonderful, by the way. Tough to write a duet where there is that back and forth; you do an excellent job on this.

In terms of sound, I’m not a fan of the female synth vocal—the tone of it is a bit odd. In contrast, I really like the male vocal on this. You do a killer job in getting them to harmonize.

Impressive work here!

All my best to you,

Deej

Hi, Shigeki.

Thanks - that's what I was aiming for.


The consensus seems to be that this voice works better as a male than a female.

That's a reaction I didn't expect.

I suspect it means I need to spend some more time learning how to make Eleanor sing better.


I appreciate you taking the time to listen and comment!

Thanks, David!

Good the hear from you!

Thanks, but I suspect you give me too much credit for this.


The same as me. Next week they're releasing Anri, and SOLARIA is due to be released in January.

Anri seems a much more pop voice, which might end up forcing me to try writing outside my genre comfort zone. That'll no doubt be... interesting.

But I really with they'd release an English male voice.


I'm glad you enjoyed it - thanks for stopping by!

Glad to hear it!


Thanks! I appreciate the positive feedback!

very cool i was just looking at a similar program Vocaloid

Hi, Deej.

I think we're on the edge singing vocal synthesis becoming fairly standard technology. These days, you can literally find turnkey neural network based spoken vocal synthesis solutions. (It still requires a ton of marked up audio).

Singing synthesis isn't that different, so I expect in the near future it'll be a much more common technology.


Thanks! I appreciate hearing that, although I admit that the back and forth is the easy part, since it's also the most fun.


That seems to be the consensus, so I'll work on it.

As for harmonies... One of the really nice things about synthetic vocalists is that they don't complain when you endlessly rewrite the vocal parts.

Thanks again!

I'd highly recommend SynthesizerV instead of Vocaloid.

In my opinion, Vocaloid has stagnated over the years, while SynthesizerV is pretty much cutting-edge technology.

More importantly, you can use the Basic Studio and Lite voices in SynthesizerV for free. The Basic editor has very few limits, and if you decide you like it, the cost is reasonable.

For example, you can buy the Studio version of the editor and unlock additional features, but stick with the free Lite voices until you feel like making more of an investment.

But - with all things musical - at the end of the day, it's a question of which sounds best, and is sufficiently easy to use.

Thanks for listening!

David, those were the best AI vocals that I have ever heard.

I'm usually not a fan of AI vocals but you are winning me over. Outstanding work!

Two thumbs up.

i just downloaded the lite versions and already amazed-- haven't even figured out the software.

David did you buy the studio pro version of Synthesizer V and get the release version on Eleanor from the AniCute site? or are you using the lite/free versions?

Hopefully I'm not running afoul with forum rules here.

Yes, I used the Eleanor Standard Lite voice for a while along with the Studio Basic version, until I was sure I wanted to actually keep using the software.

I upgraded to the Studio Pro, but at the time, the Eleanor Standard voice was the only English voice. I've now got the Eleanor AI voice even though it's not officially released, because I had pre-ordered it. The Anri voice is scheduled for release on the 12/10.

There are only three dealers who sell SynthV software, and ANiCUTE is currently the only one that has a website with an English language option. They're a legit dealer authorized by Dreamtonics, despite looking a bit shady.

I've got to say - the Dreamtonics website is terrible as far as usability and accessibility.

In contrast, the ANiCUTE website is merely a confusing mess. For example, they display three versions of the exact same product on a page, because one is listed in English, another in Japanese, and another in Chinese. This, despite having the option to choose the displayed language at the top of the page.

David,
you've become a master at this vocal creation.

Nice write, cool to have complete control over your singers

moto

David...that was super cool! The great thing about the AI voices is their pronunciation and diction...these folks are well trained...can you bend their voices to sing like people who want to get to a note but can't? then they could join in with the rest of us...the song is a neat concept and sounds great...as my wife would say, "you are a master manipulator" though contextually probably not the same thing...really enjoyed.

David,

Wow, that's pretty amazing! Excellent song and use of AI voices.

Congrats,
Rec

Firstly the synthetics are getting better and better AND with all the heavy processing on real voices in pop music they may soon meet in the middle.

The counterpoint vocals were great ... nice arrangement.

The excellent melody and humorous lyric were well presented by a really good band. Great drum sound!

Fun!

J&B

Thanks!


Glad you're making an exception for me!

Thanks for listening!

Thanks, Captain!


Heh. That's never the case, even with computer singers.

Thanks for stopping and commenting.

Sure! It's not hard to make then sound terrible if you try.

I'm glad you enjoyed the song!

Thanks, Rec!

Yep - it's a good thing for me they keep lowering the bar!


That's especially nice to hear, coming from you.


I think the drum is a combination of the Vulf Compressor, as well as some careful EQing by my son.

I'm glad you two enjoyed it!

Wow David,
This really is something special.
The vocals sound so well, music is very good.
And those lyrics, (I hate these heels :D) so funny.
Really enjoyed this one!

Rob and Anne-Marie