Many of us have begun using Synth-V Vocal Synthesizer in productions. I outlined below my workflow for anyone using Synth-V. I hope you find this helpful. NOTE: This is not the only way to use Synth-V but its the way I found to be most effective.
1 - Most of my songs begin on my old nylon guitar or piano, just kicking around chords, or a title theme. 2 - I then use BIAB to flesh out the style, arrangement, and create backing tracks. 3 - I export the BIAB backing with minimal instruments (usually just Bass, Keys, Rhythm Guitar, Drums) flat, center as a WAV files. 4 - I import that WAV file into Synth-V Studio Pro 5 - I play midi notes for the melody in Synth-V Studio Pro ... I select a vocalist ... and then type in the lyrics. 6 - ** NOTE: I usually use different vocal tracks for the VERSES and the CHORUS and MIDDLE 8 ... I found this to work best so you can give each part its own parameters. Verses might be soft and airy, Chorus might be Powerful and Strong. 7 - ** NOTE: The reason I dont use Synth-V as a DAW plug-in is because of redraw speeds. As a stand alone app redraw is very fast. 8 - This is most important: I see if the Vocalist works in the KEY for this song. Some vocalists work best in certain Keys, or Range. Some get "squeaky" in their higher register in certain keys. Especially if you have wide interval jumps. So finding the BEST KEY for the vocalist is essential. 9 - I change keys in BIAB and re-export WAV files until I find the KEY most comfortable for the vocalist in SynthV 10 - I transpose the midi notes in SYNTHV to match the new keys. 11 - I then finish inputting the lyrics, and fine tune the parameters and word timing to get a human feel, and best performance from the vocalists ... this takes time, be well worth the effort. 12 - I create a new vocalist track and copy the lyrics, then create harmonies, and other fine tuning until I am happy with the results. 13 - I export the vocal tracks as a wav (24bit) flat, centered, mono ================================= 14 - I open my DAW (I use Cubase or Reason) and import the BIAB tracks, and vocalist tracks. 15 - I mix, add effects, eq, etc and if needed I play additional instruments either live, or from BIAB or live or midi. 16 - THE SONG IS BORN
I know this sounds like a lot of work, and it is ... however, I found this method speeds up production, and creates good records.
Let me know if you do anything different, or have any questions.
I do almost exactly the same as you with just a couple of exceptions.
I've been using Groups to keep identical sections together (for example a chorus). Then, when I make a change in any member of that group, it's updated throughout all instances of the group. Groups also allow me to change tone and most other performance characteristics, too, and they are isolated to that group. I must say, though, I like you idea of having individual sections in their own Synth V file.
Like you, I much prefer using the stand-alone version of Synth V for working with. Once I get the vocals sounding as good as possible in the stand-alone version, I then open the file as a VST plugin so that I can make minor changes on the run.
Lastly, I use volume envelopes in my DAW to shape the Synth V vocals so that they reflect how I would sing the vocal line. This is important because prepositions and conjunctions are usually significantly quieter than verbs and nouns, and Synth V doesn't always get the volume relationship between syllables as accurate as it should be. These are tips that I picked up from Pat Pattison when I studied prosody with him, and matching syllabic strength with appropriate locations within the bar.
The attached image shows how I've volume-shaped the phrase "A friendly shimmering sun" for Natalie in Reaper. This is from the song "Every Single Day" (the link is below).
1. I put together backing tracks in BiaB, 2. Export a single track to SynthV 3. Develop the melody and lyrics in SynthV 4. Export the vocals to my DAW 5. Export the BiaB tracks to my DAW
SynthV doesn't always play nice with DAWs, and I can export the vocal and aspiration tracks as separate tracks.
Once the vocals are done, I'll generally keep SynthV running when I'm working the DAW. That way, if I want to make a quick change to the vocal, I don't have to wait for the entire vocal to regenerate. I just Alt+Tab over to SynthV, make the changes, export, and Alt+Tab back to the DAW. The DAW sees the vocal track is modified, and automatically loads the new files.
When I'm in the DAW, I'll open up BiaB when I want to generate additional backing tracks, and export them into my DAW. But the load times are generally small, and I only need BiaB when I'm exploring additional or alternate instruments.
Breaking it down like this also it keeps me focused on one task at a time with the best tool for the task:
1. BiaB for backing tracks; 2. SynthV for developing vocalsl 3. DAW for mixing and arranging
So is it possible to record midi straight in to SV and use any sort of punch feature? I can record but I didn't see or find the punch function to fix the bigger mistakes....
You can find my music at: www.herbhartley.com Add nothing that adds nothing to the music. You can make excuses or you can make progress but not both.
The magic you are looking for is in the work you are avoiding.
Not a user of this tech … but curious. Wouldn’t an fx like Waves Vocal Rider eliminate or reduce the amount of manual volume lane shaping? I use the Bass Rider on every production and the Vocal Rider on occasion. They are cheap, easy to use and effective.
Not a user of this tech … but curious. Wouldn’t an fx like Waves Vocal Rider eliminate or reduce the amount of manual volume lane shaping?
Yeah, but Noel is going for the opposite effect. Instead of going for a uniform volume, he's bringing up the volume on verbs and nouns, and down on prepositions and conjunctions.
He could do this within SynthV as well. I just assume it's easier (and less CPU intensive) to ride the faders in his DAW.
Not a user of this tech … but curious. Wouldn’t an fx like Waves Vocal Rider eliminate or reduce the amount of manual volume lane shaping?
Yeah, but Noel is going for the opposite effect. Instead of going for a uniform volume, he's bringing up the volume on verbs and nouns, and down on prepositions and conjunctions.
He could do this within SynthV as well. I just assume it's easier (and less CPU intensive) to ride the faders in his DAW.
I've found that once I started really listening hard to English, things like connecting words (prepositions, conjunctions) and most pronouns are softer than the words that contain the meaning or the additional information about meaning (nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs). This turns out to be useful information when aiming to increase the realism of the vocaloids.
Pat Pattison first drew my attention to the relative intensities of syllabic stresses because they are very important for aligning syllabic flow with the rhythmical flow of a melody. He covers this in his books if anyone wishes to know more about it.
Also, I think it pays to know about the two broad categories of spoken language. These are (1) Stress-timed and (2) Syllable-timed.
In stress-timed languages, the syllabic flow varies between long and short syllables due to the stressed and un-stressed syllables. In syllable-timed languages, the syllabic flow is pretty much constant and all syllables are held for similar lengths of time.
From an English perspective, what this means when working vocaloids is that the stressed syllables are most often better placed on longer notes than unstressed syllables. This information helps with getting the correct timing for the flow of language when it comes to working with vocaloids. Lastly, stressed syllables always work better when placed on a rhythmically stronger beat whereas unstressed syallables work best on the weak beats.
Stressed syllables are also usually slightly higher in pitch than the neighbouring unstressed syllables and this information is often useful when it comes to shaping a melody. It's not a requirement for melodies, though, that the stressed syllables need to be on melodically higher pitched notes.
To hear the difference between stress-timing and syllable-timing, the below two videos are the same song in English and Spanish. The Spanish clip also has conversational language at the start and it's easy to hear the flow of syllable-timing as the Spanish is spoken.
Unbreak My Heart (English)
Unbreak My Heart (Spanish, some conversational Spanish at the start)
Not a user of this tech … but curious. Wouldn’t an fx like Waves Vocal Rider eliminate or reduce the amount of manual volume lane shaping?
, but Noel is going for the opposite effect. Instead of going for a uniform volume, he's bringing up the volume on verbs and nouns, and down on prepositions and conjunctions.
He could do this within SynthV as well. I just assume it's easier (and less CPU intensive) to ride the faders in his DAW.
Thanks for the clarification. While now understanding what the objective is I will mention that the vocal rider is not to create a uniform volume but rather to increase gain on lower parts and/or decrease louder parts - but to levels you control. And it uses no compression. I only use it when I notice that any part of the vocal is a bit lost in the mix. OK there’s my Waves promo 😀 but I do understand the difference now in what y’all are doing.
I've been learning to use Synthesizer V, and really like its flexibility. I prefer to use it as a DAW plugin (in Studio One) because I can put effects (reverb, compression, EQ, etc) on the voice as I'm writing and programming, which sounds better, and in the DAW plugin you can assign different voices to separate channels for balance, mixing and effects individually for each voice, which is great for harmony vocals or choir.
I don't find it any slower in the DAW to the standalone, but I think this might be because it is well integrated with Studio One (used in their official demos.) When it adds ARA integration (announced to be coming soon) the DAW plugin will make the workflow even better.
The only thing I dislike about a lot of Synthesizer V tracks is when people quantize the vocal too perfect (which no real singer can, or would, do) and there are not enough slides, scoops and melisma (which every singer does accord to the style.) Fortunately, Synthesizer V can easily do this if you take the time.
I just bought Hayden, and his voice is quite useful for styles that don't suit Kevin or Asterian.
Well - Hayden and you - creator ThomasS are perfect ! Don Henley's voice sounds in my ears (the first time I heard this beautiful song was performed by Linda Ronstadt, where they performed with it Don Henley and Glenn Frey - the authors of the song ). I would be interested in how Desperádo created in Synthesizer V would sound in her performance (performed by Linda Ronstadt) and who to choose for the AI vocals. I would probably use Solaria, which I have, and also because I'm not very good with Mai yet. But I wouldn't dare to sing Linda Ronstadt in public, I'm not that good with the Synthesizer. Therefore, with the Synthesizer, I only make my work publicly at an amateur level, and so another handicap of mine arises, that I cannot imagine well enough how my song would be sung by a really good singer. This actually gives me an advantage over the listener, who has no comparison and will accept my imperfect form of processing, not only in imperfect Czech (my friends who speak Czech scold me for this), but my work with the Synthesizer can be improved by hypothetically be improved by someone more experienced and patient in working with Synthesizer V. Which is to say, it could be any of you... However, I enjoy my work in my advancing age... Sorry for the English translated by Google from Czech language.
Last edited by Gause Zdenek; 10/28/2304:11 PM.
BIAB 2023,RB 2023,PTA 2023,Windows 11,Studio One PRO 5.52,Melodyne Studio 5.3.1,Sibelius 8.4.1,Acoustica 7.4.14,Notion 6,Progression 3,Harmony Assistant 9.9.5c,RX9,Ripx DeepAudio 6.4.0,Kontakt 6.8.0,DeCoda 1.3.0,Synthesizer V Studio Pro 1.90 a další.
Hayden is a real pleasure to program. His flat smooth tone and only slight vibrato makes him suitable for 50's jazz, kind of like Chet Baker. Here he is on an old standard:
For people who don't read music and don't know how to notate their vocal line, this might help.
SYNTHESIZER V uses a single-note MIDI melody to generate vocals. Anyone who has a recorded vocal (no backing) can use either BIAB or REALBAND to obtain a MIDI interpretation of that vocal. This could then be used in Synth V. I dare say that it won't be perfect but it will certainly give you a good head start that can be tweaked to get the vocal line that you want.
In BIAB it's called "Audio Transcribe" and it's found under "Audio" on the main men. It's also possible to use the "Transcribe" option found in Audio Edit in the "Edit" menu.
In REALBAND, it is done using "Generate | Generate Intelligent Audio Harmony" then selecting "Transcribe Audio to MIDI".
I have tried creating MIDI from a monophonic WAV in both Realband and BIAB and it worked fine.
I prefer to use it as a DAW plugin (in Studio One) because I can put effects (reverb, compression, EQ, etc) on the voice as I'm writing and programming, which sounds better, and in the DAW plugin you can assign different voices to separate channels for balance, mixing and effects individually for each voice, which is great for harmony vocals or choir.
Same here, but I think you need a halfway decent computer to have a fast workflow.
Originally Posted by ThomasS
I just bought Hayden, and his voice is quite useful for styles that don't suit Kevin or Asterian.
1) Start Realband and click on the Tracks View. It's on the top row of icons and to the right of 'Copy' and 'Cut'.
2) Open a MGU file that contains MIDI melody on the Melody track.
3) RB will automatically generate the backing tracks. It's a little slower than BIAB because the tracks are generated fully before playback begins.
4) Stop the automatic playback once it starts. The Stop button is on the bottom left of the screen with the other transport buttons.
5) Click on the Melody track. Press CTRL+A to select it all.
6) Under the Generate menu at the top of the window, select "Generate MIDI harmony". Select a harmony... I usually use #50 (3 parts... 1 x unison, 1 x above, 1 x below)
7) When the option window appears, select "Put harmonies onto multiple new tracks".
8) To save each of the generated MIDI harmony tracks to a file...
Click on the track.
Press CTRL+A to select the whole track.
Right click on the selected track and right at the bottom of the menu that appears, select "Track" and then "Save track to file".
For the file type, select "MIDI" and give the file a name.
I was sleeping very soundly in the dirt here until I heard the video above and I rolled over. Come on!!
I politely request that someone remove this Moonlight video immediately.
Although I am indeed outraged, I am not wishing the video would had played longer. I am wishing that you would have not introduced this ridiculous pop melody to my masterpiece in the first place.
While I was here, I listened to a few other things.
What the hell have you Anglo Saxons been doing for the past three hundred years?????
Please erase all of this so I can go back to sleep.
Danke.
David Snyder Songwriter/Renaissance Man Studio + Fingers
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