Pss sorry terrible speller dont chastise me too much this i know that it's not good an academic and all not being able to spell and i do like to rant .

I can say this with some authority being a masters student.

Well, there you have it, then. We expect you to come back and answer all the rest of our questions after you've received your degree, doctor.

dr.hash


Ok guys good talk about this subject.  A couple of things this is not a small pissy subject that i am doing this is my major project and i am trying to see if it is possible to put together a track like strawberry fields together in a daw.  That is with things like slowed down voice and various other tricks im even going so far as to purchase a uad laptop cad to see if the fairchild limiter will add anything.  and by the way rings beat kit contained in session drummer 3 does indeed sound like his ludwig kit esp after detuning it and useing a filter to muffle the sound.  After listening to strawberry fields for the gadzillinith time my cello sounds within reason like the cello.  John lennon once said he hated what george martin had done to his track.  This is an expiriment to see how far a daw has come because as an industry that is studio not live were in some deep ****.  The dimesion pro instrument is amazing i was asking by the way about the expansion pack of orchestrial sounds that you can pick up for 150 bucks and what they were like.  Perhaps the guys at cakewalk would like to donate this expansion pack to me i am after all a very loyal customer.  after 5 years of study and everyday being told that Pro tools is the bomb i would defended sonar to the death Sonar forever protools never.  anyway back to the subject look thanks for your help, the cellos are indeed working and i dont belive that it is necessary to spend a 1000 dollars on a orchestral sample bank but the expansion pack would be suffcient.  what i  have discovered is that it is indeed possible to recreate strawberry fields in a daw sure it doesnt quite sound like the original but it can sound as good if not differnet as the original.  The point being that if you are a producer and a great is a great song the daw has arrived and the studio is indeed dead.  Sonar is the most powerful daw on the market and the most flexible.  I can say this with some authority being a masters student.  I would not even attempt this project on any other product.  if any body can let me know how the orchestral expansion pack sounds for the dim pro this would be apprcieated.  Finally what i am trying to do is not replicate the track as such but make it new and use all the tools avalible to me in a modern daw to try and add a digital flavour.  If we can have tape flavour surley we can have digital flavour.  This is the argument that i am having with my industry at the moment tape is dead and we now have to embrace digital and that means we must understand how to impart and use digital to its fullest just as in 1967 they used tape and the studio to the fullest.  I declare that we are indeed in technological terms back in 1967 with our DAW's and that means the future is bright imagine what we are going to acheive in 6 years with the technology avaliable.  The problem is we must push the technology and we as listeners have to start to listen to digital and instead of saying oh it doesent sound like tape, sure no, but it does sound like digital and WOW did you hear that.  If we can get the punters to start listing to music in that way again once again the future is bright.  Once again for all your help.
 
Peace Love Ben B.CT

--Sorry your Enter key, carriage return, like --PARAGRAPH BREAK is broken.

Randy B.

dr.hash


PS here is a link to a guy who did beethovans 1st all within a DAW.  This is amazing this is the future.  If beethovan or mozart were alive today they to would get rid of all those pesky musicians and go down the virtual route.  Bring on the future Long Live Digital!!! Hoorha Hoorhra Hoora

Ok, this is where we part company. 
 
Having played classical solo double-bass for many years, while a good sample set (the solo double-bass of VSL SE), can do many things quite decently (by using many different bowing articulations), a sample set cannot mimic the sublte nuances that a live player can perform.  While orchestral mock-ups can be quite good, they do not equate to real, live performance.
 
Seriously, long-term, if you are not already doing so, attending orchestra concerts, or even listening to quality CD performances, will help considerably in gaining an understanding of the capabilities of orchestral instruments.

Sorry jim did not mean to offend, did you go to the site and have a listen.  For a pop recording sample cellos the like included with the dimension pro are more than adequate.  Look I'm just saying that the future is here use it.  Really going into a studio and recording can be time consuming. 
The average punter cannot hear the difference only those with the golden ears can.  As a composer my belief is that if we can get it done ourselves then do it.  I like to do my art on the fly and involving a whole orchestra or a bunch of cello players get in the way of that art.  Also they want their opinion heard as well. 
Look all i am saying is that within a given time (and I'm talking 4 or 5 years) period the technology will be good enough to get rid of the orchestra in the studio at least for certain things.  This has to be a good thing.  This is where the technology is taking us and so we have to either get on board all be called luddites.  The recording industry is in disarray our product has been devalued so much that to create a track like strawberry fields it will have to be done the way that i am doing it.  I'm just hoping i can pull this off convincingly. 
Listen to anything that has been today and i cannot hear anything new or great nothing like a strawberry fields.  Why not the technology is there or almost there.  The answer to that is the people that are in the industry today are scared and do not tell the truth. Tape added its own flavour to recordings of thirty years ago and today digital can do the same.  Things like tape saturation and tube saturation, emulators and even sample based instruments can all add something new to our recorded world.  we can manipulate audio like never before yet it seams everything is in 4/4 and everybody's using the same effects eg autotune.  Yet people in the industry still tell us that digital sounds like **** and you need an expensive studio blah blah blah.  Yes you need knowledge but if digital recorders have been around since 1976 you would expect the bugs to be ironed out by now.  what they are not saying is that digital sounds different not better not worse and that is the same for sampled instruments vs the real thing.  we have a new canvas, a new bunch of ingredients use them.  That's all i am saying.  Sorry i am not a doctor yet nor do i have my masters at the end of the year i will and that will be a masters in music technology.  I don't know everything never said that i did, but i know a stuffed pig when i see one and the producers and engineers that i have known over my short career can certainly squeal like a pig.

dr.hash


PS here is a link to a guy who did beethovans 1st all within a DAW.  This is amazing this is the future.  If beethovan or mozart were alive today they to would get rid of all those pesky musicians and go down the virtual route.  Bring on the future Long Live Digital!!! Hoorha Hoorhra Hoora

Ben,
Hi.
Sounds interesting but no link...

OK.  Having recorded in both 100% analog as well as hybrids and 100% digital studios I think I'll weigh in on this even though it's completely off topic.

Ubiquity of the technology that you revere is what is causing the stagnation and lack of creativity in a lot of modern music.  

Your Master's thesis is to determine that a song such as Strawberry Fields can be put together in a DAW?  Of course it can.  There's no question.  Will it sound like the original?  It might given enough tweaking and fiddling.  Does it need to?  Who knows?  I think it is a gross understatement and missing the mark entirely to say that because you can RECREATE a song in a DAW proves that the DAW is all you need to CREATE a good song.  There's a very big distinction between CREATE and RE-CREATE.

A far more interesting question is:  would a song like Strawberry Fields even be written if technology like we have today had been available to the Beatles?  The answer to that is: probably not (in my opinion).  It's entirely academic because there's no real way to test it.  The song has already been written and comparing one song to another is pretty much pointless.

The Beatles were not just John, Paul, George, Ringo, Martin and the multitude of individuals who worked with them (including the orchestra).  It was the sum of those individuals that gave us those recordings.  All of them, working together, to create these songs.  When you work with real musicians in a band or just for hire there is a process of give-and-take.  The musician (who hopefully is accomplished at his/her instrument) will have ideas about things that you probably wouldn't have thought of.  This takes the piece to a new level ... sometimes.

I had 10 years of classical violin lessons as a child (I also play cello, guitar and piano).  However, I do not know everything there is to know about violin (or the other instruments).  It  has given me an advantage when arranging string parts for songs and using string patches (from GPO or any source).  However, when it comes to recording I prefer to use a real person because they will introduce subtle variations to my arrangements that make it come to life.  The song has been re-written from a new and fresh perspective, even if it is just a small change.  It's not always better but usually it is (especially if I have worked with the person before).
I don't care how sophisticated software like Jamstix gets, it will never be the same as talking to a real drummer and working with that drummer on a song.  Although, that has it's own implications.  :)

Mistakes and limitations are also a good part of those Beatles recordings.  Pushing limits is where some of the most creative and interesting things happens.  When you remove those limitations artists tend to stagnate.  Tension among artists can be a good thing too.  I love working in a band, although I do a lot of my writing at my DAW by myself.  When I take those songs to a group of people and they learn parts and bring their own perspective those songs usually become infinitely better.  It's cliché but it really is like watching your children grow up.

Now, having said that, I will say that there are many, many artists out there producing excellent music all by themselves on a DAW that is not always 4/4 and autotuned to hell (and even some good songs that are 4/4 and autotuned to hell).  I have listened to lots of stuff that blows me away that was produced in Sonar (or similar) without a $1000 sample pack. 

TLDR:  I don't agree that just because a song can be recreated in a DAW means that the song could have been written in a DAW.


Caveat:  I don't have a Master's degree.  However, I do work at a small private college at which I am surrounded by people with PhD's in various fields, including music.  The one thing I've learned after my decade here is that there are generally two kinds of people with higher academic degrees:  those that know the degree is essentially worthless, that they themselves are full of sh*t and then there are those that think they can do no wrong.

A simple solution that I have used in the past on a very limted budget is to take your midi and split it into 2 tracks (normally alternate notes) and use a different cello sample on one track (upstroke) from the other (downstroke)....a bit of tweaking can make it quite effective.
 
Take it 1 step further and split the midis up into long bows and short bows to further add realism.

Surprised there is no mention of Miroslav Philharmonik Orchestra & Choir Workstation , probably the best synth for strings, orchestra, and choir. It is very affordable now as well