The virtual instruments that I use

Hi everyone!

Today, I want to talk about the virtual instruments I use in my compositions.

First, although it's not an instrument, my sequencer is Protools 9 (not HD). Although I am currently testing the demo of Reaper, I am quite attached to Protools. This version comes with a few virtual instruments that I use quite often.

Now, let's talk about the instruments:

First, for all general sounds, I use Xpand2, included with Protools. It has a lot of sounds. I use it a lot for synth pads or lead synths, some percussions or ethnic (koto, mandolin ...) I can also use it for bass, before recording a real one.

SYNTHS

If I quickly need a lead synth sound, I also use an instrument included with Protools: Vacuum. It has its own personality, with a very high volume, and it can do some really nice bass synth sounds.

For pads, I use the UVI Workstation with the String Machines bank. I discovered UVI this summer, and I'm now using 2 of their sound banks, I find them very usefull.
I use String Machines for these old polyphonic synths sounds. The sound bank is very complete, and editing functionalities are also great. Almost all pads of my upcoming album "Shadows" were made with this instrument.


PIANOS

For pianos, I use two instruments:
Until very recently, I used almost exclusively MiniGrand, included with Protools. Its doesn't really have any particular personality, but is very good. It is simple to use and quick to load.

A few weeks ago, I bought the bank "Grand Piano Collection" from UVI. That is the piano sound that I use since. The sound bank offers 5 pianos, quite uneven. I mostly use the "Acoustic piano," a sampled Steinway, and the "Upright Grand Piano".

All my EP that I released last week uses the "Acoustic Piano" sound.


ORCHESTRA

For all orchestral instruments, including strings, brass, woodwinds, orchestral percussions, I use Eastwest Symphonic Orchestra, Gold version.

It is this instrument that you can hear in all the orchestral musics of "The Visitor from the Future".
I also widely used taikos from this instrument.

PERCUSSIONS / DRUMS

This is surely where I use most of different instruments.
First, as previously stated, I love the taikos of Symphonic Orchestra and the bass drums.
For the 4th Season of "The Visitor from the Future," and some musics for "Frenchball", I used Stormdrum 3, from Eastwest, mainly for large percussions (such as those that can be heard in the teaser of the 4th season). I also used some small gongs and originals percussions, like the clocks. I love the sound and the visual interface of this instrument.

For electronic drums, I use two instruments:
Boom, included in Protools, allows me to quickly have sounds from old drum machines. It is easy to use and sounds good. I used it a lot each time I needed that kind of sounds (like in the track "Here We Go" from the 1st Season of VftF, "Dancing Future", the famous music of the ball in the 4th season...)

I also use Geist, from Fxpansion. It comes with a library of interesting sounds rather hip-hop and electro. I have not much used it as a drum machine, but I often use it as a sampler.

For acoustic drums, I use Superior Drummer 2.
I have all the sound banks. I mostly use the "Allaire" or "Avatar" banks, but on my album "Shadows", I exclusively use the "Music City" bank. The sound and dynamics are great, the settings are complete, there is everything you need to make great sounding drums!


So long for the virtual instruments, in a future article, I will tell you about the real instruments that I use!

Clara Neville - Keyboard programing in details

Hi !
Today, I'm going to show you all the sounds and I have for the songs of Clara Neville.
You'll have all my tips!

I split this into eight small videos. These videos are in french, I think you can understand it as it's really about sounds layering, but if you really need some subtitles, I will do some, just tell me.

The first one is about my gear: all I have on stage, and how it's plugged. It's technical, and there is no music in it, just description.

Here comes the second song, "A bout portant". I made some audio extracts in the article about keyboard programming, you can now see how I play it and how I'm using my delay pedal.

Next, a simple setup on another song, with just two sounds: piano and strings.

One other song in which I explain how to layer short sounds (rhodes piano) and long sounds (strings), and how to have a "full" harpsichord sound.

The next song, "Dans mes larmes" is about a lot of strings and pad layers, and a massive use of the delay pedal.

In the song called "Serre-moi", I speak about RIFF, one of the kurzweil PC3 functions which allows to play a full song or just an extract by simply playing one key ! Here, I use it to play a single chord.

Another example on another song, but this time, it's a 4 bars strings RIFF, and an other way to launch and stop it.

The use of a sampler, here an iphone with the impc app, to launch samples live.

I hope you liked it ! See you next week.

A making of a concert - Episode 3: keyboards programming

Hi everyone !
This post follows the previous one about choosing gear.
I finally know which gear I'll use. I chose to use only one keyboard, my Kurzweil PC3.

Now is the time to program the keyboard, but what does that mean ?

In music, programming is used for several things:
- Programming could be the process of creating or editing a sound
- Programming could be the process to create a sequence of sounds (that is widely used on drum programming)
- Programming could be the process of setting up the hardware for live. It includes many things, including sounds changes, sequences, effects parameters ...
This post is about this last programming process. This summer, I will do a little series of mini tutorials about synthesis, in which I will tell you how to make a sound from scratch.

Multis , splits and layers
These are complicated words which require explanations, since they are the basics of programming.
A keyboard has several modes of operation:
- We are talking about single or sound mode when using a single sound (a piano, for example).
- When it comes to use multiple sounds, we talk about multi mode, and of course, it is possible to use sounds together or each one on a portion of the keyboard.
- The word layer is used when multiple tones are played together at the same time, on the same zones of the keyboard.
- If a part of the keyboard uses one sound, and another one uses another sound, we say that the keyboard is splited into several zones.
Obviously, it is possible to combine several splits and layers.

Action!
I am now going to explain a "multi" programming with a concrete example for the concert of Clara Neville.
Let's see the programming I made for the song "Je t'aime à bout portant"
On this song, I need a Wurlitzer electric piano sound, a Rhodes electric piano sound, and some strings. Wurlitzer and Rhodes play on the verses, but not at the same time .
Rhodes and strings play on the chorus.
- As the Wurlitzer only plays on the verses, alone, it will have its own zone, my keyboard is now splited into two zones
- The Rhodes and strings layers will be on another zone.

The four sounds that I use, with their respective zones.

But it's not finished yet. To make some evolutions during the song, specially during the choruses, I chose to add another sound, some synthetic strings (the "buzzy strings").

So here are the sounds:



Everything is under control !
On the Rhodes track, you can hear tremolo and distortion effects. They are all controlled live . A modulation wheel allows me to control the tremolo depth, and a fader allows me to manage distortion. These are the same controls for the Wurlitzer sound.
I also use other faders to handle the volume of each part.

The PC3's 9 faders, 2 modulation wheels, and the delay pedal.

In addition to that, I chose to add a delay effect (in this case, my Eventide TimeFactor pedal) . It also can be controlled. I control two parameters: the effect ON/OFF, and the mix setting, a mix between the normal sound and the repetitions (I control this via a pedal).
So here are the results on a chorus with in order:
Rhodes, then I add the strings layer, the synthetic strings layer, then I turn the delay on, and I raise the mix level, then I gradually go back to the Rhodes sound. It's not very fine, but you have an idea !



The same kind of job is done for every songs. The next step is to check that everything is fine in rehearsals...