The story
I missed the deadline for the ’29 Bagpipes’ competition, but here’s what I produced from those 51.1 seconds of audio: 4 pairs of looped stereo samples, one octave apart, from A#2 to A#5. Each pair contains a ‘harmonics’ part (‘harm’), which contains the harmonic content from the processed 51.1 seconds, plus an ‘inharmonic’ part (‘inharm’), which contains all the non-harmonic content from the processed 51.1 seconds. All the parts can be enveloped, filtered and pitch-shifted – in particular, the inharmonic part can be shifted by non-musical intervals, and does not need to track the played pitch, so key tracking need not be 100%. The video shows four example sounds that have been synthesized using the pairs, using an Instrument Rack inside Ableton Live, but similar results can be obtained by using other sample player applications like Kontakt et al. I am sure that the Pianobook community will synthesize more sounds!
Reviews for 29 Bagpipes Synthesizerwriter
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- Character
- Playability
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Amazing Sound Design
The Sound Design here is so amazing and creative, I have no idea how you were able to get these sounds of bagpipes. Ive never personally been into synthesis myself, there are so many areas of music one an focus on and synthesis was just never one of them for me. I commend you for making these awesome sounds and there's a lot to choose from here. I think the nature of how kontakt works makes it more inconvenient for shuffling through presets as opposed to a vet synth where you just click next. Theres some really nice sounds here ranging in vibe. Some are more synthy and some are more reminiscent of the original sound source. Its a bit too much for me but i hope others really enjoy this as theres a lot to offer.
Wide variety of sounds
There's a huge variety of sounds here. You probably wouldn't guess that the source was bagpipes unless you knew. Most of the sounds have a quality which is reminiscent of late 80s and early 90s synths which used a short PCM sample for the attack transient, and then a simple periodic wave for the body of the sound. It's also worth noting that this library was saved with absolute sample paths, so you're going to have to reconnect all of the samples and images each time you load an instrument or multi. It's not a huge deal, but it's kind of annoying. Overall, this is a fun and useable library and a worthy download.
Are too many options always good?
26 single patches,12 multies, and a lot of vague naming included in this bundle. You will need to spend some time in order to become familiar with it. There are some very interesting and well sampled cases in here for sure, but don't expect it to be in an instant. The average sound signature is a minimal synth one, but you will also find some percussive parts in there. You really have to try it yourself in order to figure it out. I'd honestly prefer a more minimalistic approach with user-adjustable settings instead of tons of preset patches.
