A performance question from an EWQLSO guy

[dcoscina]

I keep reading about GPO's infinitely more playable interface. Some posters have referred to the mod wheel as a key figure in this equation. How exactly does this work. Does raising the mod wheel affect the attack partials of the sample or the tone of the sustain? Does it depend on whether it's a string/wind or brass instrument? Do you have all articulations under one patch in the form of keyswitch programs? I know my bundled Giga VSL 24 bit sounds have all articulations which is convenient when one is using an AWESOME scoring program like Overture (just got it- top drawer folks, and this is coming from a Finale guy).

[trentpmcd]

Although there are a few keyswitched patches for the most part GPO works like this – Velocity changes the articulation, modwheel the volume and tone and the sustain pedal (I believe) takes out part of the attack transient to make very smooth legato playing. There are other controls, but the balk of it is in the interrelationships between these three controllers.

It sounds strange, but once you start playing it is very expressive.

[dcoscina]

Although there are a few keyswitched patches for the most part GPO works like this – Velocity changes the articulation, modwheel the volume and tone and the sustain pedal (I believe) takes out part of the attack transient to make very smooth legato playing. There are other controls, but the balk of it is in the interrelationships between these three controllers.

It sounds strange, but once you start playing it is very expressive.

Sounds cool. Thanks Trent for the info.

[Tom Hopkins]

Here's a more detailed description:

1. Velocity controls attack strength - gentle attacks for low velocities up to accented attacks for high velocities.
2. Mod wheel controls expressive volume/timbre changes. The amount of timbre change with volume varies with instrument type (e.g. brass instruments change much more than woodwinds.)
3. Sustain pedal down functions to smooth transitions between notes. This is a legato function in strings. In wind instruments it switches between tongued and slurred articulations. In some instruments, like harp, sustain pedal switches to "hand damped" strings.

Those are the main controllers; secondary controllers on many instruments are:

4. cc19 and cc20 = portamento
5. cc21 = note length - can be used in combination with actual MIDI note length and velocity to achieve a wide variety of articulations from extremely short notes to gentle overlaps (especially useful in string section legato passages).
6. cc22 = VAR 1 - variability in intonation. Can be drawn in to help solve problem phrases (like the dreaded "machine gun" effect of repeated notes).
7. cc23 = VAR 2 - variability in timbre. Similar to cc22 in application.
8. Aftertouch = vibrato intensity for certain solo instruments.
9. cc17 = vibrato speed for certain solo instruments.
10. Keyswitches - certain instruments (like strings) have keyswitches between the available articulations. This is only done where absolutely necessary; most instruments allow the creation of a common variety of articulations without the need for keyswitching. Other instruments (like timpani) use keyswitches to choose between standard hits and playable rolls (a note is sounded both when you press the key down and when you release it).
16. cc16 is sometimes assigned to control the aggressive nature of an instrument - higher values are more aggressive. An instrument like bass drum uses cc16 to control the strength of the strike while cc20 controls the strength of the fundamental.

Unlike most libraries, GPO, wherever possible, uses programming techniques to simulate articulation and expressive changes rather than employ separate samples. This approach allows a great deal of expressive capability to be packed into a single, easy-to-use instrument that also takes up very little space on the user's hard drive. It's a different means to a similar end.

Tom

[cptexas]

This may be a dumb question, but how exactly are the articulations in EWQLSO played? :confused:

[chriscaouette]

I have both GPO and EW Gold & Silver. EWQLSO Gold has very little programming that resembles GPO. The have some DXF (dynamic cross fade) and velocity attack programs but nothing like the control you get with GPO. EWQLSO Silver actually is closer to GPO's programming than Gold and in my opinion more playable. There are some demos on the EW page done with silver that people think are Gold or Platinum.

To answer the previous question cc11 (expression) controls volume and velocity controls dynamics in EWQLSO. There are no KS programs like GPO (unless you make them yourself) so you have to load each articulation separately and run it on its own MIDI channel.

In my opinion if you want to experiment with EW get Silver and save some money. Sure Gold has the release trails, but with all the new reverbs coming out (or if you have Logic Pro) you will have the same thing.
Chris