JABB in the UK!!!!!!

[Twinset]

Yeah, just received my copy of JABB. Very impressive delivery.

Gary, thank you so much for not making your overseas customers feel second-class. I can't tell you how much I appreciate it.

Now to work .....

David

[Richard N.]

Well that's Scotland (Navidson) and South England covered :) - just waiting for the Midlands postal service to catch up.


[By the way, David, was it delivered by Royal Mail or some other parcel post service?]

[Twinset]

Hi Richard,

my copy came via Royal Mail (ordered from Time+Space)

David

[joaz]

Yep, got mine courtesy of fedex. Now to open and explore........I may be some time....... :D
regards

[Garritan]

Glad it arrived quickly to my friends in the UK.

Hope you enjoy it Sir Twinset, Sir Richard (and the lovely Mrs. N), and Sir Joaz.


http://www.garritan.com/pictures/JABB-UK.gif

[navidson]

Richard, I'm actually from the Midlands too and that's currently where the Mystery Parcel is... unfortuantly being at University in Yorkshire means I have to sit here twiddling my thumbs until it can be re-directed to my term-time address and I can find out once and for all what it might contain... :)

[Richard N.]

Navidson - apologies, I thought you were North of the Border.

Gary - hopefully, my copy will arrive tomorrow. Mrs N. loves the Tom's new demo though, and she has now forgiven me for buying my latest keyboard which was just for JABB (lots of sliders and knobs!).

[Richard N.]

Andrew,

the concept behind GPO and JABB is "playable instruments". You don't get mega-gigs worth of articulations that you have to stitch together, you get instruments that you control in real time (editable in sequencer of course) using a variety of midi controllers - the most common being

1.the foot pedal for legato
2.mod wheel for volume and timbre
3.aftertouch for vibrato
4.key velocity for attack

[Haydn]

JABB is complete library including 16 different saxes, 5 different trumpets, 5 different trombones, bass trombone, flutes, clarinet, a killer piano, electric piano, guitars, bass and excellent drums including a brush kit that even has brush stirs.

The Chris Hein is only 5 instruments if I remember correctly. You will get much more mileage out of JABB.

[Markleford]

Well, if you "just need the jazz horns", then you're going to probably need at least a baritone sax, and maybe a soprano sax, both of which Chris Hein's Horns doesn't have. Though I suppose you could get away with a jazz quintet with just a sax and trumpet (plus your favorite bass, piano, and drums).

JABB is definitely geared to someone who wants the *whole* band, including a variety of instruments of each type. If you play 4 trombone parts in a section with only one trombone sample set, for instance, you'll run into "phasing" issues with your mix. JABB has 4 different trombones (plus a bass trombone!) to choose from to solve this issue. But again, you may only require small ensemble work. JABB also has different mutes for the bones and trumpets (harmon, straight, cup, and bucket), though you might not need those either?

If you want all the representative instruments to make a real big band chart, then JABB makes a very compelling choice! If you're very brave (and patient!) and want to attempt to simulate a solo instrument in your final mix, however, you'll have to determine if Chris Hein's Horns is up to the task. Quite simply, as a design philosophy JABB wasn't meant to try to "fake out" people for solo parts (though I imagine people will try when they become familar with it! :D)

Another thing you might want to consider is relative complexity. Chris Hein's Horns do sound very nice and have a lot of detail, but at the cost of requiring the management of a whole lot of keyswitches to perform them. That might become burdensome if you just want to write charts for jazz ensembles, but understandably essential if you're trying to fake a solo: personally, I wouldn't have the patience for it!

Also, keep in mind the extra RAM or HD performance needed to serve up all the potential individual samples that allow for the extra detail: if you want to go with Hein's Horns, make sure you look into the system requirements to see if your PC is up to the task.

Hopefully the decision will be obvious based on your needs: they seem like similar libraries, but really they serve different needs for different composers. Mind, if you don't have upcoming projects that require "jazz horns", then you could always wait for more JABB demos to come out as a comparison. No need to rush into either library! ;)

- m

[hotwash]

JABB reached Wales last week and first impressions are excellent.

I'm a dunce when it comes to controllers, so excuse this doofus question. I would like to introduce a little vibrato to a flugelhorn line. I'm using Sonar 2.2 and my controller keyboard is an old Roland FP8 with no wheels or aftertouch. I guess I could draw controller data, but which controller(s) and how? I know CC17 is for vibrato rate, but what about aftertouch? Is this the same as ChanAft? Nothing I do seems to work.

On the positive side, I've achieved mighty things with the vibes hard mallet sound.

hotwash

[Markleford]

I know CC17 is for vibrato rate, but what about aftertouch? Is this the same as ChanAft? Nothing I do seems to work.Aftertouch/Channel Pressure does indeed control vibrato depth/level. You should be able to draw it in manually, or with a MIDI envelope (I think MIDI envelopes went as far back as SONAR 2: I'm not at home to check).

Also, I believe there is another CC that will act as a substitute for channel aftertouch. It's eluding my memory at the moment, though, so you'll have to dig through the manual to find it (or wait for someone to mention it here).

One wildcard that may affect this is that in the MIDI Options menu, you have to click a checkbox to *allow* Channel Aftertouch to be recorded. I'd previously thought that this only matters on live recording (i.e. will filter out that data from the keyboard). I don't *think* it applies to hand-drawn data, but it's something to verify.

- m

[hotwash]

Thanks, m

Further experimentation seems to have achieved something, but I'm still not sure what I'm doing. I have a Yamaha wind controller and have obtained some kind of vibrato that way, but not through controller 17. I have a feeling I'm closing in on the answer in my usual random and inefficient fashion. Further helpful comments from those who understand controllers would still be appreciated.

hotwash

[Markleford]

Note that there are two controls for vibrato: depth (via aftertouch) and rate (via CC#17). You'll need to use both for the best performance!

- m