How hard to play Wallander Instruments?

[hendyb]

Hi,
I'm quite interested in Wallander instruments after hearing some demos. But I'm wondering, how hard will it be to play the instruments without a breath-controller or wind controller (using only keyboard and a slider for the breath data)?
I'm looking for terrific sounding instruments without wasting time too much to tweak the parameters (i know that Wallander instruments do have so many parameters)

And how hard will it be if, someday, I'll buy a breath controller and use it for wallander instruments (i have no experiences in wind/brass instruments)?

Maybe some users that already have wallander instruments could share their story of learning the wallander instruments?
thanks

[Yossarian]

And how hard will it be if, someday, I'll buy a breath controller and use it for wallander instruments (i have no experiences in wind/brass instruments)?

I think you may be confusing a breath controller with a wind controller. A wind controller is indeed played like a wind instrument but a breath controller is basically just an input device which converts air pressure to controller data, the actual playing is still done with the keyboard.

If your keyboard doesn’t have a breath controller input you will need a breath-to-Midi converter like this:

www.midisolutions.com/prodbth.htm

and of course the breath controller itself, like the Yamaha BC3.

/Yoss

[JT3_Jon]

Incase you dont know, you can treat WIVI instruments just like "mod wheel blend" patches from traditional sample libraries. All "breath" data can be controlled via any midi CC you wish, including mod wheel. So you dont NEED a breath controller to get great sounding results with WIVI.

Also, if you wern't already aware, they offer a free demo of their WIVI player so you can try it yourself. Right now you can only demo the brass instruments, but the player is exactly the same for all WIVI instruments.

VST Download: http://www.wallanderinstruments.com/index.php?menu=products&item=dltrial&fno=1

AU Download:http://www.wallanderinstruments.com/index.php?menu=products&item=dltrial&fno=2

I will have an article on up my website in about two weeks going into greater details on the whole WIVI system, as I think its just fantastic!! Let me know if your interested and I'll post a direct link when its up!

All the best,
Jon
http://www.shopjt3.com

[hendyb]

thanks for the reply Yos and Jon.

I know what breath controller is, even though i haven't ever tried it yet. I'm just imagining would it be hard to play keyboard while breath on the controller? Because I imagine it would have like split the brain into breathing the controller and pressing the notes... I just can't imagine that, but it sure looks as a tempting way to produce realistic wind instruments...

Jon, I'd be interested in that article, and will be thankful if you could give the link. Actually i've been playing for a very short time with the trial version, but it actually doesn't have much parameters to be played with, and I worried if it will take a long time just to play with the parameters to get the sound right, instead of just playing it out of the box..

[Yossarian]

I'm just imagining would it be hard to play keyboard while breath on the controller? Because I imagine it would have like split the brain into breathing the controller and pressing the notes...

My experience has been the opposite, it just feels more natural and intuitive to use a breath controller than input devices like sliders or pedals.

/Yoss

[Wallander]

Hi,
I'm quite interested in Wallander instruments after hearing some demos. But I'm wondering, how hard will it be to play the instruments without a breath-controller or wind controller (using only keyboard and a slider for the breath data)?
I'm looking for terrific sounding instruments without wasting time too much to tweak the parameters (i know that Wallander instruments do have so many parameters)

And how hard will it be if, someday, I'll buy a breath controller and use it for wallander instruments (i have no experiences in wind/brass instruments)?

Maybe some users that already have wallander instruments could share their story of learning the wallander instruments?
thanks Well, I don't think you'll have to spend a lot of time tweaking parameters in WIVI, but if you don't have access to a breath or wind controller it's likely that you'll need to spend quite some time drawing breath data in your sequencer.

It all depends on what level you require your results to be on. The good thing about WIVI is that you have full control over the envelope of each tone and phrase, but that is also the downside of WIVI. If you don't add expression to your phrases, the results can definitely become quite stiff (if you listen to the Gran Partita demo, you'll hear that almost every tone in the melodic part is played with great expression, like a crescendo, and this is as crucial to realism as the sound itself).

You might want to try out the Trial Edition (http://www.wallanderinstruments.com/index.php?menu=products#Trial), which now also features woodwinds. If you want results fast, I'd say buy WIVI if you're open to using a breath or wind controller. If you only use a keyboard, you'll need to spend more time sequencing with WIVI than with a sample library, because you also have the breath data to deal with, not only velocities. But if this is something you're open to doing, you can do a lot with WIVI which currently is impossible with a sample library.

Another thing that differs WIVI a bit from sample library is the CPU/RAM usage. If you use WIVI for brass and woodwinds, you'll have no trouble using a single laptop for sequencing. Just about all RAM is left to be used for strings and percussion. And you can expect a WIVI instrument to use considerably less RAM than an advanced sampled instrument these days (you have release samples, overlapping notes, transition samples, etc).

[JPRmusic]

I've just been experimenting with the trial version and a breath controller and WIVI sounds excellent using this method. Its easier than playing and singing together and feels extremely natural. For a minute I almost felt like a brass player; I even tried double-tonguing. So Wivi and a breath controller is a great match. My K2600 already had a breath controller input, but for those who don't have that input MidiSolutions makes a little box that converts breath controller data into Midi data.

Jeff

[Piet De Ridder]

Most hosts can map one controller to another, can't they? I'm using WIVI in Logic, I have one of the faders on my controller keyboard mapped to cc#2 (breath control) and since I always use WIVI as monophonic synth anyway, there's absolutely no problem playing the notes with my right hand while adjusting the value of cc#2 with my left hand, in realtime.
And afterwards, it's very easy to tweak/optimize the recorded controller data in Logic's graphical editor or do a few other adjustments if necessary. Works great.

_

[tfishbein82]

Most hosts can map one controller to another, can't they? I'm using WIVI in Logic, I have one of the faders on my controller keyboard mapped to cc#2 (breath control) and since I always use WIVI as monophonic synth anyway, there's absolutely no problem playing the notes with my right hand while adjusting the value of cc#2 with my left hand, in realtime.
And afterwards, it's very easy to tweak/optimize the recorded controller data in Logic's graphical editor or do a few other adjustments if necessary. Works great.

_
Actually, the WIVI breath control parameter can be assigned any CC (or pitch bend or key velocity), so you don't need to worry about mapping that in your host. In other words if you want to use your midi keyboards modwheel (CC1) to control WIVI "breath data", you just set that parameter in WIVI to CC1.

[Piet De Ridder]

Yeah, I know but by taking care of the remapping outside of WIVI (permanently), I don't have to adjust the setting everytime I open the plugin, as it seems to default to breath=2.

[Andrew]

For what it's worth, I have a breath controller and prefer using the mod wheel.

[hendyb]

I think I'll give another try first with the WIVI trial since it also includes winds instruments now (i didn't know then)..

[Little Red King]

I use it without any breath/wind controller. I either draw in data in the mod CC (in the piano roll view of Cubase) or record mod wheel data from my midi keyboard. I like the way it works. In general, I find that Wivi is much easier to play than a samples-based VSTi. Wivi is set-up to give reasonable sounds right out of the box with minimal CC programming. Of course any extra time that you will spend working with the controls of the instrument and programming your CCs will pay off in added expression and realism. I think the demo gives a pretty good idea of the ease of use. The way the demo is set-up, the reverb might not be to your liking, but don't let that worry you. The reverb is very flexible in the full version and goes from very drippy wet to bone dry.

[Joris de Man]

I don't have a breathcontroller yet, and have been using Wivi for a while now and control it using the modwheel.
Works great and I've been extremely impressed with the playbillity.
It takes a bit longer to setup than sample libraries; it took me a while to get the kind of tone I was looking for, but a combination of Altiverb, only using the early reflections of Wivi itself and some heavy EQ'ing meant I got a tone very similar to VSL's Epic Horns, which I think have a great sound.
Love that you can get a lot of different sounds/tones from it, and how tweakable it is. The tuning and randomisation options help making it sound very realistic.
Unless sample libraries become this playable, I can't imagine going back to them.

Like any good instrument, you will need to learn to 'play' this a bit more than with samples; but the effort is totally worth it!

Cheers,

Joris

[hendyb]

Anyone knows how Wallander Instruments handle trumpet falls? I've tried the trial edition, and though it really sounds real good, but i was having difficulties to imitate trumpet falls..

And how about shakes? Do you just play regular trill between two notes?

[venzon]

I've never played a brass instrument in my life, but have no problem playing WIVI brass with my MIDI controller keyboard (aftertouch for vibrato/tremolo, modwheel for the breath CC) and getting extremely realistic results. This is by far the easiest sound library I've ever used, and the results sound fantastically amazing.

[dewdman42]

For what it's worth, I have a breath controller and prefer using the mod wheel.

Andrew, can you comment more on that? I have been thinking about getting one of these breath controllers for a while now. What do you like better about the mod wheel besides the fact that its $229 cheaper?

[raweber]

Hi, Arne,

I downloaded and installed the Trial edition, but I'm afraid I cannot figure out how to get any sounds out of it. I have loaded into SAVIHost and a DAW with no results. I can add an instrument, but playing either a keyboard or wind controller produces no sound.

Any tips?