Auto Theory VST well for noobs? safe to use?

[Caine123]

i know i know, learn f*cking chords manually , need to get some good book/tutorials to understand the progressions etc. when to use, what keys to play after 1 chord and so on. but sadly my job is consuming too much time and the spare time i just wanna play music!

so this vst looks nice, do i understood it correctly that it will play the progression for you automatically which is in harmony and you just play your notes? this would be magic?

[fischkopf]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-S5kNLv3xU

And also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3t2yD1kX2_w

[ezelkow1]

A word of warning, it is not a vst. It is a standalone app that comes with its own virtual midi routing to route midi in to your daw. It also expects to be able to talk directly to your midi controller

I previously owned it for reason and expected it to be a plugin, guess I should have done more research. I also expected that even if it wasnt a vst that I could feed it a midi track from my daw and have it output through a midi port back (basically how it works in reason), but their manual recommends against routing anything directly in to the autotheory midi inputs and to only use a midi controller input and to disable this midi controller as input to your daw. This basically makes it completely unusable with an ableton push which is what Im using, unless I want to add even more virtual midi shenanigans to route push output through yet another midi track to go to another virtual output which autotheory could take as an input and then route back in through another midi track from autotheory

tldr; not a plugin, they should make it a plugin like it is in reason

Id stick with cthulhu, nora, or if you own ableton liquid music

[donntw]

I have been using Cthulhu with another fx instrument as well on the same track in Reaper but Cthulhu will crash or get stuck playing the last note. I want to generate chords to accompany a show and use Aerophone by Roland and a keyboard. Is Auto Theory also unstable and can I use it in real time, unlike Scaler or Instachord which will not respond on every key of the keyboard?

[Topcheese]

There are a lot of nice ones out there, but most will assume you either know a little theory, or just provide you with progressions. I've checked out most every one of them looking for the Holy Grail, and the safest one would be Liquid Music by WaveDNA.

I'm not saying that it's the best, but you can easily paint the shape your chords/melody/bassline and it automatically maps it in tune. You can't get any easier than that, and it also has a nice progression editor to help with theory.

[Cloner]

All those plugins are absolute nonsense. Since you are a FL Studio user, FL Studio has the best tool and it's called: piano roll.
The problem is that you obviously don't know how to use it properly or actually how to properly compose music.

Here's how to do it:
1. Start FL Studio
2. Insert FL Keys (piano)
3. Open its piano roll.
4. Choose in which key you want to compose your song.
5. If it's E major, you set your piano roll to E major like this:


You'll have highlighted notes which would match the key in which you are working in and your first,
starting chord.
This is the MOST basic principle and starting point how to start composing music.
Also, you ALWAYS keep names of notes on piano keys in piano roll set to "ON", so that while placing notes in piano roll
you eventually start memorizing notes and notes which are forming chords.
You don't keep those fields nameless and just randomly placing notes without even trying to understand anything,
but you actually use your brain to read notes constantly and to memorize them.

As your knowledge starts progressing you start using different scales and experimenting with harmony
because different scales form different chords so in the end when you start with E minor you can use Dorian scale
or Hungarian minor to form melodies and they give you different chords, different voicings and different possibilities,
different sounds, different chord progressions, different moods because they are formed out of different notes.

In the end you will start seeing scales as a different color palettes or different sets of moods and you'll start picking them
because you will know EXACTLY what kind of mood you want to create with your music.

In FL Studio you can create custom scales and save them or you can google for scales, place notes in piano roll
and save that scale, you can google for tutorial how to do it, it's quite simply actually.
As you can see on screenshot I have much more scales and modes in my FL Studio than there are by default,
because I was importing/creating and saving scales and modes which are not in FL Studio by default.

If you go to use those shitty plugins, you won't learn anything about music because you'll be generating some random
chord progressions and shit without even knowing what's going on at all.

Guess what? Music is also time consuming. People are busting their asses off to learn how to play real instruments
and practicing for hours every day, while you don't even want to be bothered with clicking on highlighted notes in your piano roll with mouse and keyboard but you want a software to generate a music for you.
It's a f@cking disgrace, dude.

[Topcheese]

If you go to use those shitty plugins, you won't learn anything about music because you'll be generating some random
chord progressions and shit without even knowing what's going on at all.


It's a f@cking disgrace, dude.

Some random FL Studio user that rants about personal issues is much worst. Yes you may be able to do those things in FL Studio, but it doesn't answer the original question. Good to know your unbiased opinion.

[starflakeprj]

@Cloner

Don't embarrass yourself, dude.

[OneOfManyPauls]

There are a lot of nice ones out there, but most will assume you either know a little theory, or just provide you with progressions. I've checked out most every one of them looking for the Holy Grail, and the safest one would be Liquid Music by WaveDNA.

I'm not saying that it's the best, but you can easily paint the shape your chords/melody/bassline and it automatically maps it in tune. You can't get any easier than that, and it also has a nice progression editor to help with theory.

ditto for playing with a whole bunch of these - Sundog Song Studio is the one that tips it for me. Doesn't get anything like the exposure and credit it deserves.

[Topcheese]

Sundog Song Studio is the one that tips it for me. Doesn't get anything like the exposure and credit it deserves.

They are about to drop another update, and it is a good solution, but it doesn't offer VST format. I would probably rate it the best at teaching theory out of all of them.

The thing is that you still have to learn how to make real music with them. They don't make the songs for you, but if you get stuck with trying to come up with a part, then they can help you at least get back in the ballpark.

It is all used to create music, so if you can't play a traditional instrument, then these are just another instrument you can use to create it. You can still learn to master it and go on to make great music. /js

[Teksonik]

It's a f@cking disgrace, dude.

What's a disgrace is you answered a post that's two years and four months old. You think the OP might have progressed a bit in that time ?

That's just one reason why it's not a good idea to necro old threads "donntw".......