Zero-G has announced that Vocaloid Prima will be shipping this month.

Vocaloid Prima is a plug-in "Virtual Vocalist" modelled on the voice of a professional soprano opera singer and powered by the Yamaha Vocaloid2 Singing Synthesis Technology.

Whether it's soaring leads, harmonies or backing vocals, Prima can sing any word from the English language (and other languages too with a little work). Prima is also very well suited if you want to be adventurous and experimental, since her voice can be easily modified and shaped in many ways.

In addition to singing any words or combination of syllables or phonemes you can imagine, Prima will spread any sustained vowel (or voiced consonant) across as many notes as you like, with perfect legato. You can select from several different natural vibrato types and drag and drop your chosen type to any note or notes, and control the time-position and amount of the vibrato.

And that's just the beginning - you have control over all of the following parameters, which you can bring to bear on any part of your creation:

• Changing syllables/phonemes.
• Timing of each note (precise position/length).
• Vibrato (you can change its type/position/amount/frequency).
• Volume.
• Attack.
• Crescendo or diminuendo.
• Pitch bend (amount, and positionable in time).
• Glide (portamento).
• Resonance (Frequency/bandwidth/amplitude).
• Harmonics.
• Noise.
• Brightness
• Clearness.
• Gender factor.

Key Features of Vocaloid2

Vocaloid2 includes major improvements in usability and synthesis quality over the previous version. Here are the key features:

• New GUI: The Vocaloid Editor (score editing tool) of Vocaloid2 has a new look with improved user functionality.
• A much more realistic and natural sounding vocal: The synthesis engine of Vocaloid2 uses a different signal processing technique from Version 1, creating a clearer and more natural vocal.
• Realtime Keyboard Performance (VST Instrument): Written lyrics can be assigned a note by touch of a keyboard. Now you can "sing" using a keyboard.
• New functionality and improvements: Much easier to use functionality newly implemented, which reduce workloads in creating your music. Existing functionality also improved.
• Note auditioning: If you press a note, singing with lyrics and pitch will be assigned to the note. Instantly check lyrics and notes.
• Transparent control track: Control track for controlling timbre is transparent, so you can check two parameters at once.
• Toggling between Playback and Rendering: You can specify playback/rendering mode for each track. By rendering the finished track, you can reduce CPU load in playback. Maximum number of tracks is 16.
• Expression control: You can easily specify musical expression (attack and vibrato) with this intuitive user interface.

Key features:

• Vocaloid Editor:
  • Piano-roll editor.
  • Note editing / Automatic phonetic conversion / Phonetic editing / Note auditioning.
  • Transparent control track.
  • Toggling between playback/rendering.
  • Expression control.
  • Synchronization with host sequencer through ReWire.
• Vocaloid Playback VSTi:
  • Playback sequence created with Vocaloid Editor.
• Vocaloid Realtime VSTi:
  • Keyboard performance with lyrics input in advance.
  • 4 polyphonic.

Vocaloid Prima has an MSRP of $199.95 / €169 / £114.95. It will ship this month for Windows XP/Vista in VSTi and stand-alone/ReWire formats.