Musyng Kite 990MB GM/GS soundfont. Former Evanessence overhaul! 2011-2014 June 21st 2014

[Sarcyan]

First, I would like to thank kode54 for his/her intelligence and input. He/she found some little issues most mere mortals wouldn't notice as easily. And thanks to him/her the soundfont is simply better as a result.

- There was an "early cut off" problem with the Celtic Harp and all the Drum kits, which I fixed thanks to him/her, who noticed that. The fix just involved modifying the Envelope values, (Hold, Decay, Release, Attack, Delay, Sustain Level).

Now the drums sound more lively because of that --the issue was that I imported the drums from WAV files and when you do that they get default values for everything, and just touched those drum samples that need some very specific Envelope values.

In addition, the Celtic Harp is being done justice, I always loved it, but it's true that due to the early cut off issue it didn't get the sound that it deserved before in some cases.

- Stream (GS instrument sound) modified. I used the same sample, increased the output rate to 48KHz, and modified the equalizer values to give it more presence.

- Other minor fixes thanks to kode54 feedback.

The download file of the definitive version can be found here:

http://1drv.ms/VeywIN

Enjoy!

- Cose

[kode54]

Thanks for your hard work, good sir. You're gonna love this.

A bit of assistance in case BASSMIDI/XMPlay ever support this for XG MIDI files. A SoundFont, that while only 4MB, manages to arrange most of the XG/GS parity instruments into a GS mapping, maps the XG instruments that don't fit into GS into other spaces, and maps the XG SFX bank to 125 from its original place of 64/0.

http://www.sf2midi.com/bd5-yamaha-xg-so ... e-map-sf2/

Based on information from this map here, which contains GS, 88, MT-32, and XG instruments:

http://eric.hurtebis.chez-alice.fr/patches/inst.htm

I'll see if I can work that mapping into my attempted XG to bank mapping table, so I can either get that to Ian Luck, or at least draft it into some code, so it will work together with a largely mapped out bank.

BASSMIDI may eventually get variation support as well, although that's probably a really big undertaking, considering how many variation effects there are, and how the different parameters map to all of them.

Then we can talk about replacing S-YXG50 VSTi with something that also works on Mac OS X and Linux, as well as Android. And can utilize any instrument set you choose to throw at it.

Something to think about, at least.

[Sarcyan]

Thanks for your hard work, good sir. You're gonna love this.

A bit of assistance in case BASSMIDI/XMPlay ever support this for XG MIDI files. A SoundFont, that while only 4MB, manages to arrange most of the XG/GS parity instruments into a GS mapping, maps the XG instruments that don't fit into GS into other spaces, and maps the XG SFX bank to 125 from its original place of 64/0.

http://www.sf2midi.com/bd5-yamaha-xg-so ... e-map-sf2/

Based on information from this map here, which contains GS, 88, MT-32, and XG instruments:

http://eric.hurtebis.chez-alice.fr/patches/inst.htm

I'll see if I can work that mapping into my attempted XG to bank mapping table, so I can either get that to Ian Luck, or at least draft it into some code, so it will work together with a largely mapped out bank.

BASSMIDI may eventually get variation support as well, although that's probably a really big undertaking, considering how many variation effects there are, and how the different parameters map to all of them.

Then we can talk about replacing S-YXG50 VSTi with something that also works on Mac OS X and Linux, as well as Android. And can utilize any instrument set you choose to throw at it.

Something to think about, at least.

Well, I think I know that one. And it is a really good, professionally made soundfont, created by Yamaha themselves. It's an old one, too, and the little amount of RAM it uses shows sometimes, but it is very admirable and especially SO balanced.

If you have that one, Timbres of Heaven, Fury, Aspirin, SGM, and the 25MB Roland SC-55 soundfont -adding to this the 60MB SC-55 soundfont, which features the ASIA drum kit, that no other soundfont ever made has- you are pretty much covered.

Timbres of Heaven does the same as the Yamaha XG soundfont, and it adds SFX sounds -from the SC88?- on top of that. You can find Timbres of Heaven here. It has just about everything.

http://midkar.com/

My dream soundfont of the future is a General MIDI 2 one -I wonder how it can be handled with 256 presets without running out of generators in the soundfont though. As a future owner of a General MIDI 2 hardware synth device -I've decided which one- that would be a dream come true.

I've seen videos of the S-YXG50 VSTi and it's pretty good, especially on GS mode. On GM mode I find it to be unbalanced, which I find surprising, but the GS mode is just amazing.

Let's see how things pan out. Arachno 2, Jazman 32 bit (planned to be released between the current date and year 2020, Jazman is my most favourite commercial soundfont ever ) and Timbres of Heaven 2 are the soundfonts I am looking for in the future.

See yah' kode54.

[Sarcyan]

Btw, I will upload/share my large MIDI collection, with 80000+ files and yes, some of them are just useless without either the Yamaha XG soundfont or Timbres of Heaven. In some cases the Yamaha soundfont sounds right, in other cases, the sound of Timbres is higher quality or fits the song better. It depends. But the amount of FX in the XG soundfonts is just crazy, and very fun, and useful, too.

[Sarcyan]

I uploaded my collection of MIDI files, 80000+ MIDIs conveniently organised by download date in the Monthly Hi-Fi MIDI folder and 60000+ MIDI files in the "Large MIDI Collection 60000+ files" folder, also organised.

In this "Large MIDI Collection" folder, there is a subfolder called "MIDI Dateien", and inside there is another subfolder named "Songs".

There are quite a few XG files which are perfect for both the Yamaha XG soundfont and Timbres of Heaven. Some sounds are better with the Yamaha XG (like the Door Creak sound in the Cybergate song, which perfectly suits the Dance music) and others sound better with Timbres of Heaven.

Lots of nice sound effects in there, too!

My 80000+ MIDI files collection can be found here (it has been compressed with 7zip, so you might need that program to decompress the file)

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6caGN ... sp=sharing

[sunhome]

I must say that this thread has been a really helpful resource - thanks to letting kvr in on this type of info about soundfonts, this has been a real educational resource about soundfonts.

I have been a big fan of the Chaos soundfont for a while now, so this week after reading this thread, I have been adding to my basic collection with the roland Sc-55, WeedsGM3, TOH 2.0.2, arachno, and the OP's Musyng Kite ... lots of options now !!!

Found this interesting algorythmic software tool called cgmusic, http://codeminion.com/blogs/maciek/2008 ... ate-music/ and have been using that to compose and synthfont 2 to play the midi files getting some outstanding results from this. I am curious to find a tool that will let me more or less edit the scores, and notewoorthy might fit the need. Also, noticed that pizacatto compo light/pro has some advanced midi intiutive tools that might fit nicely into the workflow.

Just wanted to let you know there is someone paying attention to your soundfont hard work - cheers!

[Sarcyan]

I must say that this thread has been a really helpful resource - thanks to letting kvr in on this type of info about soundfonts, this has been a real educational resource about soundfonts.

I have been a big fan of the Chaos soundfont for a while now, so this week after reading this thread, I have been adding to my basic collection with the roland Sc-55, WeedsGM3, TOH 2.0.2, arachno, and the OP's Musyng Kite ... lots of options now !!!

Found this interesting algorythmic software tool called cgmusic, http://codeminion.com/blogs/maciek/2008 ... ate-music/ and have been using that to compose and synthfont 2 to play the midi files getting some outstanding results from this. I am curious to find a tool that will let me more or less edit the scores, and notewoorthy might fit the need. Also, noticed that pizacatto compo light/pro has some advanced midi intiutive tools that might fit nicely into the workflow.

Just wanted to let you know there is someone paying attention to your soundfont hard work - cheers!

Thanks for your kind words. Btw, the author of Timbres of Heaven is working on an update afaik, so don't forget to check http://midkar.com/ regularly.

I uploaded the WONDERFUL Roland SC-55 soundfont (the one that weighs 25MB) here, just in case anyone has trouble finding it -it's a quite rare file-:

http://1drv.ms/1pBFfb5

There are several SC-55 soundfonts. One whose file name is SC-55.sf2 and weighs 60MB is the only one feauring the excellent ASIA drum kit. You should find it easily on the net if you search for it.

You can find a great comparison between the different Roland SC-55 soundfonts out there, with comments on how accurate they are compared to the real thing, in this video by Ultimate Doomer:



Thanks for sharing that link, it's the first time I heard of such a thing. I downloaded the MIDI files in the site. They sound okay overall, nothing that is going to make history -plus the latin file doesn't sound like salsa or similar to me- but quite decent taking into account it's been made by a computer.

See you.

p.s. the cgmusic program is interesting to use.

[Musical Gym]

Thanks much for all the great resources, hard work, and generosity!

[Sarcyan]

Thanks much for all the great resources, hard work, and generosity!

You are welcome.

[Sarcyan]

I must say that this thread has been a really helpful resource - thanks to letting kvr in on this type of info about soundfonts, this has been a real educational resource about soundfonts.

I have been a big fan of the Chaos soundfont for a while now, so this week after reading this thread, I have been adding to my basic collection with the roland Sc-55, WeedsGM3, TOH 2.0.2, arachno, and the OP's Musyng Kite ... lots of options now !!!

Found this interesting algorythmic software tool called cgmusic, http://codeminion.com/blogs/maciek/2008 ... ate-music/ and have been using that to compose and synthfont 2 to play the midi files getting some outstanding results from this. I am curious to find a tool that will let me more or less edit the scores, and notewoorthy might fit the need. Also, noticed that pizacatto compo light/pro has some advanced midi intiutive tools that might fit nicely into the workflow.

Just wanted to let you know there is someone paying attention to your soundfont hard work - cheers!

Edit: The cgmusic program is okay, there are some fun and interesting tunings you can create with it. After fiddling around with it, I still prefer the music created by "normal" means though.

Additionally, I'd also recommend you Noteworthy for that, Musescore is also an option, but nothing beats Noteworthy Composer when it comes to that, in my opinion.

The CGMusic program which sunhome shared and creates computer generated music and transforms it into a MIDI file can be downloaded here:

http://www.codeminion.com/blogs/maciek/ ... _Setup.exe (I've checked the 500KB EXE file at https://www.virustotal.com/ and it's totally clean)

The author's text on the program can be found in the link that sunhome has shared:

http://codeminion.com/blogs/maciek/2008 ... ate-music/

Here is a screengrab of the program:

[Jake Jackson]

Thanks for posting these links and this information over the past few years. One thing that would be good to have is links to demo songs--I hesitate before downloading big files if I do not know what sound to expect from them.

[Sarcyan]

Thanks for posting these links and this information over the past few years. One thing that would be good to have is links to demo songs--I hesitate before downloading big files if I do not know what sound to expect from them.

Your observation is something I wanted to say but never wrote and that's right, everything contained here are some things I learnt in the past 4 years using DAWs, more DAWs, soundfonts and various audio applications.

As for what you ask for, well, I have many sounds where the soundfont shines and I was thinking about making a video, but time will be at a prime and I don't think I can pull it off.

In fact, I have a dedicated folder where I placed some of the songs with nice sounds just if I wanted to make a video. But I am not sure it will happen.

There is a little demo I have here, but there is only one sound from Musyng Kite -and that was when it hadn't been released-:



I also have some MIDI files, not demos, just MDI files that sound great with the soundfont, and there is a bit of everything (though not much), here:

http://1drv.ms/1hNrkrR

I also made a comparison between the sound from a professional MIDI site and the soundfont, but preferred to keep the video unlisted 'cos it's not for everyone.

I love Sophie Ellis-Bextor with all of my soul and just compared her songs, which might not be to everyone liking and gets mixed reactions. Plus, it's from a version of the soundfont which wasn't finished yet, although very very close to it. So it is representative of what you will get -except a few additional tweaks in the drums that version hadn't gotten and the cut out issue kode54 has found- for the most part.

Anyways, you can se It here, it's the closest thing I have to what you are asking for. There are GM and GS sounds in those songs.



The great thing about this video is whether you love or hate the sound, is that there are no tricks there or it doesn't just show where the soundfont shines, but it shows where it does great and where it could fail, it's a what you see what you get kind of thing. (the original video of Musical Box, which can be seen in the 1st page, was more like.... meant to show just where it sounded great, but the soundfont 2 years ago was unbalanced, though I wasn't totally conscious of it back then)

p.s. I opened the video to public view. It was "unlisted" before as it was an unfinished version of Musyng Kite, but it's basically the same thing, save the fixing of the cut out issue, which was not fixed then. You've been warned, it might not be to everyone liking, as it focuses on a single artist.

Take care of you and have a nice day.

[kode54]

I have since purchased JaZMan GM, and I do enjoy it quite a bit, but I do have some minor complaints about it.

1) The individual string instruments are a little odd in various files I've played. They don't really meld together that well compared to a number of other banks, including the professional Colossus GM bank.
2) The square wave lead and bass&lead instruments are too loud. I have modified it to fix this, by attenuating the square wave by 36dB instead of 10, and the bass&lead by 24 instead of 10.
3) The square wave lead is programmed into exclusive set 1, which locks all of its notes to single polyphony, including single polyphony of either the left or right channel in its panned/detuned pair. I have since removed this exclusive setting from the instrument.
4) The fiddle instrument is one octave too high, so I adjusted its regions upward by 12 semitones, then the individual samples' root keys, as the instrument itself did not override the root keys.

I also had to use Polyphone to perform my edits, as Viena discarded the sm24 chunk (lower 8 bits of the sample data) the first time it resaved it.

Other than that, it's a pretty satisfying experience.

Maybe I'll check out that Merlin Symphony bank, and GMR Basico as well.

EDIT: Never mind Merlin Symphony, it's up to 50 credits now, and I don't have $50 to spend on another bank after already spending $70 on JaZMan GM.

[Sarcyan]

I have since purchased JaZMan GM, and I do enjoy it quite a bit, but I do have some minor complaints about it.

1) The individual string instruments are a little odd in various files I've played. They don't really meld together that well compared to a number of other banks, including the professional Colossus GM bank.
2) The square wave lead and bass&lead instruments are too loud. I have modified it to fix this, by attenuating the square wave by 36dB instead of 10, and the bass&lead by 24 instead of 10.
3) The square wave lead is programmed into exclusive set 1, which locks all of its notes to single polyphony, including single polyphony of either the left or right channel in its panned/detuned pair. I have since removed this exclusive setting from the instrument.
4) The fiddle instrument is one octave too high, so I adjusted its regions upward by 12 semitones, then the individual samples' root keys, as the instrument itself did not override the root keys.

I also had to use Polyphone to perform my edits, as Viena discarded the sm24 chunk (lower 8 bits of the sample data) the first time it resaved it.

Other than that, it's a pretty satisfying experience.

Maybe I'll check out that Merlin Symphony bank, and GMR Basico as well.

EDIT: Never mind Merlin Symphony, it's up to 50 credits now, and I don't have $50 to spend on another bank after already spending $70 on JaZMan GM.

Hello kode54!

1) Well, I don't think Jazman is meant for orchestral music -like pretty most soundfonts actually, save maybe Merlin Symphony (or that Colossus?, which I never tried, but all I've heard about it, despite being 32GB in size, is that it sucks), but that's not saying too much- although it is probably my favourite soundfont to date.

2) Oh lords... yes. I've heard of that issue with the Square Wave, another super intelligent person, whose nick is Ultimate Doomer on Youtube mentioned that the problem is that the Square Wave is set to monophonic. I didn't study the soundfont much, just listened to actual songs with it.

If anything, aside from that, I'd say that the Chiffer Lead isn't going to win any awards if you use Jazman. Nor the Bagpipes are that impressive, just functional, but no soundfont I know of has decent bagpipes, save SoniVOX GS250 -a pretty average former commercial soundfont, that it is not only average, but at 99$ it's directly true daylight robbery!-.

3)... same as before.

4) ... Gotta admit that I didn't run into that issue, but maybe 'cos I didn't dwell on the innards of the soundfont too much. The fiddle is actually one of my preferred instruments in Musyng Kite, now that you mention it.

Yes, I use Viena for the most part, but I also have Polyphone and I tweaked some instruments with it as some features come in handy. I think that issue is related to how Viena handles 24-bit samples, that error message is quite common, I believe.

I gotta admit to being fascinated by your opinions on some subjects related to soundfonts, especially when you try to put things into your perspective, it surprises me how you put that into words. Anyways... I will comment on the rest of your post, later.

edit: A file where no soundfont shines as much as Jazman, is this one. FluidR3 GM soundfont doesn't sound bad with it either, but Jazman sounds so awesome there.

https://db.tt/yuNMy9u7

[Sarcyan]

Maybe I'll check out that Merlin Symphony bank, and GMR Basico as well.

EDIT: Never mind Merlin Symphony, it's up to 50 credits now, and I don't have $50 to spend on another bank after already spending $70 on JaZMan GM.

GMR 1.1 is a hell of a fine soundfont. The basico version has a very nice overall sound, I like the drums and some of the pads are quite unique. There is a commercial version called GMR Latino 1.1 which adds quite a few world, ethnic melodic presets, and other than that it's the same as GMR Basico 1.1. A soundfont that I find excellent to compose music, and it's been made by a music teacher. Like any other soundfont, it's not perfect though.

EDIT: Never mind Merlin Symphony, it's up to 50 credits now, and I don't have $50 to spend on another bank after already spending $70 on JaZMan GM.

When did that happen? Merlin Symphony 50$???? At that price it is highway robbery, but maybe that's just me.

You cannot do the blind faith thing when you are spending such amoung of money on a soundfont. All I can say is that at that price don't even touch it, not even with a stick.

That price is unfair. I purchased Merlin Symphony more than 2 years ago for 10$, yes 10$, and it wasn't even on sale.

I consider 10$ a fair price for this soundfont in particular. It is not a bad soundfont, it has fine balance, and that's important -'cos of that it was my favourite for a couple of weeks when I was starting with soundfonts again-.

But.... the drum kits are sooooooo weak and come from the 8MB Creative soundfont, which means they just work but meh... The power set is mediocre, so are the rest compared to other soundfonts. The distortion guitar is the Garcia Distortion guitar, which is average, it gets the job done, and where it shines is at orchestral sounds, but you aren't going to feel blown away but its quality in that regard either.

I've made a video featuring the Merlin Symphony soundfont more than 2 years ago, with a very nice song called Popful Mail - World.

Here is the MIDI file used in the video.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/803 ... 0World.MID

This is the video /I enhanced the Garcia guitar using the Wiggles preset in EasyQ equaliser, it doesn't sound as good as in the video by itself, but it's a decent one/:



Now listen to the MIDI file with Jazman, GMR, Arachno, Musyng Kite, or FluidR3GM, to name a few... Merlin Symphony is an okay soundfont, and I'd say it's good even, but not at that price, imho. For 50$ I'd rather prefer Edgesounds soundfonts, more exciting and less generic. At that price Merlin becomes average rather than goo.

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If you want to spend some spare bucks in a Good soundfont then I'd wholeheartedly recommend you proVitamin, as it is on sale now. It cost me 25€ back in the day, and it's now priced at 15€.

proVitamin has my most favourite Vibrapone that I've heard on any soundfont to date, as well as solid instruments overall, whether they are orchestral, pianos... Plus, the organs are unmatched in my opinion...

Even so, it has a dud, but it's such a dud sound that it has to be replaced with something else at once!

I'd recommend replacing it with Jazman's Distortion Guitar -just removing the Dist Guitar Sample split-, and there you have a pretty awesome soundfont!

Back in the day, 2 years ago, I've made a video with it in order to showcase it, Crucifix Held Close from Castlevania:



And two days ago I uploaded a video of the song from Turbo OutRun, title "Shake the Street" and most of the sound comes from proVitamin: