Instruments with microtonal support

[aMUSEd]

Doesn't Alchemy (now owned by Apple) have it?

AFAIK they removed full keyboard tuning from the Apple version, so now it's 12 note retune only. Really backwards move, deeply disappointing.

Micro and alternate tuning is built into Logic itself though including Scala import, the only problem with this would be if you wanted different tunings per instance, but the advantage is that the whole project understandings that tuning, including and especially the midi recording/editing. Very few DAWS have this level of microtonal and alternate tunings (because it is really about alternate tunings, these are not always microtonal) support.

Isn´t that bound to 12 notes per octave in Logic always. You can´t use 13 or more if you want/need?

Isn't that true of most 'microtonal' synths though too apart from the few like Pianoteq that support keyboard remapping and kbm files.

[ENV1]

I think Rapture hasnt been mentioned yet.

Supports the SCALA format and comes with 3,304 .scl files in the 'Tunings' folder.

[Cinebient]

Doesn't Alchemy (now owned by Apple) have it?

AFAIK they removed full keyboard tuning from the Apple version, so now it's 12 note retune only. Really backwards move, deeply disappointing.

Micro and alternate tuning is built into Logic itself though including Scala import, the only problem with this would be if you wanted different tunings per instance, but the advantage is that the whole project understandings that tuning, including and especially the midi recording/editing. Very few DAWS have this level of microtonal and alternate tunings (because it is really about alternate tunings, these are not always microtonal) support.

Isn´t that bound to 12 notes per octave in Logic always. You can´t use 13 or more if you want/need?

Isn't that true of most 'microtonal' synths though too apart from the few like Pianoteq that support keyboard remapping and kbm files.

No....again here (posted that link before) is the best list of all and how they support actually microtuning. I prefer tools with .tun file import since they always work for me. Simply it set a frequency to every midi key. It could also include different scales in one file and in different orders etc. A lot synths actually supports this and even some of my favorite ones.
With some tools which support just .scl i have sometimes problems and they not always seems to work as they should if i import such files.
You might find no better info about this: http://xenharmonic.wikispaces.com/List+ ... re+Plugins

[ReverendLove]

No, it takes the values from a tun file and translates them per MIDI note, so it can handle any 128 note scale. The 0.01 bit is just changing the value from the tun stored one to the format Halion's changeTune requires. Why they couldn't have built that into Halion I have no idea, but that script lines up with most other synths that accept tun files. One thing that surprised me was the accuracy, it accepts a load of decimal places, so the exact tuning values are useful (as opposed to the simplified list, usually at the start of a tun file).

Wow Six lines of code for this. I should consider getting Halion. In Kontakt I have HGS Microtonal which can do all sorts and you can write own array files.
For some experiments on pure oscillators I used CSound and pure data.

Yes, I read the link you provided before (I think it's how I wrote my Reaktor retuner), but it's really not very satisfying to make music with. I can't find an easy way of updating the tables and then the accuracy is disappointing, it seems to only be able to get to the nearest cent (as opposed to that changeTune function in H6, for example). It's really the same method as I've provided for H6 (2D table of values - note# and cents/frequency, pick entry by MIDI note number), but it takes so much longer to get a scale into it and it's less accurate - a distinct lack of fun.

Didn't tried it yet. But I definetely will do.
The hardest problem seems to be the table framework and the fact not having easy string manipulation there. I can only imagine to use core tables with the editor and especially prepared text files. If I will have done that I'll let you know.

[monomaker]

With some tools which support just .scl i have sometimes problems and they not always seems to work as they should if i import such files.

Scl files only have the functional tuning in, so if it doesn't work it's worth trying to transpose everything 3 notes up or down (some synths use C as the root note, others A). This sometimes works and everything is suddenly in tune. This only applies to vsti's that don't accept kbm's but do accept scl's. This is a sign of poor implementation, tun files are easier to implement but likely to be less accurate (very few devs support the functional tuning in tun files).

Functional tuning only became available in v.2 of the tun spec, v1 files only contain the tuning and exact tuning tables.

[monomaker]

Wow Six lines of code for this. I should consider getting Halion.

LOL, I thought six lines too many. Also, there's no way of locking the tuning, which I find irritating too. Halion is great, but microtuning for it is fiddly. In the manual it says it can take Scala files, when you try a non-12 note file it'll tell you the truth.

In Kontakt I have HGS Microtonal which can do all sorts and you can write own array files.

Do you mean the HGS Scala Creator VSTI? Do you use this much?

Didn't tried it yet. But I definetely will do.

Hope you have better luck with it than I did!

[Cinebient]

Microtonal sampling would be great to get a more natural thing. A multi sampled instrument with velocity layers would have 1000GB
Omnisphere 3 anyone
But for physical modeling tools and synths like Pianoteq indeed it is more easy to sound good at this maybe.
But i also hate the workflow in Kontakt and in Falcon it works great with the included tunings but when i load my own it doesn´t work well with many instruments.
I wish Spectrasonics would make a Stringscape and/or Guitarscape library.
It´s so easy with Omnisphere and it sounds mostly very good.
I wish today we already had better tools where you could just draw your own midi layout/scale (like Wilsonic scales f.e.) via all these pencils and digital pens and just use them as midi keyboard then.
But i saw this here and wonder if it will work for Falcon too since it is for the UVI workstation :

[ReverendLove]

Do you mean the HGS Scala Creator VSTI? Do you use this much?

No, no need for this plugin. It creates only Scala files.
Scala itself can create Kontakt scripts IIRC.

What I wrote about is a script for Kontakt to put in the script folder. You select the script and you're done. It is really fun and inspirational stuff. it has 300+ tunings on board.

It is here on KVR.

https://www.kvraudio.com/product/kontak ... own-sounds

[Cinebient]

Today the developer of Wilsonic posted some interesting news for me and i still ask me if there is no plug-in which can do that. I guess it would need polyphonic pitch bend to make it work then.
There must be something like this for desktop as well? Or?
What he wrote:
"Hi guys,

Good news is that I am developing a feature for midi out for Wilsonic, bad news is I don't have a timeline just yet (talking weeks or months). I am currently migrating much of the microtonality to the open source project AudioKit, which has a feature called "etNNPitchBend", which takes a microtonal scale's midi note number and maps it to a 12ET note number plus PitchBend. This feature is being tested now by AudioKit developers."

[monomaker]

Scala itself can create Kontakt scripts IIRC.

Pretty sure they stopped working 2 versions of Kontakt ago.

What I wrote about is a script for Kontakt to put in the script folder. You select the script and you're done. It is really fun and inspirational stuff. it has 300+ tunings on board.

Ahh, I had seen that before, don't think I ever tried it. So it works well? The tunings match OK? I'll give it a go, thanks!

[Cinebient]

This list might include even some more (but is also not on the latest update yet). Scroll a bit down.....
http://huygens-fokker.org/scala/

[monomaker]

There must be something like this for desktop as well?

In theory Scala can do it, in practice every time I've tried it's been terrible (MIDI timing comes back all over the show and the resultant pitches can be quite a way off, depending on the target vsti). I'm going to buy the H Pi CSE program too, because that has a live retune feature (another MIDI pitch bend one).

It seems like it's just not a great method but if anyone has had experience to the contrary I'd love to hear it.

[Cinebient]

There must be something like this for desktop as well?

In theory Scala can do it, in practice every time I've tried it's been terrible (MIDI timing comes back all over the show and the resultant pitches can be quite a way off, depending on the target vsti). I'm going to buy the H Pi CSE program too, because that has a live retune feature (another MIDI pitch bend one).

It seems like it's just not a great method but if anyone has had experience to the contrary I'd love to hear it.

I have both but really hate the workflow and it´s like another language for me.
Installing was already a challenge for me
So i might have no choice other than using my iOS device for these things.
I want this as midi FX plug-in.
But yes, the midi pitch bend thing might never work, especially if it takes note numbers and then pitch bend. In a .scl or .tun file the incoming number is defined. But if these live retuning using the same midi number and then pitchbend it could be that some notes will be way off and highly stretched rather than getting the next possible frequency.
I didn´t tried it with the CSE but will do if it let me do it in another way.

[monomaker]

I have both but really hate the workflow and it´s like another language for me.

Yeah, they're not the easiest things to use. I've got a real love/hate relationship with Scala, it's not very intuitive and takes a lot of work, on the other hand it can handle most tuning jobs with to vary degrees of success. I bought CSE, will try it out this week.

Making music is meant to be creative and fun, not spending all of your time trying to work out how accurate systems are, programming and working out how to use complicated programs. I think this is one of the reasons more people don't experiment with microtonal music, it's got a steep learning curve and the tools are comparatively poorly developed. Even the good ones don't necessarily make it easy to complete whole pieces of music, rather small experiments. All of that must change if we're going to escape the 12 TET rut thats defined the last century and a half.

So i might have no choice other than using my iOS device for these things.

Some of those apps look great, I've got an iPad on the way just so I can try them all out.

[borealfarmer]

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