Recent content by Chrisulrich

Dear Anyone. So mixwise - gainstaging wise - my pieces come in 3 flavours. 1.) Pieces that sound the same as anyone elses volume-wise - till you drop them into something like Audacity and see they're clipping like a hairdresser on steroids! 2.) Pieces that sound too quiet - till you do...

Dear Anyone. Pretty basic piece, 2 instances of a piano (left and right hands kept separate) sparkly pad panned left, soundfont choir panned right masquerading as the top end of the sparkly pad. Idea is, piano sits nicely in middle of pad-and-choir masquerading as One Beautiful Backing New...

Dear Everyone. Firstly - thanks for all the great advice I've had here, you're wonderful. Secondly - I thought I understood reverb till I read three different descriptions of it that seemed to contradict eachother. Here goes. First. "Reverb is used to push sounds back in a mix." Fair...

Hi all! I'm 54, and I've been writing music for, like, 20 years and more and I'm still looking for someone to walk me through doing it all properly. With most teachers, it's one of 3 things.... "You've not got the Most Modern Software/Most Modern Applemac Logic" (I use notation software cos I'm...

Dear All. Sorry I wasn't clear enough - no sarcasm intended there, my bad! I can't play anything because of co-ordination problems so I use a lovely notation package called Quick Score Elite Level 2. Which is 32-bit and REALLY designed for Windows XP, though it runs in Windows 10 under...

Thanks - thought it was something like that. GAAH!! Hate 64-bit nightmare VSTs - never gotten on with any of them, love my 32-bit one because it's pure notation, you can just sit there and happily write music with it rather than wondering where to FIND anything! All these modern 64-bit jobs...

Dear Anyone. I'm working in 32-bit because I've got disability software that never got updated so I have to watch out for memory usage, or the whole thing just crashes and burns and takes your work with it! Most modern VSTs seem to be monotimbral, dunno WHY, but that seems to be the case...

Dear Everyone. I'm writing solo piano tracks using a piano VST. It's Edirol Orchestral, it's a nice, clear sound but all the tips on filling up a mix with a solo instrument that I can find are all dependent on mike placement, room type etc. I can't find anything on mixing a piano if all you've...

Dear Paj. He did answer - but we're talking a top-of-the-range composer here, he told me to buy Omnisphere! OK so he's probably totally correct but one look at the price of that thing and my credit card died of shock - there's gotta be a cheaper way to get a few decent background pad sounds...

Dear Anyone. Two things before I ask the question. First - if the question smells like bull, it's because I don't really know what I'm talking about. I'm basically not very well self-taught here so I'm kinda groping in the dark (did that sound bad!?!) Secondly - I know you can get things...

Dear Anyone. I use notation and MIDI for everything, am disabled, can't use anything else. Am trying to get the hang of mixing the New Age music I'm trying to write and I've hit a dichotomy (don't worry, am suing the guy who left it in the road!) I've read that in MIDI notation it should be...

Dear Anyone. I've got a bunch of free synths (high budget operator, me!) and I'm happy with the sounds for what I want to use them for, but they've all got the same problem. No CC controls, so how the heck are you supposed to control volume/velocity/panning etc? Is there any kind of plug-in...

Dear Anyone. I'm a wannabe basic New Age composer. You know - lead sound, pads/strings. Thing IS - I've found a bunch of wonderful threads here about mixing - but not about making the sounds sound good BEFORE you mix them! That's the bit I cant do. If I write a piano'n'strings track (think...

Dear Anyone. Depending on the answer to this, might be a follow-up question but for now - hear(!) goes! I'm just hoping this doesn't sound too vague, because I'm trying to wrap my head around all of this mixing stuff. OK, if you've got - say - a real bunch of 23 real violinists in your back...

Dear Anyone. I'm disabled so everything's MIDI and mouse for me. I use a notation program which I've MIDI Yoked to Ableton Live 8.1. I've only just got the package - legit, it's not cracked, just secondhand - and after a day's strugling managed to set up one multitimbral instrument with 4...