Garritan Personal Orchestra 5

Discuss playback problems, including VST, Garritan, MIDI, etc.

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Vinkelheimer
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Finale Version: 25
Operating System: Windows

Post by Vinkelheimer » Mon Mar 01, 2021 8:20 pm

I need something to give me better sounds than the SmartMusic Softsynth or Garritan sounds that come with Finale.

I have tried NotePerformer, but I don't like the way all the brass sounds in that program come out very accented and marcato.

What about Garritan Personal Orchestra 5? Can someone give me your comments on that program?


BuonTempi
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Finale Version: Finale 27
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Post by BuonTempi » Mon Mar 08, 2021 5:31 pm

The Garritan Instruments in Finale are a subset of those from GPO5 and other Garritan libraries: but they are the least good ones. GPO5 contains many more playing styles and samples -- there are over 100 violin instruments.

You'll get better results than with GIFF alone, but the real advantage comes when you start to tinker with it, either in a DAW (Cubase, Logic etc) or with Finale's playback controls.

However: I'm unaware of any other choice that's under $150 and works out-of-the-box with Finale.

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DavidGaines
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Finale Version: Finale 26.3
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Post by DavidGaines » Mon Mar 22, 2021 3:59 pm

However: I'm unaware of any other choice that's under $150 and works out-of-the-box with Finale.
The Virtual Playing Orchestra is free, responds well to Human Playback, and is great for layering with GPO5. Be sure to download the Performance Orchestra version, which uses CC#1 to control volume like GPO does, if you're going to use the two libraries together.

http://virtualplaying.com/virtual-playing-orchestra/
Last edited by DavidGaines on Mon Mar 22, 2021 4:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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David Gaines, DMA | Composer
Finale 26.3.1, Windows 10, GPO5, COMB2, JABB3, NotePerformer 3.3, VSL SE + downloads
davidgainesmusic.com

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DavidGaines
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Finale Version: Finale 26.3
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Post by DavidGaines » Mon Mar 22, 2021 4:09 pm

What about Garritan Personal Orchestra 5? Can someone give me your comments on that program?
GPO5 includes a larger collection of instruments than is included for free with Finale, and a MUCH wider variety of articulations. It really can't be beat for a library that costs less than $200. For me, the trick is to adjust the 3-band EQ for each instrument inside the Aria player carefully in order to get more authenticity out of the sounds. You'll also need to make some additions and corrections to the articulations list inside Human Playback Preferences. But if you're willing to do some tinkering, you will get very good results with it.

I also highly recommend reading through these blog posts from Jon Burr, an arranger who uses Garritan extensively, in order to resolve common playback issues with GPO:

https://www.rpmseattle.com/of_note/gett ... in-finale/

https://www.scoringnotes.com/tutorials/ ... tempo-map/
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David Gaines, DMA | Composer
Finale 26.3.1, Windows 10, GPO5, COMB2, JABB3, NotePerformer 3.3, VSL SE + downloads
davidgainesmusic.com

tss-music
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Finale Version: 26.3
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Post by tss-music » Sat Mar 27, 2021 3:33 pm

Great info, DavidGaines. Could you elaborate on how you use the 3-band EQ in the Aria player? I've been really unclear on which settings in Aria I can actually adjust and which are subsequently undone by Finale HP. Also, any issues with installing VPO alongside GPO5, or should one just do what seems logical and charge ahead?

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DavidGaines
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Post by DavidGaines » Sat Mar 27, 2021 7:03 pm

Could you elaborate on how you use the 3-band EQ in the Aria player? I've been really unclear on which settings in Aria I can actually adjust and which are subsequently undone by Finale HP.
I use my ears. ;-) That's really all it takes. Some instruments sound great out of the box; others require some fiddling. The euphonium and bass trombone, for example, are pretty awful (I was a euphonium and bass trombone player so I'm fussy about those) so I spent a lot of time EQing those until they sound very, very acceptable.

The EQ controls (accessed for all instruments that have them - not all of them do - from the Controls tab on the right side of the Aria player) are marked low, mid, and high, and the midrange includes a variable frequency control for dialing in the precise midrange frequency you want to boost or cut. Again, it takes trial and error on your part to find the settings that please you. What I recommend is carving out some time to sit down for a session specifically for EQing the instruments you use most often and then saving them (Click in the upper right area where it says Ensemble, then click "save" in the drop down menu). The time you spend doing this will make your GPO5 instruments dramatically more realistic and pay dividends in your audio exports down the line. Another thing to spend time on for fine tuning purposes is the convolution reverb included in Aria, which is an AMAZING addition they threw in a few years ago. It really, really adds to the realism.

Note: There are frequently dynamics/balance issues with Garritan instruments, i.e. some instruments, such as unpitched percussion, are frequently reported to be ultra quiet compared with other instruments in the ensemble. If you experience this, - I recommend that you load your "quiet instruments" into one bank, your "normal" instruments into a 2nd, and your "loud" instruments into a 3rd. Again, this is something you'll pick up on the more experience you have listening to your playbacks. Then you can use the horizontal volume sliders for each bank on the right side of the VST Banks & Effects (or AU Banks & Effects if you're using a Macintosh computer) dialogue box to adjust each bank's volume separately to compensate for these volume issues if you experience them. You shouldn't be entering all different dynamics markings (e.g. fff for a "quiet" instrument and pp for "loud" instruments in order to compensate for the volume difference when they should all be marked mf) - set the volume faders inside Aria and inside the Finale mixer for all instruments at the same level, and then use the VST/AU Banks & Effects individual bank volume sliders to compensate.
Also, any issues with installing VPO alongside GPO5, or should one just do what seems logical and charge ahead?
Just charge ahead. Again, be sure to download the VPO sample set that uses the mod wheel (CC#1) to control volume, as Garritan does, and your layering should work fine without your having to fuss with additional customization of the Human Playback settings.

You can do the layering by creating duplicate staves for the VPO instruments, which is pretty clunky, but if you're using Finale solely as a playback device and don't care about how the score looks, that will work fine. Otherwise, the cleanest way to layer (although a bit tricky at first) is to create a text expression that triggers a MIDI data dump which will send the information on the staff to which you've assigned the expression to 1 or 2 additional MIDI channels simultaneously.

For example, let's say you have a piece for orchestra and you've loaded your GPO woodwinds into bank 1, your GPO brass into bank 2, your GPO percussion into bank 3, your GPO strings into bank 4, and then did the same thing with your VPO instruments in banks 5 through 8. So, the Score Manager has assigned your Violins I staff to the GPO violins, which are in bank 4/channel 1, which Finale sees as MIDI channel 49. Separately, you've loaded your VPO first violins into bank 8, channel 1, which Finale sees as MIDI channel 113. So you'll create a text expression to attach to the Violins I staff that will duplicate all of that information to MIDI channel 113 without you having to duplicate any of the notation. Pretty slick, right?

The instructions for creating this text expression that will trigger a playback data dump are in this page from the Finale online manual: http://usermanuals.finalemusic.com/Fina ... DMPDLG.htm

FINALLY - I STRONGLY recommend that you upgrade from Finale 25 to Finale 26.3.

So that's it - keep asking questions if you have any, and let me know how this works out for you.
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David Gaines, DMA | Composer
Finale 26.3.1, Windows 10, GPO5, COMB2, JABB3, NotePerformer 3.3, VSL SE + downloads
davidgainesmusic.com

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