10.4 Studio Horns observations and advice

I’ve been experimenting with the 10.4 Studio Horns to create a Jazz “Big Band” template for composition and mockups. I’d like to share some of my insights and perhaps get some new ones from the community here.

 

The Studio Horns contain all of the instruments typical of a traditional Big Band i.e. 4 trumpets, 3 tenor trombones and a bass-trombone, and a sax section with 2 Altos, 2 Tenors and a Baritone Sax. The new LPX manual states that each should be accessible via separate MIDI channels from a single instance of the Studio Horns plugin. Despite attempts I haven not been able to get a 13 channel-strip/MIDI-channel multi-output instance of SHs to work. This would allow a quick “faking” of Big Band tutis by utilizing the voice split feature of the multi-instrument instance by simply playing the chords in on a keyboard.

 

I was able to create a track stack with single instrument instances for the Trumpets, Trombones and Saxes respectively that worked pretty good (unison lines from the “stack bus” would pass on the Note/CC/Articulation-ID info. This is when I found in the LPX manual that there are extra art-IDs for: Trumpet 1, Trombone 1, Alto Sax 1 & Tenor Sax 1. Presumably these are to create more realistic solos from one example of the most common soloing instruments. Still, it is curious that they wouldn’t just include ALL of the articulations for ALL of the instruments. The “scoop” and “marcato” articulations would be very useful in harmonized and unison Solis for each section. I rearranged the articulations in the articulation-editor to better fit my preferences and to ensure that articulations played from the “stack” played correctly in all instruments of that section.

 

The next quirky observation is that even when set to “Controller (Absolute)” mode (where dynamic level is exclusively controlled by where the corresponding CC is at that moment, ONLY the “sustain” articulation responds in real time after the note has begun. In other words; you can do a swell/fade-in/fade-out/crescendo/decrescendo with the sustain articulation but the other articulations only play out from the level decided by where the CC is at when the articulation is selected. This probably has to do with the limitations of the EXS programming underlying the plugin. The “Expressive” articulations are essentially sustained notes with their recorded swells crescendo/decrescendo and play out from the starting level (where the CC was at the time they start).

 

Despite the quirks of this plugin, I have to say that I have been able to achieve much better results than all of my attempts with Garritan Jazz & Big Band for an accurate approximation of a full ensemble (and solo instances as well). I do like the “combo” patches from JABB, because they use keyswitches for all of the common mutes and doubling played by each seat of the ensemble (trumpets have straight, Harmon and plunger mutes and double on Flugelhorn, saxes double on soprano, flute and clarinets etc.) The sound of LPX Studio Horns doesn’t compare to the examples that I have heard from “Samplemodeling” (company), but now I have a pretty good Big Band template that would fool the general public for those type of sounds and would serve as an example of the sound of my Big Band arrangements to prospective clients.

 

Here is an example of a few sketched out bars to illustrate. The full Horns with bass and drums, then the saxes by themselves, trumpets alone, trombones alone and then full ensemble again for reference. Forget the composition and arrangement for a second and give me some feedback on how real you think the Horns sound in context. Also if anyone has further insights about getting the most out of this plugin, I’d love further feedback.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/4njmfv02jn3ejm5/Studio%20Horns%20Big%20Band%20Experiment_Full%20%26%20Sections.m4a?dl=0

Sounds pretty good to me. Very convincing in most places. Although consider my opinion as a profane one.

I’ve been ‘following’ this thread and am also quite impressed with as much as you have done with the new Studio Horns. They sound almost real, but what can one expect, under the circumstances.

Arranging the parts for the various instruments is no small feat either.

 

I’ve been working on a few arrangements but it’s tedious and ‘slow-going’ with so many options but most enjoyable when I get the chance to work with it. I like the Strings too.

 

Without having to lay out hundreds of dollars for the expensive pro stuff, the new samples & Artics as part of Logic Pro are a fabulous deal, IMHO.

Here is an example of a few sketched out bars to illustrate. The full Horns with bass and drums, then the saxes by themselves, trumpets alone, trombones alone and then full ensemble again for reference. Forget the composition and arrangement for a second and give me some feedback on how real you think the Horns sound in context. Also if anyone has further insights about getting the most out of this plugin, I’d love further feedback.

The mockup sounds really good. The trumpets are the biggest offenders to my ears. They seem to have a synthyness to them that the other instruments don't.

 

I also think it might help sell the mockup better if you treated bass and drums programming a little more. The sounded a little boxy to me. I know they having nothing to do with the horns, but I figure everything helps.

Nice work. I've been spoiled by the Sample Modeling/Audio Modeling stuff.... If you're serious about doing Big Band Mock Ups... IMHO, this is the way to go... here's a link to some of my mock ups. All done with SM instruments and my trusty breath controller;

 

The trumpets are the biggest offenders to my ears.

Granted Paul! I was thinking the same. Still I got better results than using the JABB libraries.

I've been spoiled by the Sample Modeling/Audio Modeling stuff.... If you're serious about doing Big Band Mock Ups... IMHO, this is the way to go...

Yep, everything I’ve heard from the Sample Modeling/Audio Modeling libraries is about as good as it gets! I’m jealous! Hopefully they’ll fit in the budget someday. Thanks for the reply to all you guys!

Airforceguitar - Any chance you’d still have that mockup you did? The dropbox link is dead.

 

Just started playing with Studio Horns today...

Danrad - thanks for reposting your link - your mock ups sound awesome!

 

But if I’m not mistaken, those were created using the Sample Modeling samples - I’m hoping to hear the OP’s tracks that were done with LPX’s Studio Horns, as thats all I’ve got!

Two/three years down the line from the OP and still the Studio Horns will not sustain for more than 3/4 seconds and, to make it worse, the saxes sustain fractionally longer than the brass. Was that intentional, Apple? Please note: I'm not interested in live keyboard performances. I take a notation midi file into logic and apply the instruments in an attempt to produce an authentic playback. How can people on here claim to be satisfied? I'm not asking for the Earth, I just want to sustain a note over 3 – 4 bars and the fact that Studio Horns won't do this is really strange. I have failed to modify the instruments through Sampler because the option to add them doesn't appear.