Percussion sound quality in Finale 2008 (GPO)

Hello,

There's something that's been bugging me a little bit in Finale 2008. I can't get the percussion sounds (from GPO) to sound decent, especially the timpani (for example, the rolls in Eerie Remarks in bars 21, 40, 41, and 70 - just to mention some spots). I've heard quite a few pieces that other people have written in Finale, and the percussion parts always sound amazing. Am I missing something that you have to tell the program, or possibly set up in ambiance reverb thing? Or do people normally use a different sample library for percussion instruments?

This is just kind of bugging me because all of the instruments sound great except for the percussion, and I'm writing a piece with quite a few percussion parts right now, so it would be nice if they sounded at least decent.

The biggest one would be GPO's timpani, whenever I give it rolls, or even just louder sections, it doesn't have anywhere near the effect that I've heard some people get from it in their pieces. It could be that I'm just not writing rolls properly, they're notated with three slashes across the stem of the note, right?

Anyways, any suggestions that you could offer (different settings for the ambiance reverb perhaps, or even just a different sample library I could use?) would be really helpful, thanks!

For myself, I tend to set the GPO percussion to a louder base volume (instrument list).

As well, in the Kontakt Player 2, by clicking on the little gear icon on each instrument loaded, you can change the base "decibels" to a higher value, which I normally set to 6.

Another thing to do, and this requires more work setting up your score, is to MANUALLY load all your instruments and channel assignements rather than let the wizard do it.

The advantage to doing this is that you can then set your woodwind in one player, your brass in another, percussion in another, and strings in another. This lets you use the output volume adjustment for specific groups of instruments without affecting those from another group (ie: boosting percussion won't affect that flute). The output volume adjustment affects ALL instruments within a KP2.

This last requires placing all of "like" instruments in groups of 16 channels. So 1-16, in my set-up, are always woodwinds. I generally use one KP2 per orchestral choir.

BTW, you might also consider setting your clarinets to a slightly lower volume (in the Instrument List) than the rest of the woodwinds. For some reason, the clarinets that Garritan sampled are disproportionately louder than the other woodwinds. If my woodwinds are all set at 90, my clarinets are usually around 75-80.

Regarding this volume setting, my brass are normally all set to over 100. This allows them to punch a bit more.

For chamber music, however, you may need to reset the volumes to give more presence to the woodwinds.

For what it's worth, Relinquished, I don't have GPO (yet), but I noticed the one question you asked top which QC didn't respond - the question about notation. In my version of Finale (2005a), putting the three slashes (otherwise known as a Tremolo mark) on a Timpani line will produce a kind of roll... but. I've always been taught that, when notating rolls in an orchestral setting, the Trill symbol is used (Tr~~~~~). In Finale '05, there is absolutely no difference between the sound produced by a tremolo mark and a Trill symbol, unless I manually input how many notes per second I want with a trill, something you can't do with Tremolos.

I'll take a small deviation to explain why...

Tremolos are broken down in sections according to how many slashes there are - one slash usually means eighth notes, two slashes are sixteenth notes, and three slashes are thirty-second notes. Usually. If you see one slash on an eighth note, you'll obviously produce two sixteenth notes, and the breakdown continues in this pattern with all flagged notes.

A trill, on the other hand, leaves the interpretation up to the performer, for the most part. This is why Finale allows you to specify how many notes per second you want on a trill in the Human Playback settings. (Granted, there are some customs today for trill interpretation, but these are easily set aside in more romantic or later settings.) I would recommend that you use the trill symbol when writing in those rolls, especially on Timpani and Bass drum. Then you can control how many notes per second, etc.

However, should you wish for an exact subdivision, go with tremolo marks of whatever... um, caliber... you wish. I more often find myself using tremolo markings with smaller percussion (snares, etc) for those exact reasons, and when noting repetitive parts in the strings (or, occasionally, woodwinds).

I hope that I've been some help, and if anyone disagrees with something I've said, let me know - but I can confidently say that I'm practically quoting my own Music Theory teacher, for whatever that may be worth.

~Dallas

Dallas, either the trill symbol or the /// mark are acceptable as tremolo notation on timpani. Logically, it isn't really a "trill", so the /// symbol is actually more true to the effect.

However, anyone who tells you that it "must" be a trill marking is wrong. There is no engraving rule regarding this. Either is perfectly acceptable. I happen to us the hash marks rather than a trill symbol.

In Finale 2008, either symbol will be recognized for playback. One important factor is that the staff be properly named. If your staff has no name, then HP will not know how to interpret the symbol. Particularly if you put a trill.