The New MuseScore Orchestra Soundfont for the Next Up-Coming Update (AS THE DEFAULT SOUNDFONT)!!!

• Oct 31, 2016 - 12:27

Hi Everyone! I have some Very Exciting News! I have made a New Version of the MuseScore orchestra Soundfont.

Note: This Soundfont I created is going to be the default for the Next Up-coming update for MuseScore, because a LOT of people dislike FluidR3, and I HATE it SO MUCH!!!

Anyways, this soundfont is mostly GeneralUser GS, and I do NOT own these rights. S. Christan Collins did the GeneralUser GS Soundfont. Anyways, I replaced these Orchestral Instruments from many different Orchestral Soundfonts like Squidfont Orchestral, Bellatrix Orchestra, and No Budget Orchestra, etc. Most of these Orchestral Instruments have a lot of Reverb, and the Rest of the instruments have regular effects.

Instrument Presets that have been replaced:

Concert Piano (Samples From the University of Iowa): http://theremin.music.uiowa.edu/MISpiano.html
Harpsichord (Blanchet from Soni Musicae): http://sonimusicae.free.fr/blanchet1-en.html
Crotales (From EWQL Orchestra Library - and Instead of Music Box)
Church Organ and Double Bass (From Timbres of Heaven): http://midkar.com/soundfonts/
Harmonium (From Church Combo Soundfont - and Instead of Reed Organ)
Violin, Fast Violin, Violin x Slide, and Slow Violin (From aaviolin)
Viola and Harp (From No Budget Orchestra): http://www.bandshed.net/sounds/sfz/
Cello (From Karoryfer x bigcat cello): http://www.karoryfer.com/karoryfer-samples/wydawnictwa/cello
Strings, Woodwinds, Brass, and Percussion (From Squidfont Orchestral): http://soundfonts.darkesword.com
Timpani (From Bellatrix Orchestra Soundfont)
Choir Ahh (From choir choral aahhs)
Irina Brochin Soprano (Instead of Synth Voice)
etc. etc.

This soundfont also has Solo Orchestral Brass and Woodwind Instruments and you can choose if you want the Sections or the solo instruments.

Wanna hear what it sounds like, Well here are some links to give you some examples

The first one is a demonstration of onestep.mid which uses this soundfont: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRe9bjxzNLI

And the next one uses All the Orchestral Instruments in the 4th Movement of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67f6xG1gaJw

You can download and try the soundfont by clicking on these links here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B2I_8bgGH-Q3a1hhTXVBNUtuNTg?usp… and at: http://www.mediafire.com/file/i244sqvo1xjabxx/New+MuseScore+Soundfont.s…

Let me know if it's going to work for the Default Soundfont for Musescore.

Have fun and enjoy the soundfont.

Comments

• Oct 31, 2016 - 12:44

Arriana, it has already been explained to you that this soundfont cannot be used for the MuseScore default as it contains samples which are not compatible with the GPLV2 licence it is distributed under.

The Soni Musicae samples are a particular problem as it clearly states in the licence that any remapping of the samples must be purely for personal use, so in the act of distributing your soundfont via this forum you are in breach of French copyright law and laying yourself open to prosecution.

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• Nov 1, 2016 - 09:09

No Arianna, I'm not trying to teach you a lesson, I'm trying to prevent you from getting into trouble due to not understanding the consequences of some of your actions.

In reality I suspect that MuseScore's reliance on SF2 soundfonts will diminish in future versions, due to the magnificent work of hpfmn for the Google Summer of Code this year. I see the importance of Zerberus, and the creation of SFZ instruments for it rising to the level that choosing an instrument from the list will automatically load the associated SFZ into Zerberus, and whilst SF2 will still be supported we will not be heavily reliant on it as we are now.

You did say in another thread that you would be willing to help with the maintenance and improvement of FluidR3, and I apologise for not having followed up on that. The problem has been that paid work has been consuming my time, and MuseScore has had to take a back seat.

But if you look at the forums, you can find a long list of found problems - you could begin with this one....
https://musescore.org/en/node/123771

The first stage will be to get all issues into the Issue Tracker so that both of us, and the rest of the development team are aware of who is working on what.

We will also need to set up some form of version control. I would prefer GitHub as that is familiar to me, but I'm concerned that the size of the FluidR3 soundfont will impact negatively on the repository.

And should you find suitably licensed samples for replacing some of the bad ones in FluidR3 do please start on the replacement process, but keep me and the rest of the dev team copied in on what you are doing.

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• Nov 2, 2016 - 12:50

Regarding collaboration for soundfont creation, Git (and now Github) supports git-lfs (large file storage). By storing the files on another medium and keeping track of their revision only on Git, it makes it possible to work with large binary files.
If anyone would like to collaborate on this, I'm happy to discuss and help on IRC https://kiwiirc.com/client/irc.freenode.net/?nick=musescore|?#musescore

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• Oct 31, 2016 - 21:06

Furthermore, please be aware that no one person (well, other than Werner I guess) can generally decide on their own to change the default soundfont even if an alternative is proposed that *can* be legally used. There will have to be general agreement among many people that it the proposed alternative is truly better, and also that it is not so large as to cause problems in installation or in actual usage, that there are no other concerns, etc.

Feel free to share your soundfont all you like, and if you ever create one that can legally be used as the default in Musecore, feel free to *propose* it for inclusion. But unless the development team has told you they have agreed to replace the default, please do not announce that this has happened.

Realistically, I suspect the soundfont you have created is *far* too large (like, by a factor of 10) to ever consider making it the default. If you wish to create a soundfont that is as good as possible, that's a laudable goal, but realize that many people won't be able to use it because they don't have enough memory. So you might also consider making a second stripped down version of the soundfont that strikes a better balance between sound quality and file size. but again, not point in doing this until you have samples that can legally be used for this purpose.

Note: there is a difference between simply informing you of facts, and trying to "teach a lesson". We are simply doing the former.

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• Oct 31, 2016 - 21:33

FWIW, totally aside from any issues of whether or not this particular soundfont could potentially be used as the default for a future version of MuseScore, I did check it out, and have some comments.

My main usage is jazz, so to me, the instruments I end up caring most about are saxophones, trumpets, and trombones. Also piano, acoustic bass, and drums - but realistically almost soundfonts do a passage enough job on these that it is almost always the winds that mnake the final determination for me in deciding between soundfonts for my own personal use.

I also do a fair amount of classical composition, most of this for small chamber groups, so the solo violin, viola, and cello (and contrabass - bowed - as opposed to the pizzicato acoustic bass) are also important, and then to a lesser extent things the other orchestral / band winds likes flutes, clarinets, oboes, bassoons, horns, or tubas.

Unfortunately trumpets and trombones are problematic in that often what makes for a good orchestral sound is not so great for jazz and vice versa. So it's almost never the case that any one soundfont will be ideal for both genres. That's also true for saxophone but luckily few people use saxophones in a setting where the orchestral sound is preferred.

Then there are all the guitars and various electric or ethnic or specialty instruments that I personally care about less so I might be willing to "buy" a smaller file size by compromising the quality of these. Others, of course, care more about these than saxophones, and would perhaps prefer someone compromised the quality of the saxophones where compromise is necessary to achieve a certain file size. Realistically, in order to make a good *default* soundfont, you'd want to compromise on quality for all instruments equally, or at least, determine which instruments are most commonly used and prioritize them.

Another area where genre makes a big difference is balance. If you are primarily writing for orchestra, you have an idea of how loud two trombones need to be relative to the rest of the brass and winds and strings, and might set the balance accordingly, but in a jazz setting, we're likely to hear those same trombones relative saxophones and trumpets, and a totally difference default balance might make sense (plus the music *role* of the instruments differs in a way that might affect this).

If you are truly interested in creating a soundfont that could work as a new default for MsueScore, you might consider starting discussions based on any or all of these points, to make sure you make choices that don't just reflect your own personal biases but also reflect the needs of the community at large.

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• Dec 11, 2017 - 06:16

You seem to mostly be saying that people who actually care about their music should install a soundfont specifically for that kind of music because the default should be a weird combo of the ways each instrument sounds in different types of music. It makes sense: have the default be a compromise between everything and then people like me can download Laurelin's symphonic sounds soundfont out something of the like while jazz people go for jazz, rock for rock and such. And what you said about the trumpets very well explained why the trumpet parts of my scores sound so much better with symphonic sounds.

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• Dec 11, 2017 - 18:25

It is definitely the case that different scores might be best served by different soundfonts. But it's not really accurate to say that people who "actually care about their music" need to be concerned with details of how the computer playback happens to sound on their own private system. As a professional musician, that is the least of my concerns. I care very deeply about the music itself - the notes I am entering. I care equally deeply about making sure it looks clear and readable on paper, so the human musicians who eventually play the score will do a good job. I care that the the computer-generated playback on my system accurately reflect the notes I entered and that the sounds used are close enough to the real instruments that I can get a rough idea of how it will eventually sound for real. If I have extra time on my hands, I might tweak Mixer settings to make sure the sections are balanced with respect to each other in a way I personally find pleasing.

But fiddling with different soundfonts just to get a slightly more realistic sounding trumpet, and hoping it doesn't come at the expense of less realistic saxophones - or using multiple soundfonts and painstakingly selecting different instruments from different soundfonts and re-balancing them in the Mixer - for me there is no added value in this. It in no way improves the quality of the printed sheet music or the sound I will hear when it is actually performed. And unless you are expert at this, most people could probably spend hours tweaking these things and still end up with something that doesn't sound any better than what they started with (same as, say, tuning a piano!).

So, it's important to get a default soundfont that serves the best interests of the most people well. Those few who happen to find it worth their time to experiment with other soundfonts are always welcome to do so.

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• Dec 13, 2017 - 18:25

Sure. But other people want a realistic soundfont for jazz, others want a realistic one for marching band music, etc. Only one can be the default, and this thread is specifically about selecting a particular new soundfont as the "DEFAULT SOUNDFONT" - that is, one to hopefully satisfy everyone to some extent. My point is that this is a tricky proposition.

A further complication is that the only real standard that exists for the organization of soundfonts is General MIDI, and while it's OK for pop / jazz and not too bad for certain classical chamber ensembles, it very limiting for larger scale classical music, since it doesn't define a number of important sounds nor does it define section sounds separate from individual instrument sounds aside from a general "brass" and "strings". So the ideal classical soundfont would not be GM-compatible, and this in itself makes it almost completely unsuitable for any other purpose.

Probably the best solution long term is to provide at least two soundfonts with MuseScore - a GM-compatible to use for most instruments, and an orchestrally-optimized one that can be loaded optionally. Would still be tricky to manage, though, due to the GM issue. We might need separate instrument definition file, or maybe separate listings for "solo trumpet (jazz/pop)" versus "solo trumpet (classical)" versus "section trumpet (jazz/pop)" versus "section trumpet (classical)", etc.

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• Dec 22, 2017 - 15:59

So we should have the default soundfont be what it is. (Maybe improved) And then an optional orchestra/concert band soundfont with the following:
Piccolo
Flute
Alto flute (no this does not sound exactly like a soprano flute)
Oboe
Cor Anglais/Baritone Oboe
Small clarinet (E-flat)
B-flat/A Clarinet
B-flat bass clarinet
Bassoon
Contraforte (A major improvement on the Contrabassoon which is okay but any orchestra with a contraforte will make that substitution)
Sopranino/tenor saxophone (Uses sopranino up high and tenor in low)
Soprano/Baritone sax
Alto sax
Sarrusophone (contrabass down low and soprano up high)
Double horn(Mistakenly called French)
Stopped horn
Baritone horn
Five trumpets
Trumpet solo
Muted trumpet
Cornet
Bass/tenor trombone
BB-flat/B-flat tuba
Euphonium
percussion (a percussion soundfont with concert bass drum loud and soft, snare hit and roll, cymbal roll, cymbal crash, tambourine hit roll and shake, gongs, whip, sleigh bells, castanet, and more)
Kettle drums
Crotals
GlockenspieL
Marimba
Tubular bells
Harpsichord
Grand piano
Upright piano
Celesta
Grand pedal harp
Violins
Pizzicato violins
Normal violin
Slow violin
Fast violin
Violin soli
Pizzicato violin
Viola section
Viola solo
Violoncelli
Violoncello pizzicato
Solo cello
Cello pizzicato
Contrabasses
Pizzicato contrabasses
Double bass
Double bass pizzicato
That should do the trick.
And they should be in that order. Since that's the order that scores are usually ordered, it makes it very convenient.

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• Nov 5, 2016 - 01:04

I truly hope this does become the default soundfont--The Fluid soundfont makes anything sound bad! Especially the clarinet, which makes strange popping noises after every note. (The clarinet is my principal instrument, too!) Good luck!!

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• Nov 5, 2016 - 09:31

As explained by others, this soundfont cannot become the default MuseScore soundfont for legal and practical reasons.

I'm not a lawyer. The following is my understanding and it would need more eyeballs... Especially if you can find the license I couldn't locate, it would be useful. Sometimes the license file is only available in the downloaded soundfont.

It's based on Christian Collins' General User GS. This is good. The license of this soundfont is very liberal and it can be used without restriction.

  • Concert Piano (Samples From the University of Iowa) seems to be considered public domain but I cannot find any statement. It would also be good.
  • Harpsichord (Blanchet from Soni Musicae): They use a custom license and it disallows the remapping of the samples except for personal use. Also It is forbidden to distribute this soundbank without permission.. Exactly what the google drive link in the top post is doing, and what MuseScore would do if that was the default soundfont...
  • Crotales (From EWQL Orchestra Library - and Instead of Music Box): I could be wrong but EWQL is a commercial soundbank, redistributing these samples is probably illegal.
  • Church Organ and Double Bass (From Timbres of Heaven): I cannot find an actual license for this soundfont. The website states that it cannot be redistributed anywhere but this website. We contacted Don Allen, the author, a year ago but he stated that the soundfont can be modified but the name needs to be kept... which is not practical. The "new musescore orchestra soundfont" would need to be renamed "Timbres of heaven"... Also, there is no public statement about the source of the samples.
  • Harmonium (From Church Combo Soundfont - and Instead of Reed Organ): I can't find the source or the license of this soundfont, so we have to consider it as non distributable...
  • Violin, Fast Violin, Violin x Slide, and Slow Violin (From aaviolin): I can't find the source or the license of this soundfont, so we have to consider it as non distributable...
  • Viola and Harp (From No Budget Orchestra): http://www.bandshed.net/sounds/sfz/
  • Cello (From Karoryfer x bigcat cello): The samples are licensed under CC-BY 3.0. It means that any composition using these samples should attribute the author of the samples. This is not practical for MuseScore and MuseScore users.
  • Strings, Woodwinds, Brass, and Percussion (From Squidfont Orchestral)I can't find the source or the license of Squidfont Orchestral) soundfont, so we have to consider it as non distributable...
  • Timpani (From Bellatrix Orchestra Soundfont): I can't find the source or the license of Bellatrix Orchestra Soundfont soundfont, so we have to consider it as non distributable...
  • Choir Ahh (From choir choral aahhs): I can't find the source or the license of "choir choral aahhs" soundfont, so we have to consider it as non distributable...
  • Irina Brochin Soprano (Instead of Synth Voice): This soundfont has been created by Simon Papel from PapelMedia. Unfortunately the website is down and I can't locate the license of the soundfont, so we have to consider it as non distributable...

@Arianna2001 and others, I applaud your enthusiasm in putting together a great sounding soundfont for MuseScore but as I explained several times, we need to be sure about the legality of all samples used in the soundfont. If we are not careful, MuseScore and MuseScore users could be prosecuted. I know it's no fun, but if you really want to participate in the creation of a new soundfont for MuseScore 3, it would be a lot more useful to track down the licensing of soundfonts and find the ones that can be used and distributed without restrictions and then access their quality. Doing it the other way around is unfortunately a loss of time since the end result will not be usable without breaking the law...

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• Nov 5, 2016 - 12:33

I am aware that some of you have seen this link before.

http://vis.versilstudios.net/vsco-community.html

VCSO2 is an open-source, open-ended subset of the main VSCO 2 branch designed for young composers, hobbyist sample library designers, and students around the world to create better sounding music for free, and learn more about the process of sample library development.

They have also updated their website with free Samples. I received an Email which provided the link to more samples.

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