Improved Timpani and Tam Tam
Both the timpani and the tam tam sound horrible. They also are unable to play nearly as loud as some instruments, like the trumpets and trombones. Being a percussionist myself, I am desperate.
Do you still have an unanswered question? Please log in first to post your question.
Comments
I'm trying to figure out the tam-tam, but you can at least adjust the volume of the separate instruments via the Mixer (mentioned at https://musescore.org/en/node/96436). You may also find you like an alternative SoundFont better—you can download a few from https://musescore.org/en/node/36171#list.
In reply to I'm trying to figure out the by Isaac Weiss
I finally found an amazing tam tam!! If you download the sonatina orchestra sound font, go to the mixer and choose the sound "all percussion" for any instrument. Then click the g or the a and you will get a great gong sound.
In reply to I finally found an amazing by meganemer4
Two years late, but oh well. I downloaded the soundfont, but I can't seem to find the option for a tam anywhere. How can I find it and use it?
Unfortunately the GM standard doesn't include gongs or tam-tams.
Consequently the nearest sound in the default soundfont to it has been used which is the chinese cymbal.
I use the Roland Orchestral Rhythm soundfont when I wish to use gong or tam-tam in my work. To be found here.....
http://soundfonts.darkesword.com/
The only downside is that all the soundfonts listed there are in SFPack format which you will need to uncompress them. This is fine if you're on Windows, but Linux and Mac Users may have a problem there.
It would be good to include a gong and a tam-tam in the default soundfont, and I will try to source some suitably licensed samples.
The Timpani isn't the worst I've heard, it suffers from only having three samples across the range, and is, again, on the list for eventual improvement.
Keep your eye on the soundfont forum which is where announcements about changes to the default soundfont are made.
In reply to Unfortunately the GM standard by ChurchOrganist
What do you think of raising the volume level of the timpani?
In reply to What do you think of raising by Isaac Weiss
People need to remember that a volume control can go down as well as up :)
If the brass is too loud compared to the timps - turn it down in the mixer!
Part of the problem is that the timps are getting attenuated somewhere - the samples themselves are pretty loud. Also there different filter levels for the different velocity splits, which again aren't helping.
I find when using timps that I usually need to up the velocity levels in the inspector in order to get the timbre to sound right.
I did recently have a look at replacing the samples with the ones from SSO but I wasn't very happy with the result.
I will have a look to see whether I can fix the attenuation, although they seem loud enough in Viena.
Perhaps there's some attenuation going on in the FluidSynth implementation - IIRC we added a little to stop artifacts appearing in the SF3 version - #21814: Playback of SF3 features loud pops
We can do very little about this until a new version of libsndfile is released.
In reply to People need to remember that by ChurchOrganist
I know that you did raise the level of the drumkits in FluidR3Mono version 2.10, so I thought perhaps the timpani was in need of the same.
In reply to People need to remember that by ChurchOrganist
It looks like a new version of libsndfile has been released in november. Maybe we could take another look?
In reply to It looks like a new version by [DELETED] 5
Very good idea Lasconic :)
In reply to People need to remember that by ChurchOrganist
I took a look at the timps during the past day, and I may have hit on the problem.
You may be interested to know that attenuation on the timps was reduced from 11.5 to 10.0 in version 2.09
I think part of the problem is that the decay and release envelopes aren't set well enough to allow the sample tail to come through on short notes.
Working on it.
In reply to I took a look at the timps by ChurchOrganist
I have improved the Timp sound considerably, although it is still not as good as it could be due to only being composed of 3 samples.
The Decay phase of the ADSR enevelope was set as longer than the Release! Guess the original designer wasn't fully au fait with amplitude envelope concepts.
I've also removed the global attenuation.
In reply to I have improved the Timp by ChurchOrganist
I'd like to request that even without replacing the timpani samples, their volume be increased, a lot. I tested it in several contexts, and as far as I can tell the preset's attenuation of of 10dB should be changed to -10dB.
In reply to What do you think of raising by Isaac Weiss
well NO KIDDING. It doesn't go loud enough.
In reply to well NO KIDDING. It doesn't by meganemer4
Have you tried the latest version of FLuidR3Mono?
It is sounding a lot better now
You can find it here....
https://musescore.org/en/node/41521#comment-428021