By
Jamon
Fri Aug 24, 2012 7:05 pm
I actually started off trying not to write long, since your tl;dr-ing might explain why you keep talking about multisampling when that is not what I'm talking about, and it can't achieve the same effect. But without a whiteboard, voice, or video, it feels like it needs more detailed explanation to convey what is imagined, because all I have to talk with is text, and really what I need is to draw, and make sounds.
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Yeah, for adding variation to the instrument beyond what multisampling and modulation can accomplish the sample start parameter and chop might work.
But there are multiple uses for what was described. It's a quick way to achieve effects that otherwise would require a lot of work to setup and program.
For example, suppose you sample a 1-minute bass solo at the BPM of your sequence. With the legato instrument, you could play with it without chopping or programming.
It's already in time with your sequence, so if you only wanted some of the notes to play, you could simply use the root note as a gating effect that uses ADSR.
Then if you wanted to switch up some of the melody, instead of the root note, you hit any other pad to have it tuned up or down in semitones.
With a bass solo, you could chop it up, and manually tune some of the notes, and get a similar effect. But it's not exactly the same, is extra work, with less playability.
For example, what if I gave you a .wav of a bunch of C notes being played in the rhythm and time I want, but I want you to switch it up by changing the melody, and dropping some notes, but without changing the performance?
If you sampled a symphony or full band off vinyl, you could chop it up, and you'll get that very sample-music sound, with abrupt changes, and repetition. You could also do a lot of work programming to manually get it to flow while still making it your own.
Or, you could use the legato instrument, and play it, in realtime, without breaking its fluidity. It's a different method.
With chops, it's about cutting up a performance, and rearranging it, tweaking each chunk of sound.
With legato, you start with the performance already in time with your sequence, and you don't have to do any programming work, you just play it, with keyboard or pads.
Chops is for rearranging chunks of a performance, legato is for leaving the performance order alone and changing how it's expressed.
Legato is like surfing a wave, shifting it as you go. You don't change the wave, you just ride it and shape its expression.
So if your orchestra is playing in time with your sequence already, you leave the timing along, to preserve its original continuity. To get a stab effect for example, you don't chop it and trigger a section when you want it, you let it play, and decide when it's heard or not. Then if it is, you can modify its tune with the pads in semitone steps, and its filter with the Q-links.
You can't easily do that with chops and the like. It's possible to program it manually to do what you want, but it's a lot of work, and it's not playable in the same way, where you can experiment with playing it as an instrument.
This is not about multisampled instruments. It's an alternative approach to chopping type stuff, where instead of manually slicing up a sample, and breaking the continuity, you start with something already played in time, then your work is not spent programming, but playing in realtime how that underlying sound is expressed.
You have your underlying sound. It respects the same loop points, so even if you didn't have a long enough sample you could just loop it. Then you merely make a new legato instrument and select it. Now you can instantly shift its pitch in semitones.
There are options for how it handles the time of the underlying sample.
CONTINUE: It can play from where it left off. So if you press the pad for 1 second, then let go, the sound stops, and when you press again it plays from the 1-second mark.
SEQUENCE: It can play with the sequence time, so if your sequence plays for 2 seconds, then you press the pad, it plays the underlying sample from the 2-second mark.
BEAT (size: 1/2, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16; time: continue or random): It can play in beat chunks, so if you set it to play 1/4 chunks, progressively, then you hit the pad and hear it playing the first 1/4 beat of the sample, until you want it to stop by releasing, and the 2nd time you press the pad it plays the 2nd 1/4 chop. The size might be changeable in realtime with the TC or Q-link. If it's random, then each time you press the pad it starts playing from the beginning of whatever beat size you have set, but anywhere in the sample.
Do you see how this uses what's already built in JJOS, so it's not anything fundamentally new, but would provide an option that sometimes would allow you to achieve what you would with chopping and manual programming by doing nothing more than recording a sample with the right time and tempo then creating a new legato instrument?
Imagine if you sampled 2 minutes worth of an acoustic drum beat, then simply created a new legato instrument and set it to play in beats of 1/4, where each kick would be. Then there's no chopping involved, you merely hit record and start playing, but hitting the root note pad when you want a kick. With either continuous or random mode, you're going to get a lot more variation with a lot less work than you ever could with chopping or multisampled instruments.
Yes, I know that in that specific case you can achieve the same result with other methods. But a legato instrument is versatile, in expanding realtime playable possibilities, while decreasing the amount of work you'd have to do for a lot of different uses.
I know you can non-destructive chop the same sample, setting each pad to play chop 1 with chromatic tuning, then use the Q-link to progress through the chops each time you play, or move it randomly. Then you can move to a chop with the slider, and hit a different pad to get it with a different timing.
It's nothing new. It's just a way to combine things that are already there in a way that can be useful in a lot of situations, while unlocking new possibilities that otherwise take way too much work to setup, and can't be played in realtime.
Why would you chop if you could achieve the same thing by simply creating a legato instrument instead?
