6 February 2003
"In
March 2001, Andy Thomas showed me the beta version of SampleTank®. Compared with other high quality sampler software I had seen, it seemed straightforward
and easy to use. A couple of months later, I found myself at the studio of Petr Krkavec in Boscavica in the Czeck republic. It was a flying visit
to write a six minute string-quartet dance piece for a (lesbian!) vampire movie. I needed to create a convincing demo as a backing track for the filming,
as well as a score for the subsequent live quartet audio recording in two days! Locked in to Petr's studio for 24 hours straight, with only Logic,
SampleTank® and a coffee machine for company, I soon found SampleTank®'s friendly interface meant that I wasted little time getting set up.
I quickly found very useful string samples (solo and ensemble) with the immediacy and bite needed to get a good rhythmic feel in the music (baroque
with a crazed slavic element) for the dancers to work with, and giving an inspiring edge to the creative process generally. The results were exciting
and with very little time to record the live version, the SampleTank® demo was invaluable as a means of showing the players (with limited English)
the kind of feeling and balance I wanted.Later that year, I acquired a Mac Titanium laptop to make composing and arranging easier on the move. Andy Thomas installed SampleTank® for me which I could run within cubaseVST. Compared to the USM, SampleTank® really brought my ideas to life. I was soon using it in my arrangements for the Glam. electric string quartet 'Monaco'. I would make two versions: one as a complete demo for them (quartet parts included), and one with only the backing tracks (but including some ST string fattening) for the backing CD for their live concerts. When one of my composition students wrote a particularly fine Cello/Piano duo for his GCSE last year, I recorded it using the ST Acoustic Grand Piano HQ (big, exciting, and totally convincing) as well as my own acoustic cello. A very effective combination.
More recently, I was in Geneva playing concerts, when I got an urgent call for some orchestral string arranging/composing for a song backing track. Happily, I had my laptop and keyboard controller in my hotel room. The existing guitar, drum, and vocal tracks were emailed to me (in MP3 format) and I was able to immediately get to work on it. After converting them back to AIFF and putting the audio tracks into cubase, SampleTank® provided the string sounds (a combination of solo and ensemble) to realise my arrangement and create a convincing demo. Two days later we recorded the orchestra in London's Dukes Hall.
The multiple outputs of SampleTank® really save memory and processor power, which even on a G4 500 can get stretched to the limit when using dynamic processing and reverbs. These default effects associated with individual ST instruments sound good, but if the arrangement is complex, I tend to turn these off within individual ST instruments and apply the native processes in VST or Logic more globally to groups and main outputs to preserve processor headroom.
As a long time Logic user on my PC and more recently V.5 on my Mac, it seems rather a pity that the economical advantage of the multiple outputs of ST can't be used in Logic. I really hope that Emagic will soon remedy this. When given partially finished projects to work on, usually in VST or Logic format, it is an advantage to be able to apply favorite and familiar samples while conveniently remaining within the same sequencer file format the project started life on.
I've found the ST converter utility really useful. I can convert my favorite Akai samples (for example) and play them in ST which gives a big saving in HD storage, memory, and processor load. And, of course, it's all in my laptop!"
For more info on Hugh McDonnell check here.