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  • The APP -what is it for ?

    I fear this may be a dull question, but having looked a number of times at the video about the APP synthesiser, I am no nearer to understanding what it is for !! On the face of it, having a number of sequences available at the touch of a midi note, would seem to be  invaluable. But the only use I would find for this would be if I could copy and paste any chosen sequence into the Piano Roll in Logic. If it is the case that  I first have to find a sequence (or chord) that I like, and  then  transfer each note, one at a time into the Logic Piano Roll, then it would seem to me to be more trouble that it's worth. 

    Would someone much cleverer than me would be willing to enlighten this poor lost soul, or maybe point me to the exact place in the video (or manual) where I can find this information, I  would be eternally grateful !

    VSL never do anything that doesn't have great potential, so I'm sure I must be missing something !

    Best wishes

    Jerry


  • Hello Jerry. 

    Your understanding of APP is clearer than you realize. 

    "...available at the touch of a MIDI note." Right. And if you record the MIDI note triggering the APP sequence, the sequence plays back live. If you raise the MIDI note up a step, the sequence will also play a step higher, transposing it harmonically or chromatically, depending on the APP setting. 

    I encourage you to experiment with the patterns that come with APP, build a progression with them, and then record only the trigger notes. When you apply CCs (modulation, etc) to the trigger notes, that will affect the APP patterns. 

    You observed the need to "transfer each note, one at a time into the Logic Piano Roll." Here's where you're confused. There is no need to do this if your only goal is performance. All Logic (or any DAW) needs are the trigger notes. 

    BIG CAVEAT: if you want to print out a score, yeah, you'd have to shuttle the notes into Logic before it would appear in Logic's Score. 

    VSL has suggested that a copy and paste feature will allow that more expeditiously. But this will be a "tough get" as they say in tennis. Because one could conceivably perform a good portion of the open of Beethoven's Fifth with just trigger notes. As we know, that is all built on a four note motive. So you cut and paste the four note motive from APP into Logic? What do you have? Four notes -- nothing near what the trigger notes are playing. And if you notate the trigger notes alone, what do you have? Nothing recognizable as Beethoven's Fifth. 

    So really what we'd need to notate our APP perfomance is an APP BOUNCE that captures all the MIDI events that APP generates when it is triggered. Then that MIDI capture -- likely a MIDI file -- would be pasted into Arrange, at which time it would appear in Score, Piano Roll, etc. 

    I do not doubt that the rocket scientists at VSL can do that. I am less certain that they will direct resources to that end. 

    And this is why Herb stresses that APP is a sketchpad for musical improvisation only. I think they've drawn a line in the sand, for now, at least. 

    I wrote a cue that went deeply into APP, and quite soon I realized that I would probably never be able to print out the work, as the piece mushroomed with sixteenth note string runs at high tempos, multiplying and compounding over time. But neither could I have conceived or MIDI-performed the piece without APP. I acheived more realism in those runs than I ever had previously, and in one tenth the time. 

    So the moral is, with our present version of APP, the written transcription of what you are creating will get exponentially more complex and tedious to copy as the piece evolves. 

    But if performance is the only thing that matters, just the playback, then just record the trigger notes. Many of us trigger an APP running accompaniment of strings and then orchestrate around that within the DAW. It's flat out scary how credible and extended a piece one may write with APP. 


  • As a former software dev, I'm gonna suggest that it's one of those tools one inevitably writes that works well... but you wait around and realise it's a hammer for which there is no nail.

    My suspicion is that it was meant to be used as a 'phrase trigger' with the hope that one could 'atomise' every possible articulation that a player might have and then build phrases for things like brass rips, string glisses and so on... so they could be used in conjunction with notation. (Like in a score where there is an '11' tuplet to represent a gliss. I guess you'd create an 11 note 'app' for that.)  But I think most people have realised that pre-recorded 'special fx' like these sound better than trying to use a ton of MIDI gymnastics 'just' to fit notation. Which is sad because I personally would -love- it if my MIDI and notation could fit one another like that.

    I wonder if this won't be more useful if/when VEP is controllable by the Tablet App... you might switch between VEP channels during a live performance and then trigger different 'sequences' on each instance of VIP. (If that made sense. :D )


  • Hi Plowman

    Very many thanks for your  reply to my email. It was kind of you to go to the trouble of writing at such length, and I found it all very helpful and extremely interesting. It is unfortunately the case that I always want a finished score (in Sibelius) which can, if I'm lucky enough, be performed by real musicians. That's why I still think that for me, the APP sequencer would demand more attention  than I feel would be really worthwhile, though I totally accept that it may be a source of very good ideas. There is so much to learn in VSL, that for now at least, the sequencer may have to wait.........

    Best wishes

    Cefnfaes 


  • Thank you Suntower for your contribution. I have written a lengthier response in a separate message, addressed to the first contributor - Best wishes, Cefnfaes