BBC SO Pro multi-instance in Vienna Ensemble Pro 7 - strange, instruments' excluding behaviour

WitoldSuryn

Hello,

Here I search for explanation/help for most bizarre behaviour of BBC SO Pro when used as multi-instance setup in VEP 7. So, I have the full string orchestra, each section has its own Spitfire Audio player. Every section has its own MIDI IN channel in VEP and internally, so there is no risk of sending data to two sections at the same time or data from two instruments to one section. And here the mistery begins: when two or more instruments play chords they try to block each other, when played separately they sound correctly. Example: 1st violins play E3-G3 chord in half note-half note-whole note sequence, 2nd violins play C3-E3 chord in whole note-whole note sequence. By the end of the sequence 1st violins' whole note gets muted, 2nd violins' whole note plays only C3. This is an example, because in practice this muting seems stochastic, but there always something gets muted. It also happens when the orchestra is loaded through individual instances of Komplete Kontrol (idea was to further separate Spitfire players). It also happens when neighbouring sections come from different type of instances, i.e. 1st violins directly from Spitfire player, 2nd violins from Komplete Kontrol.

Any suggestion, any useful recommendation will be most appreciated.

Witold

aldous

Have you checked that the instruments aren't set to / switching to "legato" rather than a "long" articulation? The legatos only allow one note to sound at a time. They also can sound weakly when the same note is played twice in succession (unless there's a decent gap.) Put the two together, and I think you'll get the kind of odd behaviour you're describing if you play block chords.

I also suggest having the plugin windows of your Violins 1 and Violins 2 instruments open during playback, side-by-side: that will let you see exactly which notes each instrument receives on the little keyboard at the bottom of each plugin window (so you'll see any MIDI weirdness). It will also let you see any articulation changes.

Hope that helps!

WitoldSuryn

Hi aldous,

It was not what you suggested but you sent me in a correct direction of searching for the source of the problem, for which I am very grateful. And yes, I found it. If you are a Dorico user you know that there we can create an expression map for every instrument and the problem was there, but very well hidden and not entirely my fault. I wrote all correctly and used what Dorico calls "init", a (theoretically speaking) articulation where you can set up all parameters at their initial values, so no loud surprises when you start playing your score but you did not put any articulation yet. In the "init" I put initial values for all CC's (like 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, and 23 plus CC11) plus a keyswitch for natural. All cool, but Dorico seems to use "init" in still mysterious to me ways and this was the basic source of the problem. Once I fully cleaned this "init" all went to normal.

Thanks again.

Witold

aldous

@WitoldSuryn Great, glad you found the problem! The resetting behaviour when starting/stopping playback seems to vary quite a bit across DAWs. I use Logic, which doesn't send key-switches as part of that reset (by default, at least), so it's useful to know what happens in other environments - thanks.