I've done some research on SSDs and come up with some ideas based on my own specific setup, but I could use some input before I start spending money and rearranging plugs. Keep in mind I use Kontakt, which makes heavy use of disk streaming rather than loading everything into RAM.

The time is coming for my upgrade to Windows 10. My PC is from 2013 and it does this music stuff rather swimmingly, so I'm loath to go making big changes. But since I'll have to reinstall things and migrate data when I change the operating system anyway, I figured a hard drive upgrade might be in order as well. Below are a couple of hypothetical plans I'm bouncing around.


Scenario 1: Replace HDD with SSD

I could replace the main HDD with a quality SATA 1TB SSD. My current system uses a 2TB 7200RPM Barracuda for a main drive and a Sandisk 32GB SSD for caching. Currently I'm not looking at using separate drives for samples and OS respectively. I know that's not "best practice," but I've never actually had a problem in the past. I suppose the current HDD could become extra storage. The Sandisk caching SSD would just go in a drawer somewhere. The idea here is, of course, to take advantage of what the SSD can do in all applications and move away from HDDs entirely. It's a pretty straightforward setup, too.


Scenario 2: Install the OS on the SSD and the samples on the HDD

I could just use said SSD solely for the OS and the applications. The HDD and its caching drive would still be for samples and storage (essentially doing what it already does, sans the OS). On that note, is it even possible to use the caching drive in this configuration? I don't think it is, based on what I've read. Cons also include probably not making a difference in task performance speed when working on music (disk streaming and whatnot). Would it really be worth it over just installing Windows 10 and not bothering with a new hard drive at all?

Topped 5 million file downloads and will probably run out of bandwidth in a month or two, but hey its been a fun run. Thanks for eating tons of bandwidth with your great instruments Sam and Mattias!

http://www.mediafire.com/file/r1li3so0xv...n.png/file

Since I have finally managed to get VSCO2 Pro working properly, here's my first tentative steps. Expect many updates to follow as I proceed to explore the library and set up a template.

So I got a detailed response about my orchestration of the Pathetique Sonata here:

Pathetique Sonata for Orchestra

Here is the detailed response I got:

Quote:Very unbalanced and unidiomatic orchestration. There's a lot to go through here, but let's start with the first chord. The woodwind writing is horrible. The flute is in it's lower mid-register and will not be heard over the massive forte of the other instruments. The oboe is way to low in it's register to succesfully play the C in piano. It is very unclear how many of each instrument you have so that has to be clearly written out (my concern is primarily the clarinets and horns). The chord is voiced very badly with very thick harmony at the bottom and rather sparse higher up. Try to write tutti chords according to the harmonic series.

I don't understand at all why you want to double the melody line with the flute. And you don't use the piccolo as it's own instrument but rather as an extension of the flutes register. I also don't understand the need for bass clarinet, contrabassoon and alto trombone. You can do just fine without them.

Bar 11 you write the eighth note tremolo from the original score and write super fast double-tounge in the contrabassoon. This is super unidiomatic as well as tiring and on the border of unplayability for a longer period of time.

These are just a few things to think about. Balance is important too, remember that. I'm also working on orchestrating the Pathetique right now (not on musescore), as well as all the other Beethoven sonatas. It's a very big project and it takes time but it is definitely worth it!

Quote:Very unbalanced and unidiomatic orchestration.

Quote:There's a lot to go through here, but let's start with the first chord. The woodwind writing is horrible. The flute is in it's lower mid-register and will not be heard over the massive forte of the other instruments.

Quote:The oboe is way to low in it's register to succesfully play the C in piano. It is very unclear how many of each instrument you have so that has to be clearly written out (my concern is primarily the clarinets and horns).

Quote:The chord is voiced very badly with very thick harmony at the bottom and rather sparse higher up. Try to write tutti chords according to the harmonic series.

Quote:I don't understand at all why you want to double the melody line with the flute. And you don't use the piccolo as it's own instrument but rather as an extension of the flutes register.

Quote:I also don't understand the need for bass clarinet, contrabassoon and alto trombone. You can do just fine without them.

Quote:Bar 11 you write the eighth note tremolo from the original score and write super fast double-tounge in the contrabassoon. This is super unidiomatic as well as tiring and on the border of unplayability for a longer period of time.

I really need to finish any number of things, but I got the urge to take another crack at my old time radio encyclopedia that I already did the 'A's of... Part of the reason I stopped before was I really hated the Baby Snooks show. So I decided furged aboud it and just cranked this out. Any thoughts?

Baby Snooks
 
Daddy: Mommy told me what you’ve done. It wasn’t bad enough you cut off the baby’s hair, you had to go and open up the Christmas presents too. However, could you think of two such abominable things?
Baby: It was easy, Daddy. I had the scissors and when I got through opening the packages Robespierre (her little brother) happened to come along…
 
There are some shows that simply rub me the wrong way. I try to be unbiased and generally quite enjoy listening to the variety of shows that wander across the pages of this little encyclopedia, but something about Baby Snooks…well it creeps me out. Fanny Brice was a star long before she became the voice of Baby Snooks, but somehow Baby Snooks eclipsed Fanny herself and she became a grown and aging woman dressed up like a little girl, who seemed to think she was a little girl, while sometimes pretending to be spanked by her ‘Daddy’. Since I have no problem with characters ranging from Edgar Bergan’s Charlie McCarthy to Molly McGee’s Tiny which are also youngsters portrayed by adult actors, I can’t explain this crawling of the skin.
 
There are a number of versions of how and when Fanny Brice became Baby Snooks. Brice claimed that she first portrayed the character on stage in 1912 as a spoof of Baby Peggy Montgomery a silent screen star. Since the first Baby Peggy film wasn’t made until 1921 this seems unlikely. The more probable first appearance of Snooks was in 1930 revue Sweet and Low produced by Brice’s husband Billy Rose. At any rate by 1934, the 43 year old Brice was appearing in baby clothes on stage at the Follies. Two years later the naughty little girl appeared on the Ziegfeld Follies of the Air.
 
Fanny dipped her toes in radio for a couple years before MGM’s radio show The Good News of 1938 came calling with a solid paycheck for only a few minutes of airtime every week. The other half of the Baby Snooks team was discovered on this show as radio bit player Hanley Stafford became Daddy. The Good News of 1938 became The Good News of 1939 and then, wait for it, The Good News of 1940. Fortunately for the preceding sentence, The Good News of 1940 morphed into Maxwell House Coffee Time, in 1941, which was split between Baby Snooks and the tall tales of Frank Morgan. This program lasted until June 15, 1944.
 
Toasties Time later called The Baby Snooks Show debuted on October 1, 1944 sponsored by Post Toasties. The program continued through the 1947-48 season before being cancelled. TUMS brought her back November 8, 1949 and Baby Snooks continued until March 20, 1951. Sadly Fanny Brice passed away after suffering a massive cerebral hemorrhage on May 29, 1951. She was 59 years old.


Who was Fanny Brice?
 
It is unfair to hide gutsy Broadway Star, singer and comic Fanny Brice behind Baby Snooks, especially when the sap writing the Baby Snook entry can’t stand the show. Long before Snooks took over her life, Fanny Brice was an accomplished and acclaimed entertainer.
 
Fania Borach was born on October 29, 1891. Sometime later she grew up a bit and tried her hand or rather her voice on stage winning an amateur singing contest. She was 13 and decided that show biz was the life for her. There are various rumors about the teenaged girl bouncing around through odd entertainment jobs including dancing in the chorus of the Burlesque revue The Girls from Happy Land or possibly Talk of New York. Legend has it that she really couldn’t dance and was fired, maybe by George M Cohen. When truth and legend conflict, Print the Legend!
 
Fortunately, she could sing and did in various burlesque house around New York. Florenz Ziegfeld, who was always looking for a girl singer, had her headlining the Follies in 1910. Brice appeared in the Follies and acted, sang and comedied in Broadway shows for years. The venerable New York Times reported that in 1916 she did her first version of a dying Swan Ballet and she also lampooned Theda Bera, did a take-of on Camille with W.C. Fields as her maid and performed a travesty on fan dancers and modern dance.
 
Her big break came in the 1921 Follies with the torch song My Man. Her fame spread to Hollywood and she appeared in her first film in 1928 called My Man. It was an odd film that sort of bridged the gap between silent films and talkies and was a sort of semi-talkie. The 1936 film The Great Ziegfeld was her best known Hollywood appearance. Tinsel town wasn’t done with Fanny, 1939’s Rose of Washington Square was so close to her life it resulted in a lawsuit and Barbara Streisand played Fanny in the 1968 quasi-bio pic Funny Girl and again in the 1975 Funny Lady.
 
Sadly, Fanny Brice had enough of a life story for two films and probably more. Nicky Arnstein and Fanny Brice were joined in Holy Wedlock in 1918. Nicky got his nickname from riding a nickel plated bike in bicycle races that were all the rage. Nicky soon learned there was more money in throwing the races than winning them. One thing led to another which led to Sing-Sing in 1916. Fanny visited him so often that his wife sued for alienation of affection. With this basis for a marriage what could go wrong?
 
Half a decade later, five million dollars worth of securities vanished and the police fingered Nicky. Fanny spent a lot of money trying to defend her man and stood by him during his three years in prison. Nicky seemed to think of Fanny as a cash machine as much as he thought of her as a wife and they divorced in 1927.
 
A couple years later no less a figure than the Mayor of New York hitched Fanny and Broadway imperioso James Walker. That lasted until 1937 when Jimmy divorced her for a swimming champion. Having had enough of marriage, in 1938 Fanny moved into a lovely LA home which she could afford with her Baby Snooks paychecks. Though there are questions about how deeply she embraced the role of Baby Snooks, she seems to have led a peaceful life in her post-husband radio years.
 
Her radio co-stars seemed to have sincere affection for Fanny Brice. On the May 29, 1951 broadcast of The Baby Snooks Show broadcast immediately after her death, Hanley Stafford said "We have lost a very real, a very warm, a very wonderful woman." Her legacy includes two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for radio and another for motion pictures.

I just made a new beta release for testing:

https://github.com/michaelwillis/dragonf...1.9.0-beta

This now includes a new plugin called Dragonfly Room Reverb, which is based on Freeverb3 ProG. Please try it out if you're inclined, but consider it unstable. Don't yet use it for any "real" work, and be prepared to hit the mute button as there still may be bugs with the potential to make a horrible sound that will ruin your whole day. I'm still experimenting with which dials and presets to use, any feedback on either would be very helpful. 

The original plugin has been renamed Dragonfly Hall Reverb; it remains essentially the same and can be considered stable.

I originally posted this for the purpose of workshopping my template, but I think this track is probably better for that purpose. There is a lot more happening here. I imported everything from a previous file into what is becoming the new template as the song started to take shape. There are several things that I know need attention, but I wanted to get more feedback before I started messing with things again. It's gotten to the point where it feels like  I'm just turning knobs and sliding faders again

The template is supposed to just be the basic orchestra with the idea that I'll have a better idea of how to implement other stuff once that's solidified. But there are some exotic elements here too. And I know I still need to do something about the weird closeness of a lot of the colorful little metals.


Moon Wine

Just in case you don't already know from the title, I am referring to the very well known Piano Sonata no. 8 in C minor by Beethoven. I plan to go from the very chordal nature of the piano to individual lines in a symphony orchestra. Out of all the 30 or so sonatas that Beethoven composed, this one sounds very orchestral in its nature, even as just a piano solo. One thing that should make things easier is that there are 3-4 bass lines and 3-4 melody lines in the grave sections. However, this actually causes some difficulty in deciding which instrument gets which line. I know that until the bass chords in the right hand show up, I don't want the brass to be playing. Here is what I see in each part of the Grave section as far as the orchestration:

As you can see, I separated it into 4 sections. The blue section which is bars 1-4 is where I don't want the brass to be playing. The red section which is bars 5-7 is where I want there to be call and response between the low brass and the low woodwinds so that the low woodwinds can be freed up for the bass chords in the right hand part. The green section which is bars 7-9 is where I want a buildup to apotheosis in full orchestra. The purple section which is bar 10 is where I want the texture to diminish from full orchestra. It is also where I can see a woodwind cascade happening from the flute down to the oboe, clarinet, and possibly bassoon.

I was wondering if you could help me orchestrate this Grave section. Once I get to the Allegro, it should be easier.

This is the first piece that I have ever composed for a trio. Really, it is my first go at composing for a trio. I concentrated more on expression here than the form itself. The piece is supposed to represent the transition from Winter to Spring. That is why I went more freeform with this piece(though still using fugato and there is even a canonic passage in there between the violin and the cello)

Keys

First off, the chain of harmonies that I used. I decided to go from D minor(the key of the Winter Wind phrase) to D major. But I wanted it to sound like it was gradually going towards a more major sound to represent the warming up. So I decided on this progression:

D minor -> C major -> B minor -> G major -> A major -> D major

The modulation to C major is basically a modal modulation(if there even is such a term). So it goes from Aeolian to Dorian but instead of ending on D which it sounds like it is going to, it ends on C giving a further drive forward. Going to B minor is mostly a chromatic half step modulation(I say mostly because a truly chromatic half step modulation would have landed on B major. Still 3 steps away from D major, the target key but less closely related than B minor). B minor I also use as a pivot from flats to sharps. I still use Bb though and not A# because it makes more sense to me to use Bb, especially since I go back to the flats relatively soon after the B minor phrase twice. The modulation to G major is your typical pivot chord modulation. Then you have like the modulation equivalent of a cadence to D major.

This brings me to my next point. I have 2 incomplete harmonic cycles to represent how there are several bouts of spring weather(harmonic cycle) followed by cold snaps(sudden jolt back to D minor) before spring is here for sure. The fugato that I use in the first 2 minutes or so reinforces this uncertainty about whether the warming up is long term or not. I follow this with a complete harmonic cycle to express that spring is coming.

Tone Painting

You could say the entire piece is tone painting but there are 2 places that have more tone painting going on than anywhere else. First off, the Winter Wind phrase. There are multiple layers of tone painting here. First off, the key is minor and the phrase as a whole sounds melancholy. This coupled with the fast staccato of the piano gives a very wintry feel to the phrase. The staccato itself represents the snowfall. The pizzicato strings represent the strong wind. The longer notes represent the person experiencing this winter weather.

Second is the complete harmonic cycle. After the last entry of the Winter Wind, there is a similar phrase except, the piano does not play a role here or at least one that is significant. Because of the more major sound to it, that same combination of slow cello notes and fast violin notes represents sunny weather(which becomes more frequent during Spring in my area(I live in Ohio)). After the canonic passage, the overall feel of it is "Any day now, Spring is really close, I just know it". The G major phrase sounds more anticipatory with its loud dynamics followed by a diminuendo into the next phrase. That phrase starts off pianissimo and then gradually goes to forte.

A melodic motif starts the ending phrase. That BACB motif, it represents the song-like birdcall of the American Robin, a bird that I start hearing a few days after the spring equinox. Then there are 2 instruments playing and then all of a sudden, there is just 1 line again. In this case, it is representing the well known "Jeer" call of the Blue Jay by staying on 1 note. Then, again 2 instruments and then all of a sudden, all 3 instruments are playing birdcalls starting with the violin playing the Cardinal birdcall, then the cello joins in with the Robin birdcall, and then the piano joins in with the Blue Jay birdcall and then it leads to another short, non-birdcall melody. Then all 3 birdcalls at once, and then the final ending melody which has the ending whole notes with a fermata and at a fortissimo dynamic to conclude the piece.

So, here is the link to the piece on Musescore:

https://musescore.com/user/50070/scores/5504586

I would like some feedback on this. How well did I get across the feelings of Winter and Spring? How well did I incorporate those birdcall motifs? Which one do you think I incorporated better than the others if you had to chose? The Robin motif because it is used more and is what starts the Spring is Here phrase?

Hear me out... I know at least two people on this forum who like to cook/bake. What if we threw together a little cookbook with recipes from Scoring Central members? Doesn't have to be anything fancy, just like, whatever you like making.

Thoughts?