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In The Beginning...

To start, one can say that "Virtual" Instruments are used by musicians and composers to create music that sounds like it was played on "real" instruments (such as guitars, drum kits, pianos, etc.) without actually having any of the instruments present... In fact, the composer may not even be able to play a real guitar - yet using the technology of Virtual Instruments, they can make a recording that sounds as if a professional guitar player performed it!

This is a pretty amazing thing really. So how is this done?

We can define a "Virtual Instrument" essentially as a digital simulation of a real instrument such as a guitar, piano, etc. which can be controlled in some manner.

A basic digital studio set-up will contain just 3 simple things:

• a keyboard
• a computer
• a pair of powered speakers or headphones.

And that's it! With just these 3 things, anyone can begin to write music that sounds as good as any professional studio, and with a bit of experience and some good Virtual Instrument Sample Libraries - can create music that sounds like it came from dozens of professionally recorded live musicians!

Well, perhaps this is simplifying things a wee bit...

The Connections...

A Personal Computer forms the heart of the modern recording studio. Long gone are the days of the magnetic tape, with needles waving in the magnetic flux and the smell of dust burning off glowing tubes... Now it's just the quiet hum of fans, the tapping of a keyboard, the click of a mouse...

With a PC running the appropriate DAW (Digital Analogue Workstation) software and a few Virtual Instruments, musicians can write music directly on the computer screen and have it play back immediately. No rehearsals, no broken strings, no tired drummer lagging behind the beat after dragging himself in from a 3 AM gig...

The Virtual Drummer will play your notes over and over for hours without complaining. The Virtual guitarist will strum chords long past the time where a real guitarist's fingers would have began to bleed. The only thing stopping you from composing great music is your own talent and skills, and perhaps, the talent and skill of the person who designed the Virtual Instruments you are using. For your music will only sound as good as the sound of the instruments used.

Virtual Instruments are typically controlled by writing a music score which is translated automatically to MIDI, or by playing a keyboard, which connects to the PC using either a MIDI or a USB cable.

And so what is MIDI?

The Language of MIDI...

MIDI is the digital language which tells the Virtual Guitarist what notes to play, when to play them, how hard to play them, etc. In short, it is the instruction set describing the music to be played. More information about MIDI can be found here.

Modern digital composers write their music directly onto the screen, and this is translated by the computer into MIDI, the language spoken by Virtual Instruments. Or, composers can simply play notes on their keyboard, and the small computer in the keyboard converts their playing into MIDI...

In either case, the MIDI information arrives at the Virtual Instrument, which then responds by playing the corresponding, real notes that you can hear. Each key on a keyboard can then make the sound of different drums, guitars, or anything! This amazing process all takes place in an instant, and is all done more or less automatically, requiring just a few simple controls.

Digital composers use Virtual Instruments to create music by creating one track at a time, then playing it back and recording the next track, etc.

For example, you might start with a simple Kick drum playing on each beat. Then, while this is playing, you can use the keyboard to play a "Virtual Bass Guitar" which you hear in real time as you hit the keyboard keys and you can then record this along with the Kick Drum.

Now, with the Kick drum and Bass Guitar playing along, you switch instruments in the computer to a Virtual Guitar - and once again "play" it using the keyboard. Continuing in this manner, an entire song can be composed without once requiring any "real" drums or guitars - or the musicians to play them!

So what makes a "good" Virtual Instrument?

Not All Are Created Equal...

Not all Virtual Instruments are created equal. Some simply play a note when a key is pressed and the note sounds the same each time it is played. In real life, a guitarist, for example, never plays a note the same way twice. The way the note sounds depends on the musical context in which it is played, what notes come before it, what notes come after it, where the pick is held, where the fingers land, etc.

The ability to capture the nuances of such a dynamically changing sound depends a lot on the talent and skill of the Virtual Instrument designer, the quality of the original recordings, the skills of the player used to play the instrument, as well as various other factors. The creation of a good Virtual Instrument is the result of many hours of hard work and is often the combined skills of many people. This explains why some Virtual Instrument libraries cost more than the actual instruments they are modelling!

Jayzen Sound creates our Virtual Instruments for the GigaStudio Software Sampler - a professional sampler which allows you to load in Virtual Instruments, and play them back with a large amount of control over the final sound. Our aim is to create unique instruments that you will not find anywhere else... instruments you will fall in love with and enjoy playing for years to come.

Conclusions/Summary:

Virtual Instruments emulate the sounds produced by a "real" musical instrument, and allow you to play and record these sounds without actually having to have them available "in reality." (Hence their name "virtual" instruments.)

Using a well-designed Virtual Instrument, it is possible to create music that sounds like it was made by live players recorded in a professional studio.

Most Virtual Instruments are large sound libraries of programmed samples which need another program, called a "software sampler," to run them. This gives you the ability to buy only those Virtual Instruments you need for your particular music style.

There are many such software samplers available: GigaStudio, HALion, Kontakt, Vsampler, EXS24, etc. Each program requires its own format, although the GigaStudio ".gig" format is able to be loaded by most of them and is the reason why Jayzen Sound designs most of its Virtual Instrument libraries in this format.

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We hope you enjoyed this tutorial and found it helpful.

If you have further questions and/or comments, please contact us.

Regards,

Jayzen Sound

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General overview of Virtual Instruments

Links to other websites with information on Virtual Instruments