Berlin Woodwinds PDF
Berlin Woodwinds PDF
Berlin Woodwinds PDF
w w w . o r c h e s t r a l t o o l s . c o m
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Berlin Woodwinds - Manual!
Credits
Produced by OrchestralTools.com
Schwarzer & Mantik GbR
Editing
Manfred Mantik
Jan Lepold
Gernot Lange
Peter Ulrich
Daniel Wilhelm
Sebastian Zangar
Alexander Ketel
Dennis Schuster
Tuning
Fernando Aguila Garcia
Tobias Escher
Manfred Mantik
Gabriel Gudenus
Lukas Knbl
Wolfgang Liebig
Quality Assurance
Jan Lepold
Manual
Tobias Escher
Conductor
Bernhard Fabuljan
Recording Engineer
Tom Rubueldt
BWW 101
Instrumentation and Recording
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Berlin Woodwinds - Manual!
All pre-recorded runs, the Runs Builder and figures are synchronized to your host tempo.
This marks the next step in flexibility in professional sampling. For Berlin Woodwinds,
we recorded all tempo-synced runs and figures at different tempos, with the script of the
instrument deciding in realtime upon the sample to use. The chosen sample is then
stretched to your host tempo by means of Time Machine 2 (Close and Room microphone
positions) and Time Machine Pro (Mix).
Note that when using extreme tempos not playable by real musicians, you will hear
artifacts and the playback will not be clear. If you use the auto tempo mode in BWW, the
script will default to half tempo. A 16th run at 200 bpm is not actually playable in reality there is no recorded sample for this tempo range. The script would then stretch the
fastest available sample too heavily, resulting in a bad sound. The auto tempo feature will
play the run at half you hosts tempo and the result will sound much nicer. Be mindful of
your tempo when writing with runs. Not every run is compatible with every tempo. If
you use the Runs Builder or the Scale Runs (or any runs for that matter) in their natural
tempo range, meaning: at a speed actually playable by real woodwinds, you will get the
best results.
Please note that Kontakt 5s Time Machine Pro, with a vastly improved time-stretching
algorithm compared to Time Machine 2, only works in the Runs Builder if the Mix
microphone position is used, but not for Close and Room! This is due to Time Machine
Pros limitation in polyphony, which makes it impossible to use it with double the number
of samples, as would be required when using the other microphone positions. So for more
extreme tempos always make sure to use the Mix position for best results.
Runs, Figures and Runs Builder Blocks
To make Berlin Woodwinds seamlessly integrate with our own Orchestral String Runs,
the complement of Scale Runs, figures and Runs Builder blocks is identical to the
complement present in OSR. This allows you to play runs from both libraries at the same
time without timing issues or note collisions. You can easily double a string run with flute
section - all notes will sound perfectly together.
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Berlin Woodwinds - Manual!
We have spent considerable energy on making Berlin Woodwinds fit into your existing
workflow and make it work together effortlessly with other libraries you are using.
1. The right reverb
You can control the amount of room information with the three adjustable microphone
positions in BWWs interface.
More Room = more softness, wideness; more Close = more detail, more key noises.
Using the Close position allows you to shape the sound even further by using your own
reverb.
In general we suggest the use of an unobtrusive final reverb on top of the samples to
blend everything nicely together in a coherent space and to allow for spatial positioning
of instruments within the mix (or, in plain words: to move instruments further back or to
the front in the mix).
2. Volume Control via Kontakt
We have chosen to not normalise the audio samples used in Berlin Woodwinds. This
means that all samples are at their natural volume, making some instrument ranges much
quieter than you may find in other libraries. This is intentional to give you the full
dynamic spectrum. A piccolo is pretty loud in its highest register, whereas a flute is very
quiet in its bottom range. If you want to raise the overall volume of BWWs patches, you
can either raise the volume of individual patches or raise Kontakts master volume slider:
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Berlin Woodwinds - Manual!
We have taken great care to not clash with your existing MIDI CC allocations for Berlin
Woodwinds. Most CCs used by the library are standard and should work well with your
current setup. Nevertheless, BWWs scripts internally use a number of additional CCs,
which are also available to you as a user in case you want to adjust settings. Most CCs
are user-assignable, so you can change them if you like.
Here is a list of all CCs used by default and their use:
CC 1
The modwheel controls morphing through the velocity layers if the X-Fade mode is
activated on the BWW knob. You can change this CC (right-click).
CC 11
All patches have CC 11 (Expression) set to control the general patch volume.
CC 22
This CC controls the vibrato mode (select patches only). This CC is user-assignable.
Internally, the Articulation Performer script uses three CCs. Most of the time, you do not
need to do anything with these, but if you want to influence the instrument directly, you
can experiment with them.
CC 107
Controls the volume of individual articulations. Managed by the script by default, but
overrideable by the user.
CC 108
This CC is used to slightly detune individual articulation for a humanized ensemble
sound. Seldom used for BWW, or for woodwinds in general, so for the most part you can
totally ignore it.
CC 109
The Articulation Performer manages system memory with the aid of this CC. Use with
caution. From great power comes great responsibility!
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Berlin Woodwinds - Manual!
GUI Overview
Articulation Patches vs Trills and Runs Builder
BWW has three types of patches with some differences in their GUI:
1. Articulation Patches
and
2. Trills Orchestrator
These patch types use a similar interface and represent the bulk of BWWs content. This
section will describe the common GUI features of these patches in detail, while additional
sections dedicated to the two patch types will show you what makes them unique.
3. Runs Builder
This patch type represents a breakthrough in sampling and was first introduced in
Orchestral String Runs. BWWs Runs Builder patches use a completely different GUI to
the other patches in the library. All features of this patch type will be described in detail
in the corresponding section of the manual.
General GUI
This sections shows you the user interface of Berlin Woodwinds articulation and Trills
Orchestrator-powered patches. This is how these patches look like, with all interface
elements labeled:
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Berlin Woodwinds - Manual!
1. Instrumentalist picture
2. BWW Knob
3. Volume Range dial
4. Volume Curve button
5. Release Samples toggle and dial
6. Microphone positions
Microphone Positions
All patches in Berlin Woodwinds have three adjustable microphone positions. You will
find rotary encoders with on/off buttons for all positions at the bottom of each patch:
If you switch off a position, its samples will be purged from memory. Conversely, as soon
as you switch a position on, the samples will be loaded.
Close
Increase the amount of the Close knob if you want to have a more direct sound with less
response of the room. Raising the volume of the Close mics will also increase the playing
noises made by the musicians, giving added realism for intimate settings.
Room
Increase the amount of the Room knob if you want to have as much room information as
possible. The reverb will increase while the direct sound decreases.
Mix
The Mix position is a mixture between Close and Room. This position has a rather direct
sound, but also features a lot of room information for realism.
Note You do not need to think about adjusting the mic positions if you do not want to!
When you load any instrument into Kontakt, the microphone knobs will be set to wellbalanced standard positions.
The Room/Close and Mix positions exclude one another to avoid phasing. If you activate
the Mix positions, Room and Close will be deactivated and vice versa.
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BWW Knob
The BWW knob is a key component of using the library. It allows you to select one of
two ways to control the velocity of played notes:
1) Velocity (how hard you press the keys on your MIDI keyboard)
2) X-Fade (lets you control the volume via the modwheel)
Legato and sustained articulations as well as portato are by default set to X-Fade
(modwheel). Staccato and Staccato Short use Velocity by default because they are much
more easily playable this way.
You can re-assign the CC used for the X-Fade setting by right-clicking on the BWW
knob and assigning a new CC by moving your corresponding fader/encoder or whatever
input source you are using.
In the lower third of the BWW know, the current velocity layer is displayed. As you
morph through the layers, this value will change to reflect the active layer. If no text is
visible, you are in the middle of two layers. Note that this display represents the actual
recorded samples. So if you have p / mf / f in the display, that not only tells you that there
are three actual layers per note, but also which one is currently active. This is a huge help
when creating realistic mockups because you are told by BWW that right now those
flutes are playing mf. When the display says mf, what you are hearing is the actual
sound of the flutes playing mf, not just a random sample lowered or raised in volume!
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Release Samples
You can adjust the volume curve of a patch directly in the BWW interface: Clicking on
the Vol Curve button opens a bar chart where you can set your desired velocity curve by
clicking and dragging in the chart window. Note that this setting is only applied to this
particular instance of the patch, so if you want to permanently change the volume curve
you need to re-save the patch. The volume curve also affects the X-Fade mode using the
modwheel. This means that you can fine-tune the behaviour of the modwheel to allow for
unique dynamic control, for example for creating terraced dynamics.
The Volume Range encoder sets the dynamic range of the patch. You can find a detailed
description of what this control does in the section Blending With Other Libraries.
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Wind Noises
Like a real flute player, you can add more or less air and wind
noises on staccatos notes. Press the Wind Noises button to
switch them on. The button will light up and you can adjust the
volume of wind noises with the encoder dial. This knob can be
controlled with any MIDI CC of your choice via MIDI learn
(right click on the dial).
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Articulation Patches
Berlin Woodwinds has a broad range of articulations across the whole woodwind section.
While all of these patches use the general interface described in the previous section,
some have additional features accessible in the GUI, which will be explained here.
Instrumentalists
Berlin Woodwinds has true legato (interval sampling) for all instruments and sections. To
achieve the highest level of realism and detail, we have recorded every interval up to an
octave. That means you will hear the natural transitions from one note to another. Every
true legato patch is sampled with three dynamic crossfade layers.
The legato and sustain patches both feature adjustable vibrato and key noises.
Vibrato
By default, CC22 switches between normal vibrato, no vibrato and progressive vibrato.
These three vibrato styles use dedicated recorded samples and have not been created by
manipulating existing audio material. You can see which vibrato style is active by looking
at the interface. The highlighted button shows the currently selected style:
If you would like to use a different CC to control the vibrato style, double-click on the
CC number and enter a new one. Make sure not to use any CC already in use.
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Key Noises
We have recorded key noises for every note individually, which you
can add to your performance in the interface. Click the Key Noises
button to switch this feature off and set the volume with the rotary
encoder.
Legato Volume
Legato patches have one additional rotary encoder that lets you control the volume of the
legato transitions between notes. We have found that quite often, sampled legato
instruments tend to have very pronounced transitions, whereas when
listening to real instruments playing legato, the connection between notes
is much more subtle. We have opted to recreate the natural sound of
legato instruments as close as possible, so the transitions in BWW may
be much quieter compared to other libraries. You can adjust the volume
of these transitions with this control, though.
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Berlin Woodwinds has recorded double tongue and triple tongue samples for most
instruments. In a painstaking process we recorded real double and triple tongue notes
and made them react to your playing speed. All patches have
samples for slower passages as well as samples for faster passages.
You can switch between the two modes by pressing the
corresponding button. This button, like all controls in BWW, is
automatable via MIDI CC. Right-click on the button to assign a CC.
Double Tongue
Play a note and the first note sounds. Release the key and the second note is played.
Basically you only need to play every second note, with the gap between notes
determined by how long you keep the key pressed.
Triple Tongue
Playing triple tongued notes requires a bit of practice, but it is easily worth it: Press a key
and the first sounds. The second note sounds when you release the key and BWW will
automatically sound the third note after an equal period of time. This is very useful for
playing triple-tongued triplets!
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At the right of the GUI you see a helpful tool for your orchestrations: The notation view,
a huge timesaver if you want to notate trills in your written scores. It shows you every
trill you are playing, regardless of the number of notes you play. Just like in all other
instruments, there are three knobs and buttons for the microphone positions: Room,
Close and Mix, as well as a knob for the Release Volume. Last but not least, every Trills
Orchestrator has a Mode Change Function.
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Note
Just find out which mode is good for your current needs and choose accordingly: If you
want to play flickering chords for example, choose the End Tone = Start Tone mode. If
you want to play two different trills, each between two notes, you should choose the Start
Tone = Always New mode.
Tip
You can blend the sfz trills perfectly with the irregular trills to achieve a sharp attack at
the beginning of a long sustained trill.
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Runs
Berlin Woodwinds puts a strong emphasis on idiomatic woodwind writing. No one will
argue that runs are an important part of what a woodwinds section tends to do, so we felt
we really needed to nail that bit. For this reason, you get a large complement of runs to
choose from in the Scale Runs patches, you can play your own runs with the help of the
Runs Transitions patch and, last but not least, we also created a woodwind version of our
Runs Builder. Orchestral String Runs was our first commercial library and we tried out
many things to come up with the best sounding and most flexible solution. With the
experience gained in creating OSR and OSR2 and the feedback received from of our
customers, who sent us e-mails with ideas and suggestions, we improved these run
algorithms dramatically over the course of many updates. Now we can all use the best of
it in Berlin Woodwinds.
Scale Runs
The Scale Runs patches contain full recorded runs in all major and minor keys. All runs
have been recorded at different speeds and are tempo-synced to your host. Please refer to
the included Scale Runs Chart for information about the different types of runs available.
Scale Runs patches have a toggle that lets you choose between major
and minor runs. You can assign this toggle to a MIDI CC by rightclicking on it to control it from within your sequencer.
C0 to B0 on your MIDI keyboard act as keyswitches to switch
between keys.
The tempo mode slider with the auto tempo button is controllable via
an assignable MIDI CC (right click - by now you should know this by
heart) and lets you adjust playback of the samples between half tempo,
double tempo and regular tempo as well as half triplets and double
triplets. The current selection is shown below the slider. As an example,
if you have a host tempo of 200bpm, a 16th run would be way too fast.
Change the setting to half tempo and the run will essentially play as an 8th run.
If you have the auto tempo button switched on, BWW will adjust this slider
automatically to find the ideal solution. To control the slider manually, switch off the auto
tempo button.
All Scale Runs use NIs Time Machine Pro to sync to your host tempo, regardless of the
mic position(s) used. This means unrivalled fidelity and complete freedom in choosing
your tempo.
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The Runs Transitions patches (also called Playable Runs, because that is essentially what
these patches allow you to do) are based on the same technology that powers legato
instruments and use very fast legato transitions between notes. They are available for
both solo instruments and ensembles. We have sampled transitions between notes up to
the interval of a fifth, so you can play runs leaving gaps between notes if you want. Now
it is finally possible to play completely unique runs on a MIDI keyboard and hear the
glue in between individual notes. Just play your run and BWW will do the rest!
Runs Builder
The Runs Builder, which is available for the Clarinet Ensemble (a3) and the Flute
Ensemble in octaves (a2+Flute 8va or Piccolo in the higher register), allows you to create
custom runs by combining several groups of notes. Within these groups, which are all
real recorded samples, you can hear the natural connection between notes - the glue,
which brings these real recorded short phrases combined as a bigger run into your
sequences.
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To fill the slot with an articulation, just click on any of the available articulations in the
lower left of the interface. The articulation will be loaded into RAM and its picture is
displayed in the slot.
When a slot is activated (white border), you can play the articulation currently loaded in
that slot on your keyboard. You can change the slot in realtime using keyswitches.
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Every slot has its own keyswitch. The keyswitch controlling a slot is displayed above the
corresponding slot.
To clear a slot, select it and press the articulation button again. There also is a Clear All
button next to the articulation buttons.
Tempo Mode Slider
You will find a Tempo Mode slider underneath every slot. This slider is controllable via
any assignable MIDI CC (just right click) and lets you adjust playback of the samples
between half tempo, double tempo and regular tempo as well as half triplets and double
triplets. The current selection is shown below the slider. As an example, if you have a
host tempo of 200bpm, a 16th run would be way too fast. Change the setting to half
tempo and the run will essentially play as an 8th run.
If you have the auto tempo button switched on, BWW will adjust this slider
automatically to find the ideal solution. To control the slider manually, switch off the auto
tempo button.
Keyswitches
C0-B0 = changes the key (e.g. F Major, C Major, etc.)
C1-A1 = activates individual slots
Scale
Use the Scale slider to select the scale you would like your run to be in. You can assign a
CC to this slider by right-clicking on it.
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ERLIN
WOODWINDS
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