AW: AW: AW: Mellotron/sample/wave type question.

[Haible Juergen]

	>Sure. It's certainly not a good idea to expect a perfect emulation
of
	>any instrument from a sampler. 

That's why I don't own any sampler (;->). There's some great
stuff going on with hybrid ROMpler / Physical Modelling,
however. Have you heard the Rhodes sounds on the EX-5 ?
I think some of them are excellent. If it wasn't for the poor
keyboard action. (Sorry, I disgress ...)

	>But Mellotron samples can sound very
	>expressive anyway, even if it doesn't sound like a real Mellotron
at
	>all. I use them quite often.

I am completely with you here. I have tweaked the short string sample
in my Kawai K1 to give a nice "Mellotron", too. I like it, especially
for what it costs. IMO, it's often a good thing to model a certain
aspect of an instrument, without trying to copy it as a whole.
If things have a certain "distance" to the original, they can be fine.
When the intention to make a "replacement" is too obvious,
but the copy is still not good enough, it may sound a little ridiculous.
Flute sounds are (to my ears) a very good example:
Phase 1: Sine Wave with delayed vibrato = good; it makes a good
lead sound; no one would seriously  take it as a "fake flute", but it
has *one* effect (wavering pitch on long tones) that we learned to 
appreciate from flutes.
Phase 2: Sample with !original! breath noise = bad; you recognize
it after a few repetitions. (You can do a lot of programming to make
things better - one word: D-50 - but thats' not the benefit of
sampling)
Phase 3: Physical modelling = good; it sounds so close to the
original (to my ears - probably not for a flute player), that I can use
it like the real thing.
(Just my opinion, of course. One of my idols, Klaus Schulze, aparently
has a very different point of view - at least that's my impression when
I hear him improvising on abysmal sampled flute sounds ...)

In terms of mellotrons, I agree that there is much fun in "Phase 1",
but no way to see land in "Phase 2" even with today's standard of
memory, and no sight of "Phase 3" at all.

JH.