May I have recommendations for choir sounds?

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AALLF
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18 Jul 2020

(I'm new here, and wasn't sure whether to post this in the Re-fill or Rack Extension section)

I love the "Female Choir" patch in Thor. That type of ambient sound is what I'm looking for. I have the Olympus Micro Re-fill, but if I could have recommendations for any synthesizers in the shop that produce a choir sound like the Thor does, that would be great!

I am also aware of the ProjectSAM Orchestral Sampler, which says it has the choir combined with the orchestra. I would use that, but I need the choir to be by itself, and I'm not sure if that is possible with that instrument.

I am open to any recommendations, both for synthesizers and Re-fills with real sampled choirs. When I compared the Thor "Female Choir" patch to the Olympus Micro, however, I much preferred the Thor. My ear is leaning towards a synthesizer, but any recommedations would be appreciated.

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guitfnky
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18 Jul 2020

not sure what version of Reason you're on, but if you want something clean, a great bet would be to go with Humana--there are several female vocal options to choose from. that one also has an excellent built-in reverb. the benefit of going with a nice clean sound like that is it's easy to dirty up if you need to--otherwise, you can keep things nice and pretty.

you can also check out the ChamberTron and Re-Tron Rack Extensions from GForce Software. they're not as realistic sounding, but they're not meant to be--they still sound great. they don't sound as breathy as that Thor patch, and they don't have built-in reverb, but it's easy enough to add some external verb to get them sounding nice and epic.

there may also be some good stuff for other devices in the factory soundbank, but I'm not sure--might be worth a look.
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deeplink
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19 Jul 2020

Search 'choir' in Reason Sounds. Humana, NNXT, NN19 and ID8 all provide choir samples - which can be made quite interesting with help of some panning, chorus, reverb and layering within a combinator
Get more Combinators at the deeplink website

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AALLF
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20 Jul 2020

Thank you everyone for your recommendations. I'll be sure to check those out!

madmacman
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23 Jul 2020

Olympus Micro Refill is more or less the same as Humana. Except for the boy‘s choir which is missing in the Refill.

mtbh
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23 Jul 2020

Try a Mellotron choir. Definitely a different “color”, you might like it.

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guitfnky
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23 Jul 2020

mtbh wrote:
23 Jul 2020
Try a Mellotron choir. Definitely a different “color”, you might like it.
the Re-Tron and Chambertron Rack Extensions I mentioned are Mellotron emulations. definitely a distinct flavor, and very cool if you like a more vintage vibe.
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JiggeryPokery
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23 Jul 2020

guitfnky wrote:
18 Jul 2020
not sure what version of Reason you're on, but if you want something clean, a great bet would be to go with Humana--there are several female vocal options to choose from.
Did they ever fix Humana?

Because as far as I know despite both alpha and beta testers pleaded with PH at the time to add legato, it was <sigh> ignored, even though Gorilla Editor included a basic legato script by default, so it could have been added, with a GUI switch, in probably less than 30 minutes. So concerned they were to just add in a ton of cheaply licensed content fast, they demonstrably didn't care to apply any basic application of attention to detail in the quality of the content they were pasting in.

The result is that Humana sounds like a choir where no singer is capable of producing more than one note without taking a breath in between. Literally no-one sings like that. Even people who can't sing don't sing like that. Try it yourself, right now: regardless of whether you can hit a pitch, go (somewhere where no-one can hear you if need be!) and sing an entire octave of "Doh Re Me... "

I bet you've just sung all twelve notes in one breath, cos you're not an idiot and it's the natural way to do it. Now try it again but take a short breath between each note. That's Humana. Every note forces you to have the initial transients.

You can apply a bit of attack to remove the first transients, but you still don't get that subtle slide between notes, plus to compensate for the gain loss at the start, you'll need to add release, which creates its own problems, particularly with solo vocals. Of course, a serious choir device for musicians, rather than for marketeer's winning Facebook likes, wouldn't merely have been content with just basic legato, but would actually have bothered to add dedicated legato samples too and scripted automatic keyswitching.

As a texture deep in a mix, or layered with stuff, sure, it's not unusuable, you can mostly get away with it, but as a lead or standalone it's extraordinarily piss-poor. Absolutely one of the shoddiest devices PH ever produced.

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guitfnky
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23 Jul 2020

JiggeryPokery wrote:
23 Jul 2020
guitfnky wrote:
18 Jul 2020
not sure what version of Reason you're on, but if you want something clean, a great bet would be to go with Humana--there are several female vocal options to choose from.
Did they ever fix Humana?

Because as far as I know despite both alpha and beta testers pleaded with PH at the time to add legato, it was <sigh> ignored, even though Gorilla Editor included a basic legato script by default, so it could have been added, with a GUI switch, in probably less than 30 minutes. So concerned they were to just add in a ton of cheaply licensed content fast, they demonstrably didn't care to apply any basic application of attention to detail in the quality of the content they were pasting in.

The result is that Humana sounds like a choir where no singer is capable of producing more than one note without taking a breath in between. Literally no-one sings like that. Even people who can't sing don't sing like that. Try it yourself, right now: regardless of whether you can hit a pitch, go (somewhere where no-one can hear you if need be!) and sing an entire octave of "Doh Re Me... "

I bet you've just sung all twelve notes in one breath, cos you're not an idiot and it's the natural way to do it. Now try it again but take a short breath between each note. That's Humana. Every note forces you to have the initial transients.

You can apply a bit of attack to remove the first transients, but you still don't get that subtle slide between notes, plus to compensate for the gain loss at the start, you'll need to add release, which creates its own problems, particularly with solo vocals. Of course, a serious choir device for musicians, rather than for marketeer's winning Facebook likes, wouldn't merely have been content with just basic legato, but would actually have bothered to add dedicated legato samples too and scripted automatic keyswitching.

As a texture deep in a mix, or layered with stuff, sure, it's not unusuable, you can mostly get away with it, but as a lead or standalone it's extraordinarily piss-poor. Absolutely one of the shoddiest devices PH ever produced.
I guess I just always assumed that was kind of standard for choir samples. I don’t have the patience to program stuff with lots of different articulations or any of that. I wouldn’t ever need (or want, really) to use a bunch of samples as a main focus instrument, because, well I would just assume it wouldn’t sound good for all the reasons you state. like, it kind of amazes me that anyone would even consider that as a use case. to me, almost any sample-based “real” instrument falls into the Mellotron category—the only real distinction being where it falls on the chintzy scale.

so for me, Humana is great—because I’ll only ever want or need to use it as a backing instrument, usually slathered in reverb. maybe it is a lazy RS device—I don’t build instruments, so I wouldn’t know. but it’s been an excellent tool for my purposes.
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raymondh
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24 Jul 2020

JiggeryPokery wrote:
23 Jul 2020
guitfnky wrote:
18 Jul 2020
not sure what version of Reason you're on, but if you want something clean, a great bet would be to go with Humana--there are several female vocal options to choose from.
Did they ever fix Humana?

Because as far as I know despite both alpha and beta testers pleaded with PH at the time to add legato, it was <sigh> ignored, even though Gorilla Editor included a basic legato script by default, so it could have been added, with a GUI switch, in probably less than 30 minutes. So concerned they were to just add in a ton of cheaply licensed content fast, they demonstrably didn't care to apply any basic application of attention to detail in the quality of the content they were pasting in.

The result is that Humana sounds like a choir where no singer is capable of producing more than one note without taking a breath in between. Literally no-one sings like that. Even people who can't sing don't sing like that. Try it yourself, right now: regardless of whether you can hit a pitch, go (somewhere where no-one can hear you if need be!) and sing an entire octave of "Doh Re Me... "

I bet you've just sung all twelve notes in one breath, cos you're not an idiot and it's the natural way to do it. Now try it again but take a short breath between each note. That's Humana. Every note forces you to have the initial transients.

You can apply a bit of attack to remove the first transients, but you still don't get that subtle slide between notes, plus to compensate for the gain loss at the start, you'll need to add release, which creates its own problems, particularly with solo vocals. Of course, a serious choir device for musicians, rather than for marketeer's winning Facebook likes, wouldn't merely have been content with just basic legato, but would actually have bothered to add dedicated legato samples too and scripted automatic keyswitching.

As a texture deep in a mix, or layered with stuff, sure, it's not unusuable, you can mostly get away with it, but as a lead or standalone it's extraordinarily piss-poor. Absolutely one of the shoddiest devices PH ever produced.
I tried your experiment and found that not only is the point about legato accurate, but Humana also fails to reproduce the sound of splattering rotten tomatoes, banana skins and expletives that are heard after the the Doh and Re, and just before the Me.

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DaveyG
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24 Jul 2020

The best choir sounds, and orchestral sounds for that matter, are to be found in Kontakt libraries. Great sounds, daft prices.

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Boombastix
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24 Jul 2020

Roland and Korgs flagship synths always had great synth choir sounds. Eg XV5080/Triton
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JiggeryPokery
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24 Jul 2020

raymondh wrote:
24 Jul 2020
Humana also fails to reproduce the sound of splattering rotten tomatoes, banana skins and expletives that are heard after the the Doh and Re, and just before the Me.
:lol: :lol: :lol:

Perfect! ;)

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guitfnky
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24 Jul 2020

oh, so I guess this is a “look down on people who don’t use the tools I like” thread now. that’s cool. :?

pretty sure nobody cares which sample library we used when they’re listening to our tracks. whatever gets the job done, folks.
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bieh
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24 Jul 2020

I don't like Humana much at all. Plenty of the voices sound out of tune to the point of being unusable. I don't know whether it was created that way to make an attempt at humanisation, but I think it sounds ridiculous and would only use Humana on certain voices and syllables if it happens to fit in with any background vocal sound I want to create. I think the SoundIron Tuned Micro refill that's been around for years is a little better, but it's still pretty limited. I don't have anything that I'd call a really good choir instrument, but will go looking for a Kontakt instrument if/when I need one.

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mcatalao
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27 Jul 2020

Humana is good but if you want something more than just ooos and aaaas, and more control like real word building, you should look at east west choirs. It works great with Reason, i've used it.

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challism
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29 Jul 2020

I tried your experiment too, Matt. And I keep getting this (video).
It would be nice if they had decided to add legato, especially since it was already available to them, as you mentioned.

Another good choir sound is the Mormon Tabernacle. ;)

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AALLF
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24 Oct 2020

mcatalao wrote:
27 Jul 2020
Humana is good but if you want something more than just ooos and aaaas, and more control like real word building, you should look at east west choirs. It works great with Reason, i've used it.
I just got EastWest Symphonic Choirs, but I'm having trouble getting Reason to find it and use it. I've tried moving things around from this folder to that, but I can't get it to work. If you would be so kind, how did you do it? I'm in the process of reading the documentation for Reason and Eastwest in the meantime.

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Oquasec
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24 Oct 2020

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mcatalao
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24 Oct 2020

AALLF wrote:
24 Oct 2020
mcatalao wrote:
27 Jul 2020
Humana is good but if you want something more than just ooos and aaaas, and more control like real word building, you should look at east west choirs. It works great with Reason, i've used it.
I just got EastWest Symphonic Choirs, but I'm having trouble getting Reason to find it and use it. I've tried moving things around from this folder to that, but I can't get it to work. If you would be so kind, how did you do it? I'm in the process of reading the documentation for Reason and Eastwest in the meantime.
Hi!

Here are some things i can think of:

1 - Be sure you install the VST2 64bit of QL player as reason only works with VST2 64 bit.

2 - You have to "tell" reason where the QL player dll is in properies -> Advanced ->Vst Folders.

3 - After being sure of this restart reason and see if there weren't any errors. Go to window - > Manage Plugins and check if QL Player is there without errors!

Cheers!
MC

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AALLF
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24 Oct 2020

mcatalao wrote:
24 Oct 2020
Hi!

Here are some things i can think of:

1 - Be sure you install the VST2 64bit of QL player as reason only works with VST2 64 bit.

2 - You have to "tell" reason where the QL player dll is in properies -> Advanced ->Vst Folders.

3 - After being sure of this restart reason and see if there weren't any errors. Go to window - > Manage Plugins and check if QL Player is there without errors!

Cheers!
MC
Thank you for helping. My problem is that when I ran their installation program, it put the program in a hidden folder called ProgramData, which Reason can't find. So, I move the folder to the default VSTPlugins folder under Program Files, which Reason can find, but it still won't load the VST. I also can't run the Play 6 in standalone unless I put the folder back in ProgramData. I might have to uninstall and reinstall it in the VSTPlugins folder, if that's possible.

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AALLF
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24 Oct 2020

I should also mention that EastWest created the VSTPlugins folder for me automatically when I installed it, and put a dll file called play_VST_x64.dll in it. That's what Reason recognizes, and creates a combinator when I load that, but nothing else happens.

EDIT: I fixed it! That is to say, I was dumb and didn't click in the VSTPlugin box in the Combinator (I was trying to load a patch instead). The Play 6 loads right up when I do that and have playback in Reason. I'm real new to my Reason 11 upgrade and have never really used VSTs before.

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mcatalao
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25 Oct 2020

Well that's why I told you to see if it was well loaded in the vsts window. Ultimately we'd understand it was OK and could guide you for the rest of the process.

You should look at the manual though. :)

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AALLF
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30 Nov 2020

I have another problem, if anyone could kindly help me. I can get Symphonic Choirs playing in Reason, and it works most of the time, but when I export the file as audio, the choir just cuts off after a split second of playing every sustained note. I have Pro Tools 11 (I almost never use it), but I can get Symphonic Choirs to play in that program, as well as export the audio just fine. Has anyone came across this issue with VST instruments in Reason? I'm on Reason 11.

Also, it doesn't matter whether I have 1 or 6 midi notes playing at the same time. I've messed around with buffer time in Reason, and with the sample load settings in the Play 6 software that uses the Symphonic Choirs, but there is no change. I don't know what else to do. Anyone have any thoughts?

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