GarageBand can do a lot of cool things. It can record instruments, arrange songs, and even make music. But sometimes, the guitar is not enough. The instrument of choice for many musicians is the violin. Violin is a very hard instrument to play and it takes years of practice to become an accomplished violinist. If you have access to a violin or even a ukulele, then you can get a lot of mileage out of GarageBand.
Adding vibrato to a violin is easy and the result is pretty cool. With this tutorial, you will learn how to use GarageBand to add vibrato to a violin or ukulele.
Improving Vibrato and Sound of GarageBand Violin
Some VST instrument libraries are amazingly similar to the real instruments that they sample. They are not perfect, by any means. So how do you make MIDI strings sound more like real instruments?
You need to be able to replicate what real people are doing by playing an actual instrument. You can achieve more realistic orchestral sounds by dividing the instruments and playing them in different tracks on your MIDI controller. You can also automate the positions of the different instruments, just like a professional musician would do. Here are some things you can do:
- Know your instrument’s range: Each instrument has its own limitations when it comes to its ability to play a certain range of notes. Some string libraries take this into account, but not all libraries do that. By knowing what each instrument can do, you can write music that sounds very close to the real thing. It will help you sound more real when you record orchestral pieces.
- Use automation correctly: You can also adjust the amount of expression and vibrato that is used during recording. It is possible to set how much expression and vibrato a musician should use at any one time. It would be like someone playing an actual instrument or, rather, making it sound like somebody is actually playing an instrument.
- Add reverb: Some libraries benefit a lot from having reverb, and others don’t really benefit much at all when you add reverb. They might have been recorded in a very close mic or were recorded very dry, which does not add much to the sound. Sometimes cheaper or free libraries are worse than expensive ones. Spitfire Libraries spend more time, money and money to make flexible and feature-packed products.
GarageBand Violin VST Plugins
Sometimes, you might want to add some extra character to your violins. A violin is a string instrument, so you need a certain type of sound to make it sound like a violin. You can find many VST plugins that are designed for this purpose. Some of the best ones include the following:
- Spitfire LABS Strings
- 8Dio Adagio Violins
- Albion Tundra
- Output Analog Strings
- Joshua Bell Violin
While many good sample libraries are available, it’s impossible to express yourself using just samples. This is because samples are pre-recorded, which means that they simply don’t allow you to express yourself very well. Even if samples are very good, they are not designed to work with your original music.
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