Want to know more? Then download our free Orchestral Programming Guide thinkspaceeducation.com/signup/orchestral-programming/

"school orchestra with 400 French Horns", The hours spent arranging music for lovely students with our orchestra of 1 vln (grade 8) 12 other violins (grd 3 - 5) 16 other violins (grade 0 - can I use the bow?) 16 clarinets, 1 flute, 1 trumpet, 4 drummers and 8 keyboard players. We have successfully destroyed many musical works . . . .really miss it now! (although I still have nightmares) anyway ...400 French Horns.... challenge accepted!

A section of 150 French horns. That's cool. Is that defined as a weapon of BRASS destruction? ;) I'll show myself out... see ya...

This series has been unbelievably helpful. Thanks, Guy, you are always fun and an amazing teacher! Cheryl.

Glad I saw this! Layering is such a helpful idea! Thank you for posting!

I loved how you layered different articulations of strings!! Very nice tip 💜

I never thought to combine a solo instrument with a section sound for more clarity. Great tip!

This was a light-bulb moment for me. I didn't understand how the number of instruments/players added up when you played chords. And i laughed too... Thank you.

I've learned so much about scoring from your videos, but aside from being a great educator, you're also incredibly inspiring. Thank you for all you do.

Brilliant! I was just working on a project where I wanted a sforzando string and couldn't find one. Now I can just carefully make one by combining articulations. What a great idea!

Brilliant - This is where you absolutely exceed the boys from Spitfire in sharing the kind of information that can only come from a practitioners deep knowledge and experience. I learned so much from this. Thanks.

You make me allways smile... even in this mad covid time. Thx a lot an stay healthy. Jog

very enjoyable and educational thank you

It would be so cool to be able to pick samples from real orchestral players(with credits), place them in virtual sections, so you could literally build your own orchestra. (kinda like a dream team of musicians) then have the ability to move them around in virtual studios, halls, rooms, caves, VW car boots., etc..

11:00. I did this the other day to give the brass (trumpet) some extra punch in the attack on a Discover doodle and it worked really well. Delighted to hear it has your blessing, Guy.

Feels great to be back here :)

Thanks Guy. I write and record heavy metal with orchestral sections and have learned everything from your videos. This one is crucial to what I’m doing right now.

Thank you Guy. This was so helpful. Your experience is gold.

Guy. I've learnt so much from your videos that it's beyond words, but hopefully my productions will eventually speak for themselves as a result. Thank you for all your time and effort, and for sharing the tricks of the trade with such amateurs as myself. Warmest regards.

This mini series of videos is fantastic.

I really enjoy Guy's videos! Fun, but obviously very instructive as well.

As you started speaking about section size I shouted 'but Mahler!' at the screen 🤣 (Stravinsky and Wagner too)

You are the ONE who I have ever seen wearing sunglasses for the shortest possible time ever! :)) Not to worry, it meant to be my compliment :) Of course it's easy when you are not on a demanding sunny beach in the middle of a Caribbean sunny day, but instead, sitting and expressing musical ideas inside of a cute studio like yours.:) By the way I have subscribed as well! Lucky man. haha :)

This series of short vids on orchestra programming has been very useful many thanks :)

And, you can play the solo strings on a different track, and even if the mini notes line in time exactly you can change the pan very slightly as well as the EQ to make it ever so slightly unique, especially if you automate the changes

Loving these short videos Guy. Really great advice. 👍🏼

Gold gold gold. Thank you Guy.

Metropolis Ark 1 has a 3 French Horn and a 9 French Horn patch, and I always try to use the 9 for single melody lines I want to punch through and the 3 for when the horns are playing more chordal bits. Great video!

Thanks for another great vlog..

Thank you for these great tips, Guy. I can see how they really help the realism of the sound.

This reminds me of an earlier lesson: Start simple! :)

Another wonderfully helpful video for orchestral programming newbies like me.

Excellent working of the virtual instruments, something I tend to forget myself and it makes the result very thick. I like the usage/mix of the solo and ensembles to bring out a part more than just ensemble or solo by themselves. Food for thought! Topping work, Guy! Thanks for sharing. Treat yourself to a cuppa and a biscuit! (P.S. if I had a studio space like that, I don't think wild horses could drag me away!)

quite interesting !! Tks vm ..

This series is great. Thanks Guy!

Fantastic !

Nobody is teaching this excellent job!!!

I was thinking about what you mentioned, woodwinds, brass, strings...physically played differently, there is always difference in attack and delay from breath vs bowed notes and everything amplified in sections and VW boot:) loved that vid, you just need a driver and a really bumpy road

Thank you for another very insightful video!

Totally irrelevant to the topic, but in the title the verb _to matter_ is used. The translation in Dutch is typical Dutch: _ertoe doen_ . You can recognise _to do_ in _doen_ . Compare _doing_ . Ertoe, on the other hand contains the typical and unique (with Afrikaans) word 'er'. It's there, but in a sort of abstract way. So it's "there to doing", but there in an abstract way if you can fathom that. One of the toughest verbs to get your head around in Dutch. And this is how the subtitle is totally different in Dutch: "Waarom orkestsectiegrootte ertoe doet". (orkest+sectie+grootte, compare the last to grow: size).

Thank you for sharing these great videos.

Guy, great video, as always! What I'm impressed with most about you, is your attitude, mental clarity and creativity. My question is: whilst fluency with daws and musicianship is, of course, important in the context of music making,do you have any tips regarding your great energy, creativity and clarity as a "40+" composer?

Wow that was very helpful, I overlooked that in programming my sounds. Thank you Guy

These are so amazing. Love the quick tips. Ok ok. I’m going to go write one Realistic line on music. Thank you !

thank you for the good helpful input today .Keep up and well done

I’m a string player in orchestra..it’s not wrong to play those ensemble sounds using chords..coz sometimes we have more brass and woodwind sections...like more clarinets..more trumpets..so it’s totally ok..this is why it’s important to study about orchestra or ask orchestra players if one doesn’t noe

You have talked about this before that having too many of each instrument doesn’t mean bigger sound. My question is, as I have read, Wagner composed for an orchestra with 100+ players wich makes it very hard to set up as very few concert halls have space for such a large orchestra

This is very useful stuff! Thank you!

'Apart from Mahler' that made me lol!

Thanks Guy for yet another very helpful video. It really shows that the devil of great sounding music is in the details. On a side note, could you do a more personal video at some time about your journey to becoming a professional composer? Hurdles, big decisions you came across and that moment when you obviously realized "Wait a minute, I'm good enough at this to do it for a living."?

hi guy, i was wondering if you ever get lost and overwhelmed in your vast amounts of libraries? could you perhaps make a video on "knowing your libraries" and how to make the most out of owning a lot of sample libraries? thank you!

I'm not exactly sure when I recognised the size of a section, but the 344 Strings in Spitfire Audio's Hans Zimmer Strings is certainly the biggest stringsection you can get. So 400 French horns is a bit much, but 344 Strings....

Lots of divisi in Spitfire Studio Strings Pro !!!

What am I going to do after day 5? I know there are loads more to watch but this has become my daily highlight with more and more great tips and shenanigans.

The biggest stringlibrary you can get is Spitfire's Hans Zimmer's Strings with 344 Strings. I image said Hans Zimmer would indeed pose the question: why can't I have 150 French horns? Played only by French players?

great video. Are there sample libraries that automatically adjust section size by polyphony? e.g. you play one note it plays 16 violins, play 2 notes at the same time it plays 8 on each, 4 notes plays 4 per note etc

3:12 Aren't these the rose-tinted sunglasses of optimism

Guy, I like you!😎

Hey there, Im trying to get a somewhat realistic Orchestral Template with kontakt libraries right now. After I saw that especially film composers like John Williams uses for example 3 Trumpets (he is also of course doubling multiple other woodwinds and brass) I want 3 solo Trumpet legato tracks in my template. But when I use 3 solo trumpets together it doesn’t have nearly as much power as an ensemble patch with 2-4 trumpets has (I tried various libraries: Cinesamples Brass, Nucleus, CSBrass (my favourite so far), Spitfire Brass and Sample Modeling Trumpets) How do you do it? Shall I use multiple ensemble patches which will end up having at least 6 trumpets playing something 3 trumpets should play or should I use 3 solo trumpets which won’t have nearly the power of an ensemble patch? Or should I maybe use a sustain ensemble patch, where I can have multiple notes played in one patch? (but sustain patches also doesn’t sound as good as legato patches)

Great...thanks

Is the short cut at the end an rendering mistake or did you just post recorded it? ( ;

I wonder if one could obtain the ultimate realistic sound by creating a section of 16 Single Violins. I mean: Record them on individual stems (without quantising) and slightly tweek some sound-parameters (Violins dont sound all the same). Would it be worth the efford or just crush the cpu?

150 horns? I think Hans Zimmer would love the idea. :D

Hey Guy, would you do a video on Spitfire Audio’s Originals Epic Strings or if you’ve done one, point me to it?

with so many electronic scores in films , totally supporting the film , and in example of Blade Runner...impossible to imagine the film without this " synthetic" score attached..i'm constantly mystified over why the necessity to sound orchestrally 100% real ?? would any cinema goers notice the difference between a VST mockup vs the real orchestral recording..and if so , would one of the two make the film better??? if so which one??? am i rambling??? thanks guy again. x

Guy, how do you record your voice independent from your currently running Cubase project?

Hello Guy, how about I send you my orchestral piece and you can show your viewers how to correct the music score and reproduce it to a much better standard? I am sure that your viewers would love to see the results!

The size of a nice cup of tea is all that really matters.

Apart from Mahler ;-)

I've really got to get myself some sunglasses of doubt.

Yo

Is it nine clarinets or is it three, three times? Hmmmm...:)

Hellooo! :D

It's not about the size of your section....It's about how you use it. :-P I'll get my coat.

Because a lot of RAM memory matters

牛逼

Hey Guy great video. I'm not sure if I'm just missing something (obviously I am), but it's fairly frustrating when a library has several patches and I want to play a chord but only certain patches allow you to do so while others allow only one key to be pressed at a time. I've seen this in quite a few libraries. What rule of thumb am I missing?