Quote:
Originally posted by Dnj:
I know these WS can do so many things....BUT I have YET to hear any normal everyday musician produce a quality sounding approaching PrO recording using only the WS....everyone I listen to sounds so amateurish, unbalanced, and not of a professional caliber at all. Are these things that hard to create with or is it more USER error in playing ability or lack of knowledge?


Donny, I am afraid that arranger players aren't generally any better (or worse) that WS players, on the whole...

All this shows is just how difficult it is to make an entire piece of music on keyboards, and make it sound like real players (if that's what you are after). Sad truth is, most players that CAN make a good demo on an arranger, if you stripped out the arranger parts, would sound no better... The arranger IS what is making us sound good, not us!

But for me, the main thing this shows is how unprepared, ill-equipped and unskilled most arranger players (OK, WS players too!) are at making styles. Anyone who lightly tosses off the excuse for a poorly styled arranger of 'You are supposed to make your own' is living in a fantasy world. Without great styles we are at the mercy of whatever our main musical skills are. For most keyboard players, that is playing the piano part and little else (OK, the organ part too!).

Few of us are great drummers, or imitators of great drummers. Few know how to phrase and voice brass parts well. Few can lay down a great bassline (especially one that works for an arranger). And so on and so forth. But style making involves all those skills.

What primarily amazes me is that those few arrangers that expect the user to make the styles can't even find ONE good styler maker to voice their own product. For good money, no less. Why they expect the users to be able to do something they can't even get a professional to do beats me
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An arranger is just a tool. What matters is what you build with it..!