Setting Up GigaSampler For Use With Finale

byJason Hughes

The following is the method Iused to set up the Go Fish Music Marching Samples with a GigaSampler for usewith Finale. It is by no meansperfect and I’m sure there may be a better way but this worked for me andthat was enough. If you know of abetter way then please email me at hughej3@auburn.eduor contact Go Fish Music and letme/us know.

A few things you shouldknow

· Inorder to get Finale to use the samples at playback time.  Finale AND GigaSampler must both berunning. This is because what youare doing is just diverting the midi notes that are activated by Finale intoGigaSampler for playback. The GigaSampler is a software sampler.

· Ifyour computer is slower or low on memory then you may experience someundesirable effects during playback. This is because as compared to just playing horns which may have a dozenor two notes a minute, Finale and GigaSampler are processing probably hundreds of notes minute when playing marching percussionmusic. All of those rolls andflams can add quickly! Soslower/low memory machines may experience trouble keeping up.  One thing that I’ve found to helpquite a bit is using some sort of memory managing program.  You can find some freeware andshareware versions online. Beforeplaying back, get the memory manager to free up any memory that may be occupiedwhere it is not needed. Also, trykeeping any other program usage at this time to minimum.

· Youwill also need some sort of wave editor (such as cool edit 2000) or somethingthat can rip sounds from the Go Fish Music CD and convert them to wavfiles. More on this in the nextsection.

Setting up

1. First off, you need to rip the samples from the CD since theycome in .cda format and we need them in .wav format. Cool Edit 2000 will allow you to do this.  A demo version of Cool Edit 2000 isavailable online (just do a search for it) and that will get the job done foryou. Many other programs will workfine too. Most are easy to use interms of ripping sounds so reading the help files included with them and toyingwith them a bit should do the trick.

2. I suggest putting all of your newly created .wav sounds intoone folder (giving them their own folder is also suggested) so you know whereto find them later on.

3. Open up GigaSampler. What we will be doing here is creating a new instrument file that youcan later load when needed.

4. Click on the button titled “Patch Editor” and thenselect “New Instrument” from the pull-down menu that appears.  A new program called the“Instrument Editor” will start. Begin a new file by either clicking on the generic‘new file’ button or go to “File – New”.

5. First we have to load in the samples.  You will notice two windows on the leftside. Take a look at the bottomone on the left. In the windowsomewhere do a right click then select “Import Directory”.  In the window that pops up, navigate tothe folder where your samples are stored. Select that folder then click “ok”.  Your folder along with all of yoursamples will appear in the window.

6. Now we create the instrument banks. I created four separate banks for the sections in thebattery (Snares, Tenors, Bass Drums, Cymbals). Click on the button up top that looks like a littlehorn. A window will appear withnumerous fields to fill in. In the“Name” field, type in a name for the first bank.  Let’s start with the snaresection first. Name it“Snares, “Hackers”, or (if you’re a tenor player likeme) “Whiny bunch of……….”.  You get the idea.

7. Now put a check in the box named “Drum”.   This is important because it willallow you to place the drum sound anywhere on the keyboard and it will stillplay its original pitch.

8. In the “Bank” field type in a number one (1) sincethis is the first drum bank.

9. In the “Patch” field type in a number one (1) aswell. You don’t need tobother with anything else so you can now select “ok” for thiswindow.

10. Now you will see on the top left window a directory named“Drum Bank 1” with a subdirectory named “Snares”,“Hackers”, or whatever you named it. Make sure that instrument is highlighted then take a look atthe window to the right that contains the keyboard.

11. Here is where the actual mapping to the notes occurs.  PAY ATTENTION to where you map thesamples. What I did was to justwrite down the sample name and the note it went to (Snare Section- C4, SnareSection Shot- D4, etc).

12. Another thing to remember is to make sure every sample has itsown unique note that is not used by ANY other sample (even if its for anothersection).

13. Pick any note you want to begin at by right clicking on it andselecting “New Region”. I chose C4 but you can pick any note just as long as you know whereeverything is.

14. Now go into your samples list on the bottom left window, clickand drag one of the snare samples in to the box the says “velocitymap”. If there is anothersample listed in there don’t worry, it will just be overwritten when youplace this sample. Itdoesn’t matter what sample you choose as long as it’s in thesection you are working on and you know what is going where.  I suggest writing your selections downas you go along.

15. Do the same thing for the rest of the snare samples makingsure they all have notes and you know where they are.

16. Go back to step 6 and repeat for the other sections.  BUT this time, in the“Bank” field type in the number 2, 3, or 4 depending on which drumbank you are working on next. The“patch” field will always be 1 though.

17. After everything is mapped, save your work.  I suggest saving it in the same folderas the samples. You may close theinstrument editor.

18. Under the “Available Instruments” section the pathcontaining your sample folder and .gig file should be listed.  Click on the box next to that and thenon the box next to the name of the instrument file. Your four sections should appear.

19. Click and drag each section up to its own channel keepingtrack of which section is in which channel.

Using Finale

I will only explain how to getFinale and GigaSampler to interact because there is already a tutorialavailable here on the Go Fish Music site on how to set the sounds up in Finale.

1. Start Finale.

2. Under the “MIDI” pull-down, select “MIDISetup”.

3. In the “MIDI Out” drop-down, select  “Endless Wave/GigaSampler”.

4. Make sure each instrument you create in Finale is the set tothe same channel as it is in GigaSampler (Snares in Finale on channel 1 sinceSnares in GigaSampler are on channel 1).

5. Switch over to GigaSampler. You may see a little circular group of stars spinning atop akeyboard. If you see that thenclick on it to make it stop.

6. In GigaSampler, you can change the buffer size if you getbroken audio. This is anothermethod in addition to freeing up memory. The buffer control can be accessed by clicking on the“Config” button and the selecting the “Capture” tab.

I hope this has helped those of you who have been askinghow to do this. If anything inthis tutorial is found to be incorrect or such then hopefully I will correct itin a timely fashion. Have fun.