WTF Sonar?

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Noisy Humbucker

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So I’ve barely done any recording in the last dew years, and as I begin overhauling my PC I find that Cakewalk’s been aquired by Gibson and Sonar been all but phased out?!?

Guess I’m back in the market for new recording and mixing software.

All of my experience is outdated to begin with - mostly familiar with Sonar X1 and FL Studio 9.

I’ve begun researching online, but realized there’s a wealth of knowledge (and opinions) on good old SSO for just this sort of thing.

I keep things pretty simple (definitely not an advanced user). The things I used most in Sonar were:
-Post processing effects
-Channel effects (eq, compression, etc. BIG fan of presets for different purposes)

P.S. I also always used FL Studio to put together my drums. Terribly inefficient as I’d switch back and forth between Sonar and FL, but I wanted to sequence ever single snare/kick/tom/symbol hit (again, FL probably not being ideal for this purpose).

If anyone has thoughts on user-friendly drum software that easily lets you plot everything out I’d love to hear about it.

Last but not least, my goal is to record, edit and master with a final product that would pass as professionally produced to the average listener. I’m too lazy to put in the effort to squeeze out that last layer of polish, and too cheap to but software than can do it for me.

Thanks all!
 

Drew

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P.S. I also always used FL Studio to put together my drums. Terribly inefficient as I’d switch back and forth between Sonar and FL, but I wanted to sequence ever single snare/kick/tom/symbol hit (again, FL probably not being ideal for this purpose).
Ironically, I used to do this myself, back in like 2000-2005 or so. :lol:

Grab Reaper and a copy of some sort of Toontrack product - EzDrummer, even the original, is probably enough for your purposes, and learn to sequence in the piano roll. It's really no harder than sequencing in FL, I figured it wouldn't be but I took to it pretty quickly, and the realism is WAY beyond what FL can do. You'll want to download some sort of a note name file to label all the "keys" in the Reaper Piano roll so you know what each key represents on the drums, but they're widely available on the net (nothing for Superior 3 yet though so I'm still relying on 2, which is an imperfect fit. I need to map my own, I think).
 

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Descent

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Sonar has a drum synth now I think, so you can program that on the grid as well.
 

newamerikangospel

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Here just to say I still use fruityloops, as I love the quick channela for instancing hits, and the quantize function for copying drummers "feels". I copped a lot of dirk verburen and gene hoglan from the included sdx midis I have.
 

Alex Kenivel

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Hahaha sequencing drums on FL was so easy. I used to do that too.
 

Noisy Humbucker

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Hahaha sequencing drums on FL was so easy. I used to do that too.
To me that begs the question - why change? I’m an ignoramus when it comes to just about everything beyond FL, and with a bit of work I’ve gotten results I’m pretty happy with.

The single biggest reason I was trying to upgrade was so that I could have my drum sequences and live tracks all in one place, instead of bouncing back and forth. The last thing I was working on was trying to get something akin to a sequencer ala piano roll with Addictive Drums in Sonar Pro. It was definitely taking a while and then I never got back to it.

Fast forward to now, I try to log into my cakewalk account to re-download the software I paid for... and I can’t remember by friggin’ password. Add to that their “password reset” does a whole lot of nothing, and their email support is “under construction”.

I’m just ready to be done with it. If I can’t find something easy enough to work with so as not to suck the fun out of an otherwise pointless endeavor, I’ll probably just pack it in.

All done whining. :)
 

newamerikangospel

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I like the separation, so that I have a unique writing program, and unique recording/mixing program. I do alot of orchestral stuff, and with just basic stereo channels from each, I can push 16G pretty easily. I prefer to bounce all of my channels, so that what I get is similar to what I would expect if I was mixing actual session pieces, including drums.
 

Drew

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To me that begs the question - why change? I’m an ignoramus when it comes to just about everything beyond FL, and with a bit of work I’ve gotten results I’m pretty happy with.
Realism, mostly. Unless FL Studio has gotten a LOT better since I've used it, you basically loaded samples and that was that. Each hit sounded exactly the same, was exactly the same loudness, and there was zero variation from hit to hit. You couldn't control dynamics, what you had was what you got.

Working in the piano roll in Reaper feeding Superior or EzDrummer, you can get to the same starting point pretty quickly (I usually start with one or a couple MIDI loops I've programmed, when working on drums), but right off the bat the drum programmer will cycle through a number of similar-velocity samples rather than using the same one over and over, to humanize and randomize the sound subtly. Then, when programming, you get to change velocities of hits, so you can have the drummer laying back in one section, really digging in in another, accenting certain beats or hits, and try to get a more "human" feeling variation in intensity in your fills.

You'll definitely spend a lot more time working on your drums this way, but the results are a LOT more natural sounding - a recent folk-rock project I was working on, I had a number of musician/recording friends comment that they wouldn't have necessarily realized the drums were programmed, by hand no less, had I not said so. It's kind of remarkable what you can do.
 

newamerikangospel

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There are some very deep settings you may not have scratched, especially in midi editing. If I take a midi out channel, I can setup an instance of "C" and transpose it to another note and use the tab editor to put together a drum track in minutes that is all at 78 velocity. Then, since everything is effectively a transposed "C", I can start pulling quantintized templates that I have stripped from other midi or captured myself on a homemade ekit for specific moments (blasts, heel-toe, rolls with specific movements)
 

Noisy Humbucker

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Not gonna lie, mostly greek to me...

As stupid as it sounds, I never really grasped midi. The last time I (knowingly) messed with it was a bunch of stand alone physical modules in community college. I have a bad habit of learning the bare bones basics, the stretch those beyond what they were intended for - thus limiting myself (I still use MS paint for crying out loud!).

Once I’ve actually got something down I’m off to the races, but I’m easily daunted when I’m out if my comfort zone. ;p
 

Winspear

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Hey man, ex Sonar user here. I moved to Reaper after that bad news, but, it has been acquired and is now continuing as a FREE DAW under the name Bandlab. So you needn't stop using it. I just found features in Reaper that I loved in the meantime which made me change.
EDIT: I see this was already mentioned haha my bad.
 

Noisy Humbucker

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To be honest, Sonar’s GUI was getting too crowded for my liking. Probably as good a time as any to give something new a shot.
 

Drew

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Not gonna lie, mostly greek to me...

As stupid as it sounds, I never really grasped midi. The last time I (knowingly) messed with it was a bunch of stand alone physical modules in community college. I have a bad habit of learning the bare bones basics, the stretch those beyond what they were intended for - thus limiting myself (I still use MS paint for crying out loud!).

Once I’ve actually got something down I’m off to the races, but I’m easily daunted when I’m out if my comfort zone. ;p
Drum programming in midi is super easy. Trust me. :)
 

Drew

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I believe it, but are you using an external controller for input or midi as a software communication protocol?
Nope - just a mouse. When I get home tonight if I can I'll try to post a screenshot of what my piano roll looks like, but basically it's a grid, with the vertical axis being different types of hits on different parts of the kit - kick, snare, snare sidestick, hihat fully closed, hihats in different gradiations of being open, hihat fully open, etc - while the horizontal axis is note durations, 16ths or 32ns or whatever you set it to. So you basically just click where you want a part of the kit to be triggered, at the point corresponding to where you want the note to hit. Up to that point it actually looks a lot like the sequencer view in old FL Studio, though then you can adjust the "velocity" or strength of the hit, which you couldn't in FL.
 

Noisy Humbucker

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Proper terminology is my other big weakness (with music in general). Just about everything I learn I do so unconventially, so for as much as I actually do understand, I suck at communicating it. :)

I was in progress of doing exactly what you described with Sonar Pro and Addictive drums, and just never got back to it. Sounds like I may be making a mountain out of a molehill.

I’ll have to play around with the Reaper demo once I’ve got my PC back. I’m wondering if I can find the license to reinstall the Addictive Drums that came with Sonar Pro, otherwise I’ll look into EZ Drummer as well.

Thanks for all of the input!
 

Noisy Humbucker

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Started poking around in Reaper and it’s refreshing to start with such a clean interface, where I have to add bells and whistles vs being bombarded by them. Thank you all for the recommendation!

Plus, I had registered myself with XLN to get Addictive Drums 2 the last time I uograded Sonar, so I don’t even have to shell out for new “drums”!
 
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