How (not) to write for strings - Easy tutorial for better string arrangements

welcome and welcome back i'm martin and in today's video i would like to show you how to get your string arrangements from something like this do something like this [Music] so after my last tutorial on how to program epic percussion today we are talking about strings and if you like content like this and have subscribed to my channel yet now is the very right moment to hit that button um it happened recently that um i got tracks handed out like can you arrange something for us or can you bounce something for us or can you it doesn't matter what exactly and you know it it's it's the strings i used for pop songs rock songs film music and whatever and it happened quite often then when i received those midi files that the strings were played in something like this which even me i'm guilty of you know i'm a keyboard player i'm a piano player so this is how we play in the strings [Music] and this was already a good example for a passing note so at least try to have some passing notes but not only the block chords and to get a feel for it it's not that difficult because you can take for example the free library from spitfire audio the bbc symphony orchestra discover where you can see how an orchestra is organized and how it works and then you have the fact that strings are divided into sections so we maybe work with like in my case today from project sam the orchestral essentials strings long which is an ensemble patch which goes from the base to the violin but normally strings you should think about it like a section so we have the bases and and the cool thing about those libraries is you can see already from the keyboard the range so the base can't play here huh the same thing goes for the jelly the jelly start here and and normally somewhere here then you do have the violas they go in upper range you know violas are those slightly bigger violins and then you have the first and the second violins or you take a library like jaeger for example even jaeger wonderful library has those string sections and then if you play in your chords track by track it comes naturally that you don't play block chords but you divide it and i just suggest the chord progression from before we will now recreate it starting with the bass note [Music] [Music] one nice little error that you saw here um i didn't check the you know the famous wiggling around before you play that expression and modulation uh or at 0 or at 127 when you start writing we will talk about expression and modulation a little later then we play in the cello line [Music] which by the way one really nice detail jager has legato sections [Music] so nice really so nice then we play in the viola [Music] and i'm not even going in the faders as i always say use your faders we will do this we will do this this is just for showing you how much more interesting the whole string thing becomes if you play the lines separated the violins [Music] so you see that's all that there is i'm just playing the chords now divided section by section using passing notes so for example if i go from let's take here from something like this the a and the d and d minor to up to the f i'm not doing this i'm doing this just to have these lines in and i think it already sounds quite good [Music] even if it's still quite robotic robotic because there is no modulation or expression in it but the good news is if you don't have a string library with those sections divided that's not a problem because by now we know that we divide the keyboard intersections and we can do the very same thing with an ensemble patch in this case the long strings from project sam let's do this the base [Music] after the base we play in the jelly which are more or less here [Music] then we go to our violas [Music] and last we play in the violins just a second i'm seeing now that some notes are missing this means we played them before the one this is why we then don't hear them okay we fixed this and now we play in the violins which are up here [Music] there you go there you go the whole thing now played as nice sections now we play a little bit with expression or in this case modulation just to see how alive they become if they're coming in waves [Music] you see that's all that there is i mean this is just my little beginner's tutorial on how you should treat your strings to get your music a little more interesting maybe a little more human if you will again this is the normal block chords and that's the very same chord progression blood played in you know with some passing notes [Music] so i hope you liked it i hope it was useful for you and if you like to learn more about strings there is even a video of mine there should be the link somewhere how to program string ostinati because you know even ostinati are used quite often by the string section and yeah that's it from my site for today see in the next video or in the next live stream have a wonderful time bye bye whoa you're still here looking for any library check this one out you want to learn something new this one might be the right one for you here you can subscribe to my channel and consider even visiting my patreon page for even more exclusive content bye

Channel: Martin Heidenreich Music

Views: 6,742

Keywords: How to arrange strings, Tutorial String arrangement, Beginner tutorial string arrangement, How to get a better string arrangment, Tutorial better string arrangment, How not to arrange your strings, How to write for strings, How to make string arrangements, How to use string libraries, How to write cinematic music with Strings, Martin Heidenreich Music, Tutorial Strings VST, Tutorial for beginners, Symphobia, Project Sam, Symphobia by Project Sam, Orchestral Essentials

Id: 7QwglSWx5IE

Length: 9min 56sec (596 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 02 2022