What software do you recommend for a laptop in live gigs?

[leandrusi]

I have a dig.piano and a laptop (no sound card yet), so im about to buy the proper cables to link them, but I have no software, only cakewalk and fruity loops
My main interest would be a rich piano sound, what do you recomend me?
Any other software (apart from the piano) you may wanna name?

 

[leandrusi]

Some hot talk uh?

 

[Figs]

Wish I had an answer for you. Might as well discuss this topic though, because I'm in a similar situation. I've been using Fruity Loops for 4 years now (STILL learning new things to do with it) and I also play keyboard in a band. I'd love to finally integrate Fruity Loops into our live performances but right now I don't have a laptop to handle that of processing.

Sorry this doesn't really answer your question, but I am also interested in this, and I do think that Fruity Loops would be an awesome addition to a live gig.

 

[Terr-or Form]

I wouldn't recommend any software or laptop at live gigs. Too much could go wrong and ruin a show. I could just see your piano playing evolving into the windows theme music as it shut down for some unknown error. Or worse, the note just freezes because the mac has moment to consider itself above all others.

Don't do it man!! Not even to trigger samples!!!

 

[Figs]

True it could be risky and - to be sure nothing goes wrong - expensive, but I know it has been done and can be done.

I could just see your piano playing evolving into the windows theme music as it shut down for some unknown error.

My instinct tells me to go with a mac anyway and avoid this altogether.

 

[Terr-or Form]

We bring a laptop to live gigs only for samples. We don't plug it in to the sound system and we only load samples from the computer to the keyboard if we need them. Even Mac has problems. I posted on this before. I know it can be done but it is sooooooo risky that I wouldn't chance it live.

Besides, our keyboards pretty much do everything else for us. All of our sequences are running full bore while MIDI messages control program changes in my bassPOD, all of our lights are triggered in real time (and on time) from our keyboards, all our samples are loaded in the boards and we have no fewer than 4,000 sounds at our fingertips at any given time. We could buy a few racks (yamaha and roland racks for instance) and have as many sounds as we wanted (seriously, we could have more than 50,000 sounds if we wanted to expand that far).

There are so many great units that just don't fail that we can live without a computer on stage. If you wire your keyboards right, there isn't too much you can't do with MIDI. Hell, you can even have videos running in the background and producing images that relate to your songs in real time.

I have seen people use laptops and even full towers on stage but, I have also heard them talk about the inevitable happening from time to time. This just isn't a choice I like to consider.

 

[Figs]

Damn, man. Got any photos of your setup on stage in full effect?

 

[Terr-or Form]

No - mainly cause I hate pictures. I can stand in front of anyone and give a speech, cold call anyone for any reason but, when it comes to pictures I get all self conscious...

Sorry man. Perhaps in November when we play next (we are on a remix holiday), I'll ask someone to take some sneaky shots for ya

 

[Terr-or Form]

I can however take pics of our rack and keyboards and bass and list all of our equipment. We keep a lot of our equipment stacked in a storage room between shows so, that might be tough.

Also, if you want to know how we do the things we do, I can go through the list if that helps.

(just an afterthought)

 

[Figs]

Interesting, a stage performer who hates pictures of himself. At least you can get up and play on stages in front of people despite being self-conscious.

Anyway, not to get off-topic; I was just interested in seeing how you set up everything with even the lights synced up like you said. Sounds like your music comes with quite a stage presence.

 

[Terr-or Form]

It's not hard really. You have to have the mixer board for lights, like DMX:

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Elation-Magic-260-260-Channel-DMX-Controller-?sku=800547

With this, you program your lights in scenes and shows with Elation software:

http://www.elationlighting.com/product.asp?ProductIDNumber=1396&cat=PC Lighting Control

Now, here is the fun part. After you have your lights programmed (fade effects, strobes during fast drums and rapid snare fills, smoke, etc.) all you have to do is create a MIDI event on your keyboard to trigger the DMX mixer. The mixer has been pre programmed and the keyboard just tells it "Scene 1, NOW!!!"

We don't use lights in all our shows as most of them are small clubs of no more than 300 people. If we get a show that can have 800 or more, then we grab the lights. Before we bought our own, we would rent them. We would always ask for DMX as we had the software and our own DMX mixer. Hell, you can rent someone to run lights for you if you know you are going to make enough money at the clubs.

As far as switching effects on bass, same thing. We have the keyboard send a program change message to the BassPOD and the POD has already been programmed. No need for pedals!!

This is really how most everything is triggered live. From samples stored in an outboard sampler (even a computer) to lights to vocal effects (which we do that too. We have a Kurzweil Mangler and Rumor for voice effects hooked up to MIDI and they change our sounds in real time - on time)!!

The worse thing in the world is to have to worry about a bunch of crap live. If I'm singing (okay, grunting) and I need to switch my bass sound with a stupid pedal - who knows. I could be too far away, I could accidentally miss it or hit it twice, etc. Now I'm grunting for real and everything is starting to sound horrible, I get out of time, my wife starts throwing things at me - you get it My whole point was/is - why run a laptop when a good keyboard can run your samples and trigger off events throughout the show for you? I don't have to worry about any hang-ups with OS's or a program freezing and looks really cool when you hear this woman saying, "...all of my extremities were inflamed," with a demonic voice and no one knows where it came from. Or better yet - the sudden jackhammer with strobe lights!!

Edit: You will need a MIDI interface and lots of MIDI cables. That is one thing that sucks, when you start expanding, show setups and take downs become a real pain in the _$$.

 

[funkyant]

Hey guys. First post here.

I play 4 shows a week using an AX-7 hooked up to a PC laptop running brainspawn Forte, and it's rock solid. I can load all my VST's and patches straight from the studio for live use, with effects and all.

Highly recommend.

http://www.brainspawn.com/

They have an active user forum where the actual developers get on and listen to the users for product update suggestions etc. Just read the posts from all the religious users if you're not convinced. Simply awesome!

http://www.brainspawn.com/forum/

 

[Terr-or Form]

That looks more promising than most I've seen out there. Still, one show was all it took for me. No offense, and if it works for you that's great!! I know some others who use soft synths live but I still believe that using a hard board and sampling what I need is more reliable.

The future of softsynths is becoming more reliable. It sucks that all these companies with great services have to fight with Mac and PC stability issues when they make such a great product. Hopefully Unix bases OS's will improve in the near future and we can all relax and use these soft synths as they were meant to!!!

 

[funkyant]

I am guessing that you're not a very advanced PC user?

If you have a dedicated laptop that just does gigs, and has a trimmed up verion of XP with no software other than your Audio apps, it is extremely stable.

XP doesn't crash. Software running on it does, as well as hardware can fail. In the last 4 years I've broken keys on my D70 and had a MIDI lead die from rolling a case over it. So from my experience the laptop has been more reliable than traditional hardware. Also, just because I had a problem doesn't mean I wouldn't use a MIDI lead or my D70 in a live situation again.

There seems to be a lot of fear about running laptops live. I don't really understand why. You are really missing out on an incredibly powerful tool.

I've had a laptop as part of my core setup for about 4 years and I've NEVER had a crash at a gig. Ever.

 

[Terr-or Form]

I'm quite experience with XP as I use it to record on Cubase and use a variety of VST's and the Korg Legacy collection.

Again, one bad show was enough for me.

 

[l0u5y]

if you are looking for really good rich sounding pianos, you can try ivory synthology, pianoteq or akoustik piano. laptops are pretty stable in a live show in my opinion, that is if you have a really good stage crew that can handle and problematic situation. if laptops are not your way, you can try muse receptor. it is somewhat a module, but you install the sound libraries in it. just do a google search on them.

 

[funkyant]

I'm loving Pianoteq.

My new main piano sound.

 

[Mourndark]

I'm considering using a laptop to load performance data to my JV-1080 live, although it takes some planning. I have to find suitable breaks where I can load everything up.

I need a faster MIDI interface before I start using soft synths, as mine at the moment is ridden with latency issues. Need a machine with more grunt too. It's fine for running MIDI backing tracks though, so could be worse.

 

[BALA]

software for laptop

use ableton 8.1.3 it is wonderful software

 

[Pratty]

I can't believe I found this forum this is exactly what I'm trying to learn!!!

I have a midi keyboard and want to somehow load a vst grand piano sampled sounds to it but the thought of the laptop crashing was always in the back of my mind
My question is: How do you go about "loading samples" or all the stuff you were talking about like 4000 sounds at our fingertips????

I really hope you can help me
Any advice or were I can learn this is greatly appreciated
Thankyou