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I can help with judging, Morivou!

There are also a variety of articulations you can use to make strings sound intense such as staccato, spiccato, and accents. Fortissimo tremelo/ very fast notes can also have a very powerful effect. Here's an example of some very fiery writing for string orchestra: It's a very good recording of Bartok's divertimento.

All-time YC ban leader :P ...

The term only exists in notation software and was devised as a clever shortening of the full term by some dude in marketing who thought that by making it sound like something unique, they might attract more buyers. So I don't recommend using it. Calling a software synthesizer a "soft" synth in a crowd of synthesists will get you ridiculed. Also, there's no such thing as a "hard" synthesizer — it's just a hardware synth or software synth. One is a physical machine, the other is a computer program. Connor is, respectfully, wrong about VSTs. In the world of software instruments, the way that you use a particular thing is (most often) by integrating it into your audio software as a plugin. These plugins come in a variety of different formats, only one of which is VST (think of the formats as file formats — like MP3 or WAV). Not all VSTs are software synthesizers though. A virtual instrument plugin can produce sounds a number of different ways, the two most common being synthesizers and samplers. A synthesizer is — very very basically — a piece of software that emulates the original hardware technology that creates sound based on advanced manipulations of very basic waveforms (sine, triangle, pulse, etc.) A sampler, conversely, does not generate its own sound. Instead, it acts as a very advanced 'player' of pre-recorded audio material. Garritan and the Vienna Symphonic Library are both sample libraries, and as such they integrate into your audio software as sampler plugins. They produce sound by calling up pre-recorded material rather than generating the audio themselves. If you're using notation software exclusively to write your music, then none of this kind of stuff really applies to you. It only becomes meaningful when you start working in a proper DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) with the intent of creating realistic mixes on your computer.

software synthesizer. if you wanted to you could look at any VST in that way to be honest, so I guess the players for Vienna Instruments could be considered that. a hard synth would be a physical keyboard you connect to the pc, say a korg or yamaha.

Guys. This poll is a year-and-a-half old. Feel free to let it die and start you own thread - in which you're welcome to include as many scales as you see fit.

TJS_1977, thank you! I just found out that the 80$ one was 4/4 size & that the reason the one i bought was only 30$ was 1/4 size otherwise known as a " Violino Piccolo " the smallest type of viol which is the kind Bach used in his 1st Brandenberg Concerto. Well, i hope it's not too small. :lol:

Well, I guess that's the big secret, right? ;) I definitely think wood plays a factor in why those instruments sound the way they do. However, it may well be that the families who hand-crafted them knew what to look for in a piece of wood and that knowledge is part of what is long gone. There are also probably minute differences in the structure which also play a larger role than one might imagine. I know, for example, with pianos that certain makes, like Steinway, will look for specific wood for their soundboards and will not use anything else. The trouble lately is that the wood they would like to use is less and less available because so much has been cut down. Generally older trees are better. And spruce is almost always the choice for soundboards (on stringed instruments too, I believe, though the rest is made from harder wood like maple). There is another first-class piano company in Germany called Steingraeber which will only use wood from trees that are at least 200 years old and from this one specific forest and nowhere else! But they don't build many pianos per year, so they can afford to be picky. Try rubbing them in the rosin you use for the bow. I think that's what you need to do with new tuning pegs.

Since most of the answers are, sadly, silly jokes, let me try: First listen to all finest concertos for bassoon. Pay close attention to form, motivic gradations, harmonic background, orchestration, the usage of the instrument. But you should inform us, how much experience do you have as a composer and which composers you favour as your influences. I remember when I started to compose at the age of 18, I wrote an oboe concerto with strings. It is terrible, since I had no knowledge of form and motivic workout. I made some melodies in oboe and use strings as a background harmonies with occasional solo exhibitions, in moderato-slow-quasi fast movements. But it's a try-out piece after all...