Leaderboard

I think it comes down to understanding the applicability of your samples and the player. With limited experience in real life, when I start moving music into the daw I pretend I'm on the rostrum having to prepare the orchestra. What would I expect from the players? Like you, I click the grid up to 1/64 or 1/128 to draw in the velocities so I can make fine adjustments over the duration of a note....etc. Well, you know what I mean about that. But it's important not to cheat. If yer flute playing its bottom note is too quiet against a barrage of horns, you don't push up the flute's volume fader you rethink your orchestration. etc.

Have to agree 100% about sample libraries. All inadequate but I suppose there are technical limits like memory capacity and how much time the sample house is prepared to expend. Even the best sample libraries lack. No harmonics on muted strings let alone on the bridge? No muted glissandi? Sometimes things can be faked depending on your player. So we end up with samples for run of the mill 'standard' orchestration. I still write for the orchestra occasionally in the hope that the county orchestra or even the BBC might play something (a remote hope with the BBC but still...) or that local appreciation groups will give my "virtual performances" a listen. Another problem with samples and daws is people can create "idealised" performances. I have a couple of recordings of my works performed live and they're acutely inferior, recorded on my little Tascam and some on cassette. I can't afford a Decca recording team, nor would the directors allow it without going into a lot of legal/copyright ramifications. So what I hear is poorly balanced error-prone performance. They were still a bit less than my ideal when performed but a little better than the recording. And so, yes, I'm happier to write for small mixed ensembles although my "technique" is different.