Symphony No. 7, op. 92 – Allegretto (complete)
This episode presents the complete performance of the second movement, Allegretto, of Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony, Op. 92. Performed by the Fauxharmonic Orchestra.
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(Optimized for iPod playback: The dynamic range has been reduced.)
Whenever I hear a synthesized orchestral work using recorded samples, two things jump out at me. The reverb and the attack. In this case, it sounds almost as if each of the samples, the string sections in particular, is being reverberated individually instead of the group as a whole. This makes the strings sound strange, working against one another instead of as a group. Or maybe it’s just that the reverb sounds unnatural. Also, the attack in many recorded string samples is ever-so-slightly delayed. It’s true that a string section may take a split second to sound its first note, but any subsequent note shouldn’t have this delay, as not all of the string players change notes at exactly the same moment. Samples have come a long way, but to say that musicians can be fooled is a stretch. Any musician fooled by that obviously hasn’t had much orchestral experience. In any case, you’ve done an excellent job with the current technologies available.