I've got this song I've been working on that doesn't necessarily need any fixing on but there is a flute part in it that plays fairly slowly. By the way this is through an NN-19. This works fine because it's slow and I kind of want it to spaced out, but one of the problems I've been thinking about has to do with the way a flute makes sound.

You have your initial attack which has a hint of wind noise when the player is just beginning to blow across the flute, followed by the onset of the actual note. In real life if you were to start by playing a note followed by a few other notes, you'd hear that puff of wind noise only before the first note, but not before all of them.

So I was wondering what easy way might exist where I could sequence a flute solo that's fast but where the notes sound more "tied" together. An idea that's just occurring to me now is that I could automate the s.start value so as to make secondary notes be based upon a sample that starts just after that puff of wind, to effectively cut it out... just haven't tested this out. Perhaps there's even a way to automate this so I wouldn't have to twist knobs or go in and do some vector editing on the timeline; it would be smart enough to know that if there's a note already playing to roll the start point forwards a few ms. Only problem that comes to mind with that is the fact that, again in real life, you can't play more than one note at a time on one flute. Which means I can't overlap two notes and expect it to sound real.

I have a small mp3 that shows an example of the sound I'm shooting for but since I'm new here (or rather, haven't posted much yet) I can't link it. I'll PM you with a link if you are interested in hearing.

NN-XT
Layer puff sound and use the velocity Hi/Low to trigger a specific range on the velocity (so it only triggers for instance when the velocity is 100 - 127, as an example)
Layer the flute sound (the long note) with the Hi/Low velocity setting on the complete velocity range
Single Polyphony on the last layer and a a tiny bit of legato/portamento
Modulator wheel to control the LFO -> Pitch to make the tremble effective.

That's one of the way I can think of right now.

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Well, if I'm ever able to figure out how to do all that.... I mean, it looks like you've got the perfect solution, I'm just kinda new. Does this mean I'll have to create my own samples from scratch for the NN-XT to use or is there a way to take what I'm using now to create a new patch?

By the way, you have a very nice looking tutorials site that I will certainly be checking out.

Without seeing it in front of me, I think the quickest solution might be a duplicate NNXT. One that includes the wind noise and one that has the sample start position changed like you mentioned.
On the other hand, I just looked through the flute patches I have and they automatically cut off the beginning when the notes are legato. So if the flute you're using isn't already legato you might try changing it by opening up the nnxt, pressing control-a to select all the samples and dropping the polyphony to 1. I bet that adjusting the sample start will be a bear though.
Could be easier if the samples have preset loop points: hover over the loop start knob and the tool-tip will tell you a frame number, matching that number with the sample start knob should get you closer to a smoother note transition. Once you do this you can change between legato and retrig and see if either works.

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I mean, it looks like you've got the perfect solution, I'm just kinda new. Does this mean I'll have to create my own samples from scratch for the NN-XT to use or is there a way to take what I'm using now to create a new patch?I have and they automatically cut off the beginning when the notes are legato. So if the flute you're using isn't already legato you might try changing it by opening up the nnxt, pressing control-a to select all the samples and dropping the polyphony to 1. I bet that adjusting the sample start will be a bear though. Could be easier if the samples have preset loop points: hover over the loop start knob and the tool-tip will tell you a frame number, matching that number with the sample start knob should get you closer to a smoother note transition. Once you do this you can change between legato and retrig and see if either works.

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What I was thinking is using two separate instances of the one you're already using, one set normally and one set as I described earlier, but looking at it now, setting it to legato should not cut off the first note, only those after it that overlap.
I think I might be starting to confuse myself now...
When have it set up the way you want it, just save the instrument(instead of the song) wherever you want, and you'll have it for all time.

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Well I just tried a little experiment to see what would happen, and I might not have done this just right. But as pointed out by someone awesome, I hit CTRL-A to select all the samples and the board lit up like a christmas tree. I turned the "Key Poly" down to one and change the mode from "Retrig" to "Legato". This resulted in one thing good, one thing bad. Doing the effectively allowed me to cut off the "puff" of wind at the beginning of the note for subsequent notes that come after the first key hit. The problem is that these other notes sound like they're actually the original note in the middle of it's normal loop, played back faster/slower. So at most I can get away with right now are little "flutters" and it sounds very real, but if the notes are spaced very far apart it really sticks out. Switching back to "Retrig" makes the notes sound correct, but the puff comes back with it.

"as pointed out by someone awesome"
lol

hmm, sounds like your best bet might be to open up a second instance of the nnxt and roll back the sample start knob until you stop hearing the breath when you play a note, then in your sequencer you can switch between the two versions where appropriate.
Hadn't thought of it before, but the loop would have to only be around the vibrato part of the note to make it sound seamless, and turning on legato makes all of the sample before the loop start point disappear.

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