Subject:Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Posted by: musman

Date:9/11/2004 12:51:29 AM

I'm very new to Acid and haven't even had a chance to look at the VASST dvd I bought yet. But, I was wondering if Acid could make something that sounds like a Jaw Harp. Did a search and came up with nothing.
Any help is appreciated!

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: JohnnyRoy

Date:9/11/2004 8:15:16 AM

I don’t believe the DLS Soft Synth that comes with ACID has a jaw harp. Your best bet would be to get the free Soundfont player sfz from rc:Audio and then do a google search for SF2 Jaw harp. I just did this and found one at SF2Midi.com. You need to sign up to download the file, but I just did and it’s a pretty darn good jaw harp. There are also tons of other great free Soundfont instruments on that site.

If you bought Rudy Sarzo's VASST DVD you're in for a treat. It's awesome!

~jr

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: musman

Date:9/11/2004 10:30:11 AM

Thanks very much for that. I downloaded both of those items, but I'm so green with respect to computer music that I'm not sure what to do with them now. Read a bit at the player site, but am not sure if or how this plugs into Vegas. Will it do that?
Thanks for your help!

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: JohnnyRoy

Date:9/11/2004 1:19:03 PM

> am not sure if or how this plugs into Vegas

These will not plug into Vegas, they will only plug into ACID.

> I'm so green with respect to computer music that I'm not sure what to do with them now.

OK, I made a big assumption that you were just starting to learn ACID and need a direction to start investing your time as a musician. I can see now from your question about Vegas that you probably just need a sample of a jaw harp for a video. If this is the case, I would stop here, forget about ACID and just find a wave file of a jaw harp to place on the Vegas timeline because this is going to get complicated fast in ACID and Rudy’s DVD doesn’t cover this stuff. If you’re still with me, here’s what you need to do in ACID.

When you install SFZ it will prompt you for a location with a default of: C:\Program Files\VSTPlugins . This is exactly where you want to install it to because this is where ACID will be looking for its VST instruments. Once it’s installed, open ACID and select Insert Soft Synth.... In the list of instruments, select sfz and press OK and the synth’s property sheet should be displayed. Select the File property of SFZ and navigate to where you placed Jaw Harp.sf2 on your hard drive and select it. The jaw harp instrument will be loaded into SFZ. You can press the dark grey bar at the bottom of the sfz dialog with your mouse to preview the instrument. You can now close the soft synth panel.

Now you need to “play” the jaw harp. The easiest way is with a MIDI keyboard, but if you don't have one handy, the second easiest way is probably to use the menu option Insert > MIDI Track and name the file jaw harp.mid and place it somewhere on your hard drive that you can find it later. In the track header, just to the right of the track name is a little MIDI jack icon with a number next to it. Click on this and make sure it is assigned to (sfz). Now double-click on the track header number (to the left of the track name) and the Track Properties will be displayed. Select the Piano Roll Editor tab.

With the Piano Roll Editor tab open, select the very last icon to the right on its toolbar. It’s a picture of a speaker. This will allow you to play the piano keys and play the jaw harp. Now you can draw the notes that you want the jaw harp to play. Since a jaw harp is played rather steadily, just place the notes with a equal space to their length. So if you color in every other grid space with a note, it should give you a fairly good jaw harp sound.

When you have something you like, close the Piano Roll Editor and use File > Render As... to render this as a wave file that you can use in Vegas.

If all this seems too daunting to you, that’s because it is. I’m a musician and have been doing this for over 30 years. If all you need is a jaw harp wave, send me an email with exactly what you want and for how long and I’ll make one up for you that you can loop in Vegas and I'll send it back. I can be reached at rofrano at gmail dot com.

~jr

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: musman

Date:9/11/2004 7:29:22 PM

WOW! Thank you for taking the time with that. Actually, I did mistype when I wrote Vegas, I meant Acid, but you're eactly right about my level of understanding and your step by step description is greatly appreciated. I'll give it a whirl in a little bit here.
What I was basically looking to do was to try out a song a friend had made for me but substituting the jab harp for the guitar he used. If you've ever seen the cable show "Dogs with Jobs" we're making a spoof of them in a short film I'm making. Their intro sounds like a jaw harp to me, so that's what I was trying to do.
Thank you so much for offering to make a piece for me. That's unbelievably cool. I think we'll get something we can use, but if not then I might just take you up on that offer.
Thanks again!

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: JohnnyRoy

Date:9/11/2004 9:01:33 PM

Sounds like a fun project. If your friend can give you the guitar part as a MIDI file, all you would have to do is assign it the SFZ soft synth with the Jaw Harp instrument loaded and you’re all set. If not, you’ll have to recreate the guitar part as a MIDI file (I can probably do that too). You know where to find me if you need more help. Good luck,

~jr

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: TorS

Date:9/12/2004 11:01:40 AM

Why is the instrument I know as a Jew's harp being called a Jaw harp in this thread?
Tor

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: JohnnyRoy

Date:9/12/2004 11:25:10 AM

The jaw harp is a one of the oldest musical instruments in the world. In different cultures, it is known as the Jew's harp, Khomuz, Kubyz, Dan Moi, or Vargan among other names. There is a variation in Asia called a Kubing that lacks the outer harp shape i.e., just a straight springy metal piece that is often beautifully carved.

So either name is acceptable.

~jr

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: mhbstevens

Date:9/13/2004 9:02:54 AM

The harp file is in sf2 format. My acid does not suppport this format. Should I have downloaded it in midi?

What are sf2 soundfonts anyway?

Mike

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: JohnnyRoy

Date:9/13/2004 10:21:55 AM

> What are sf2 soundfonts anyway?

Mike,

Soundfonts are virtual instrument samples that you can load into a Soundfont player like the VSTi SFZ and then play from a MIDI keyboard or assign to a track of a MIDI file. If you read my first post carefully I explain where to get the SFZ player, and in my second post I explain how to load the soundfont into it and play it via MIDI.

What about those two posts didn’t you understand and perhaps I can help further?

~jr

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: mhbstevens

Date:9/13/2004 4:14:06 PM

I understood the first and I got the palyer. Thank you. ACID recognised the player as plug in and it opened. I loaded a file not the Jaw Harp but the Douglas Drums I downlaoded from same site. Nno button to press to play or load it into ACID. No grey bar that reacted. Opened the soft synth keyboard still no link to downlaod.

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: JohnnyRoy

Date:9/13/2004 5:10:16 PM

> No grey bar that reacted

I just realized I left out a step (sorry). You have to have real-time MIDI enabled for this to work. It’s been so long since I set ACID up that I forgot about that. Use Options > Enable Real-Time MIDI (Alt.F7). You can also press the real-time MIDI icon in the Soft Synth properties.

The grey bar is at the bottom of the SFZ soft synth and your cursor should turn into a plus sign when it’s over it. Unfortunately, drums are not the best synth to audition because they are sometimes only mapped to a few keys at the low end of the keyboard. Try dragging your mouse across the bar with the left mouse button pushed to be sure to get all the notes.

It sounds like you got the synth loaded and the piano roll editor up. If you pressed the speaker icon in the piano roll editor, you should be able to play the keys with your mouse and hear the drums. If you’ve never played any MIDI soft synths before, I wouldn’t start with drums. Start with the jaw harp because I know that it stretches across the keyboard to no matter what key you press you should hear something. Once that works, switch to the drum instrument.

~jr

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: vanblah

Date:9/14/2004 7:46:44 AM

The ACID loop CD Ethnicity has some samples of Jew's Harp.

Doug

Subject:RE: Is a Jaw Harp (formally called Jew Harp) possible in Acid

Reply by: Snappy

Date:9/18/2004 6:34:18 PM

I often joke in the studio about whether it's simpler to find some sweet sampled guitars, or simply plug in a guitar and play... find some sweet sampled drums, or simply sit down at the kit and kick some... etc.

Well, in light of the fact that -- last I checked -- one could acquire a jaw harp for about US$1.95, I find this thread *quite* amusing!

;-)

Twang on!