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Midi keyboard with samplv1

Be patient if this question makes no sense but I'm new to all of this.

I want to use a digital piano (Yamaha Clavinova CLP115) as a MIDI controller to play and record (with OBS Studio) on a Toshiba Satellite on Devuan.
I started using fluidsynth+qsynth+aconnect, trying a lot of different soundfonts, but the sound quality was not very realistic.
I'm only interested in playing and recording a piano using a good sample, no other sounds or effects or anything fancy.
So I was told a sampler would be a better option than a sinth, hence I installed samplv1.
Now what?
I wasn't able to find a basic tutorial and would like to know, in simple steps, how can I go about setting up samplv1 so that i can achieve my goal.

Thanks for your suggestions.

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rncbc's picture

hi, welcome

first you need JACK up and running, if not already; you may use qjackctl for the task;
then you run `samplv1_jack` and load a sample file of your choosing;
you'll need to connect the MIDI input from the keyboard and the audio outputs to system (speakers); again, you may use qjackctl/Graph or Connections for just that.

second, a word of advice, samplv1 is not the right sampler for you to have any good piano sounds--if you think the soundfonts you tried with fluidsynth are bad, then you'll be very disappointed to know that samplv1 cannot ever be any better, no matter the quality of the sample file you load on it, most specially regarding the whole range of a standard piano keyboard (88keys?); you'll be lucky if beyond the central octave (eg. C4 +/- 6semitones) any keys would sound right.

IMHO. you better look back into qsynth/fluidsynth again, setup accordingly with JACK; the lack of quality you mentioned it's probably due on less than optimal configuration/setup, esp. re. the audio driver and/or of poor quality soundfont file (*.sf2).

or else, you may try with some other full-fledged, multi-layered samplers (eg. linuxsampler)

hth.
cheers

Hi,

first off, thanks for the prompt, articulated, and candid reply.
After a bit of tinkering with qjackctl I finally got the hang of it.
Fluidsynth was easy to set up, I tried a bunch of piano soundfonts, maybe I should try again.
If, as you say, sampvl1 won't produce a noticeably better result than fluidsynth, I better focus on some other viable option.
I actually installed linuxsampler and qsampler, although the last version of linuxsampler seems a bit dated.
I also tried ardour (synth mode), but am not sure if it has the capability to play samples.
Finally, i gave a spin to pianoteq demo, which works very well, except it has the restrictions of a demo product.

Oh, well, I'm spending more time setting up my system than playin the piano, LOL.

cheers.

rncbc's picture

yes. that (un)fortunately, is a common grief we all share

good news are: eventually, it pays off :)

cheers

copyc4t's picture

These should be good places to check for piano soundfonts
https://sfzinstruments.github.io/pianos/
https://www.pianobook.co.uk/instrument/pianos/

You will need either a sfz player like liquidsfz, sfizz, or SFZero - check here
https://sfzformat.com/software/players/

or Decent Sampler
https://www.decentsamples.com/

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