SoundFont
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Overview
SoundFont collectively refers to a file format and associated technology designed to bridge the gap between recorded and synthesized audio, especially for the purposes of computer music composition.
SoundFont technology is akin to software sampling. A SoundFont file contains one or more banks of sampled audio data, which can be re-synthesized at different pitches and dynamic levels. Each sample in a bank is associated with a particular range of pitches and dynamics. Generally speaking, the quality of a SoundFont bank is a function of the quality of the digital samples and the intelligent association of samples with their appropriate pitch ranges. Quality is also dependent on the number of samples taken for a given range of pitches.
SoundFonts are tightly integrated with MIDI devices and can be seamlessly used in place of GM patches in many computer music sequencers. The sound quality of SoundFont banks is generally regarded as superior to standard GM banks, and many SoundFont banks have been created specifically to replace GM banks with samples of each corresponding instrument.
History
The original SoundFont 1.0 specification was developed in the early 1990s by E-mu and Creative Labs. The first major device to utilize the technology was Creative's Sound Blaster AWE32 in 1994. A new 2.0 format was developed in 1996, and the current version is 2.1.
Tools
- The Vienna SoundFont Studio can be used to edit and create SoundFont files on systems with a Sound Blaster compatible card
- The SFZ SoundFont Player is a freeware VST plugin which allows the playback of SoundFonts on cards not natively supporting such playback
- SFPack is a compression technique for SoundFonts
- SFArk is another compression format