Songsmith User Reviews
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"Right Dang Cool"
Version: Songsmith 1.0.1
Pros
If you can come up with a tune in your head and sing it to a beat, you can export the 4 track MIDI accompianment to MIDI. Drop that in SONAR for example, nudge some notes around and assign synths. You can create some very useful audio.
Cons
Not enough free music types. If you want more, Garritan will sell them to you for more than SongSmith costs.
Summary
I think this same engine was in Microsofts PhotoStory. Anyway, It's a great shortcut for low talent musicians like me.
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"It creates a band background to the tune you sing"
Version: Songsmith 1.0.1
Pros
Easy to use, it has a "wow!" factor built in, cool features to change band style, fast response times, wide selection of band styles (a total of 30, from hip hop to country, jazz, etc.), it is fun to use. For 25 euros, a lot of value for the money.
Cons
Chord recognition does not work very well for melodies that have even a bit of complexity in them, retakes of inserts are not possible, no MP3 export, some band styles have cheesy sounds and too artificial playing styles
Summary
This is a fun product. It is a great toy for anyone who wants to explore composing and singing. You just sing a tune and the software plays it back to you with a band on the background. It is really easy to use.
For really simple melodies the results are quite good and useful for sending to friends and colleagues. However, any melody that has some complexity in it will not be good without manual editing -- which is actually fairly easy and educational to do.
I found the product useful even for more serious song-writing purposes: ideas can be tried out (and tossed out) really easily with different music styles and harmonies. Variety is a great source for creativity. -
"Won't install on Windows 7 :("
Version: Songsmith 1.0.1
Pros
Sounds really cool
Cons
Won't install on Windows 7 beta
Summary
There is a hotfix for the WPF sub-system of the .NET 3.0 framework that is too lamely written to install on Win7 (it thinks that the OS is not supported because it is > 6.x). The installer for Songsmith is also lame in that it won't install without detecting the presence of the hotfix for WPF. A veritable catch 22!
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"Great For Guitarists!!!"
Version: Songsmith 1.0.1
Pros
This is a great way of seeing which chords should underline a guitar melody, and you can select how many chords per bar (1/2, 1, and 2). You can then record your songs uses the chord suggestions.
Cons
The samples aren't too bad, but still has a "Midi" feel. Excellent concept; so it is understandable that like the chord accompaniment on a keyboard, it has limitations. My suggestions is to use this as a "guide", and re-record everything later.
Summary
Although I never conducted an all-out search for this type of program, the closest I have have gotten was Guitar Pro 5's "scale finder" that suggested what key the song was in. SongSmith is great in that you can sing, or in my case, play your guitar and have chords generated based on your melody (and certain basic chords). Since I record my own music, including drums, bass, and guitar, I didn't mind the "midi" sound of the trial version (perhaps better samples if purchased?), since I knew I could rerecord using the chords suggested in SongSmith. I would highly recommend this product to anyone writing music.
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