View soundfont percussion names?

Jason,

I use the 'Timbres of Heaven' VST, and this uses a SF2 file for the multiple banks of normal instruments, and the perc kits.

There is an associated .TXT file that lists all the instruments, and the numbers, byt this list has one item ONLY for the kits, i.e. the bank and the instrument no for Bank Select and PC. No indiv instrument details, as you say.

I don't know how different SF2 files compare. The SF2 file you use may be different?

Using a hex viewer on the actual SF2 file, doing a quick look towards the end of the file, I see that there SEEMS to be data for each perc instrument, much shorter than the data for normal instruments (as in a brief sample ?), but this sample does seem to include a name, although brief (compared to the names given to the main instruments). So this file at least does seem to have indiv names, but I'd wonder if they're not too brief to be helpful. Or would you say that any name is better than nothing?

May well be that the kits have a similar structure to the charts in the manual for, say, my Yamaha MU90r. These details numbers are a total guess, for purposes of illustration. Say there are 100 different instruments defined, but 50 instruments in each kit. Some instruments might be in every kit, other instruments in some kits only. Every instrument in at least 1 kit. I suppose that a specific instrument might not be the same Note Number in every kit it's used in? Each kit would have a list of note numbers, each with an instrument number attached. To get what you want, you'd need to try and create a list of ## for the instruments, with names (such as they are) and when a kit is selected, get the numbers from that and match with numbers, and thence names) from the instrument list.

A more complicated process than required for the normal instruments?

Does the SF2 file you have seem to work the same way?

Geoff

I have an in-development project at https://github.com/jazz-soft/JZZ-midi-SF2
It can show the contents of the soundfont, but cannot play it yet...
You can clone the repo and open the test.html file. Further steps should be obvious.

It looks like SF2 does not include names for the percussion instruments,
but you can map the corresponding note (zone) numbers to the ones from the General MIDI specs.
( and these are also available as JavaScript code at https://github.com/jazz-soft/JZZ-midi-GM )

Hope that helps...

A more complicated process than required for the normal instruments?

Does the SF2 file you have seem to work the same way?

More complicated for sure, which is what I hope to avoid

I am currently using, in order from first loaded to last, with later ones "overwriting" any duplicate sounds in earlier ones:
Stgiga's HiDef Soundfont
TyrolandSFX
OmegaGMGS2
ColomboGMGS2
Timbers Of Heaven (XGM) 3.94 (v 4.0 has some instrument assignment errors, such as seagull which is properly named and works in older versions, but is missing or misplaced in v 4.0)

so my kit names themselves at least are accurate for what I have loaded.

Any valid percussion instrument name is better than no name. But not like in my screenshot, where the names I have are completely unrelated, and do not match up to which numbers are actually there. So I might have a name there for, say patch 23 (if it exists in the "standard" GM/GS/XG percussion banks), but with my loaded soundfonts there may not actually be a playable sound there, or something that does not match the description even remotely.

I do have both Polyphone and Viena, which can show the contents of and edit sf2, but neither has a viewable list of names for the percussion. Even if they would just export a name of the corresponding samples, that would maybe help.

A soundfont has a series of presets, which are bank:prog, and "within" that is the sound or sounds and their properties for that particular instrument.
In Viena, I can drill down and see a structure like this with the Cartoon FX from earlier:

127:062 = Cartoon FX 127

    SFXK_Cartoon/Addit

        ArrowPlankL

        ArrowPlankR

        BeepL

        BeepR

        Bite

        BlllblblblL

        BlllblblblR

        etc...

so there are names there that would be very beneficial, but it is very difficult to follow along and figure out where each of these things go, because everything is a pointer to something else (in the editor at least). But these are the kinds of names I'm hoping to list.

Quoted from Sema on Wednesday, 31 May 2023

I have an in-development project at https://github.com/jazz-soft/JZZ-midi-SF2
It can show the contents of the soundfont, but cannot play it yet...

Currently, it seems that I can not get any info to display for any of my full/large soundfonts. I tried a single instrument soundfont and it loaded and displayed, and a smaller "8bit" soundfont also loaded fine.

The "root key" with corresponding "sample name" under zones would be helpful as an exportable list. That seems to be the values that I mentioned that I can see in Viena.

Jason, could you please attach some of your "full/large soundfonts"? I'd like to debug those...

I can't actually attach them, as they much too large. However, these are links for 2 of the 5 large ones I use (and I only tested these 2 before trying a small one)

ColomboGMGS2
https://musical-artifacts.com/artifacts/1234

Timbres of Heaven 3.94
https://web.archive.org/web/20210511040926/https://midkar.com/soundfonts/

Thanks a lot!
I was not able to download the second file, but one is enough for me for now...

Hmm, yes, I didn't actually try the download link

But the latest version can be found at the bottom of the non-archived page (which I DID try)
https://midkar.com/soundfonts/

Ooh, I posted on the Synthfont/Viena forum, and the author said the feature sort of exists already in Viena!

I have to do one kit at a time, so it may take a while, but he also has a new version of Viena that's nearing release that he will try to update the feature.

You load a soundfont, then select the drum kit name under "Presets", then under the "File" menu, select "Export Note Names"

See the attached code for what is exported, again for the Cartoon FX drum kit. I can run these files through an editor or adapt my import code to add these in to my program.

[128,62] Cartoon FX

@27@ boMk

@28@ DripletL

@29@ SplashL,SplashR

@30@ SlipL

@31@ MetalDingL

@32@ MudL,MudR

@33@ Pop2L

@34@ FlexatoneTingL,FlexatoneTingR

@35@ SeriousTickleL,SeriousTickleR

@36@ ThudL,ThudR

@37@ PopL,PopR

@38@ Bite

@39@ ArrowPlankL,ArrowPlankR

@40@ Growl1L,Growl1R

@41@ BulldogL

@42@ LittleBoingL,LittleBoingR

@43@ FartL,FartR

@44@ TwingL,TwingR

@45@ SquirtL,SquirtR

@46@ PlainOleBuzzL,PlainOleBuzzR

@47@ BounceCrankL,BounceCrankR

@48@ HardCrankL,HardCrankR

@49@ FalldownL,FalldownR,FalldownvelL,FalldownvelR

@50@ SqueakyL,SqueakyR

@51@ FallDown2L,FallDown2R

@52@ FlappyHornL,FlappyHornR

@53@ WhewL,WhewR

@54@ SwoopL,SwoopR

@55@ ZoomAway,ZoomAway

@56@ WhistleSlideL,WhistleSlideL

@57@ FakePhoneL,FakePhoneR

@58@ BlllblblblL,BlllblblblR

@59@ DingL,DingR,ShortFuseL,ShortFuseR

@60@ StringTangleL,StringTangleR

@61@ Pot!L,Pot!R

@62@ PrankL,PrankR

@63@ BeepL,BeepR

@64@ CanL,CanR

@65@ SpringL,SpringR

@66@ LooseWireL,LooseWireR

@67@ MistakeL,MistakeR

@68@ Oh S#it!25355L,Oh S#it!25355R

@69@ FailL

@70@ Aawww!,Aawww!

@71@ NOPE

@72@ SayWHATR,SayWHATL

@73@ Gunload25355L,Gunload25355R

@74@ RubberDuckL

@75@ BoomswooshR,BoomswooshL

@76@ YEET!,YEET!

@77@ F_Bomb,F_Bomb

@78@ Ting!L

@79@ Roblox Death,Roblox Death

@80@ GOAT_SCR,GOAT_SCR

@81@ Grunt (5),Grunt (6),Grunt (1),Grunt (3),Grunt (2),Grunt (4)