What are SoundFonts?

Basically, SoundFonts are files that contain recorded audio samples of various musical instruments. A "real" synthesizer does not use recorded sound. It generates sound electronically and imitates instruments using various parameters.

However, such imitation is very far from natural sound.

Sampling synthesizers work in a different way. They take a recorded sample and use it at different heights and dynamic levels. Quality of sound here depends most on the number of recorded samples per instrument (the larger a SoundFont file is, the more samples it contains).

MIDI Converter Studio can play the role of a sampling synthesizer. It takes a MIDI file and converts it to WAV (or any other format) using SoundFonts. Different SoundFonts allow you to get different sound for the same MIDI file. Professional sound artists can use special SoundFonts: for piano, trumpet, guitar, etc. Also complete GM (General MIDI) sets exist, you will need them if you want to play all instruments in a complex MIDI file.

There are a lot of SoundFonts on the Internet. If you want to try free SoundFonts, we recommend visiting the following sites:

• Hammer sound – 535 Soundfonts Library
• RKHive – Huge selection of soundfont sounds and banks
• SoundFonts.it – 22 Free Soundfonts
• Sonatina Symphonic Orchestra – GM Soundfont bank of orchestra sounds
• HD Orchestral Bank – A full compliment of all GM sounds
• Thomas’ Sounds – Classics like the Korg M1 and much more
• Hip-Hop Soundfonts – 126 Hiphop sounds
• Warbeats – 57 Soundfonts, nice list
• Guard Dere – Loads of classical Soundfonts from way back
• Nikleus Collection – 30+ banks
• Christian Collins – A few banks of full soundfonts
• Ethan Winer Originals – 13 Original Soundfonts
• Instrucol – 25 Soundfonts
• Muse Score – Some popular GM SoundFonts
• Personal Copy – GM Soundfonts and more tools for management
• Shan Soundfont – A Bank of sounds
• Ntonyx.com – 17 Soundfonts
• Lysator – FTP Directory of Soundfont
• Johannes Roussel – 32 Soundfonts
• Betty’s Instruments – 11 Sampled from Casio VZ 1
• Sounds For Beats – 12 Free soundfonts
• Milestones – Some organs

Game / Chiptune Sounds

• Megadrive Pack – Soundfont to recreate sounds from the megadrive console
• SNES Pack – SNES, N64 & GBA Soundfonts
• Chip Tune – woolies chiptune Soundfont

The Best Soundfont Player - Sforzando Soundfont Player

In this video I show you how to use Sforzando Soundfont Player to simulate virtually any sound - FOR FREE! Sforzando is an amazingly powerful plugin that, when used right, can create really cool music.

 

Last edited: Jan 13, 2022

Oh, getting bad flashbacks from 2002 or so. Never going back.

Edit: Fittingly, almost all links you posted are dead.

 

Last edited: Jan 13, 2022

https://www-maniactools-de.translat...rter/soundfonts.shtml?_x_tr_sl=de&_x_tr_tl=en

It's very old, though.

https://trisamples.com/free-soundfonts/

 

Last edited: Jan 13, 2022

Thanks for the tip, I've corrected it.

 

Soundfonts are great and use as much memory as a floppy disk. I used to make my own back in the day before my pc shitted itself. Made some nice vocals ones when this girl came over, still think about those sfz.

 

i remember my Creative Audigy and soundblaster series soundcard (my first soundcard).. vienna editor etc .. oh man. what a memories

 

SGM is the best soundfont.

 

Whats that? Is it this collection of soundfonts? https://musical-artifacts.com/artifacts/855
Or is it a sfz host?

 

That's a unofficial version, the actual one is "SGM V2.01", this one has basses and pianos from a different soundfont.

I was joking because there's this youtube video that claims it's the best, alongside being a bit meme-y because of it's recent usage on Videogames.

Literally it's just sounds from various Roland CDs and other stuff like EWQL and Hypersonic.

 

I still keep Kontakt 5 around on the off-chance I need to import some Soundfonts (K6 doesn't have the import anymore).

The only actual sf2 I keep around is an old General MIDI one, for emulating old DOS games.

 

Yeah I had an Adlib as my first sound card, if I recall correctly.. then went through a variety of Sound Blaster iterations (including Audigy)!

I do recall playing with soundfonts, mainly within a very early version of Cakewalk. Good times! Not ever going back to them, however. haha

 

I don't think soundfonts are the best option for music production but they're great for enhancing the music on old DOS games using Coolsoft VirtualMidiSynth for example. That's the main thing I use soundfonts for. Some of them have usable sounds, though. If you wanna make music using free tools only and no piracy, I guess using them is an option. But the format itself is kind of outdated and limited in what it can do.

 

I still use Soundfonts with the use of Samplelord (JBridge), many of them i made myself.
I hope that Extreme Sample Converter (new version) will released.

 

For those wanting a player for GM, FL Studio loads midi files and fill the tracks well using Flex instruments.
If you feel Fl Studio is no good as a DAW, it is worth using for Gm at least!

 

Ah .sf2's and SBLive/Soundblaster cards.....ooh and how I miss Vienna .sf2 editor.
And my $2000 Win98 pc.....that was dumber than my current phone.

Those were the days........NOT!!

 

papelmedia still has the best vocal and choir fonts if you can track them down.

drums motown kit sf2 is still an all time favorite.
theres an archive..org of that one but it has projectsam sf2's in it so im not sure i can post the link.

H.G. Fortune synths iirc have sf2 functions and generally go much farther than normal font players.

fl studio directwave can handle sf2 but its note as amazing as the font player of old.

there was an akai iso converter that let you make ginormous sf2 file sizes or pick and choose... or turn into kontakt iirc.
i did the entire vocal planet from spectrasonics into sf2.

i made this a while back entirely of soundfonts from papelmedia , fl studio sf2 , and one called boogie/y synth sf2.


also the the vast majority of faketune ive done is from these https://musical-artifacts.com/

found these also today https://archive.org/details/Sf2-one-shots1sAndMoreForHgFortuneEngines/Scw-BonVoyage.mp3


EDIT--i remembered it https://www.soundonsound.com/reviews/soundlib-cdxtract-4
along with http://www.vst4you.com/pages/vst instruments/highlife.html

and https://samplerobot.com/products/samplerobot-pro that was skylife i think.

 

Last edited: Jan 15, 2022

I'm using Studio One's native SF2 solution, Presence XT. I love it. Will load SF2, GIG, EXS, 4 different Kontakt variants. One click and boom, another sound. Very good for production workflow. I should say, "works for me."