In this article you will learn about our road to making a bullet-proof product, i.e. how Gig Performer users are our best benchmark.
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Reliability-first approach
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Gig Performer is an audio plugin host for live performance and session musicians first released in late 2016. Right from the start, and described in the blog article Why we created Gig Performer, reliability was one of the key goals for the developers. In the Gig Performer world, you won’t see any fancy flashing animations, etc. because the primary focus of all our efforts is it must work. We want you to have a robust and reliable system for all your live music needs. In the blog article Gig Performer is the best companion for all your musical efforts and more you can see various examples where people found the solution in Gig Performer.
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Gig Performer users as our best benchmark
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As we often say, musicians’ needs may develop over time, resulting in their Gig Performer based setups evolving over time, as well. In many cases, musicians have created extremely complex setups that by themselves show that Gig Performer can cope with even most difficult scenarios. We are very happy to see Gig Performer users sharing their experiences (and we encourage you to do so) of how they use Gig Performer.
You may be familiar with our Gig Performer in Action forum and our Backstage with Gig Performer show. A number of these stories is a Gig Performer stress test of its kind, which inspired us to write this blog article.
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Gig Performer live for 24 hours!
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In the 24h wir bleiben wach! event, Austrian virtuoso and multi-instrumentalist Harry Triendl used Gig Performer non-stop for 24 hours!
Harry said that he überlebt! (survived) and Gig Performer was rock-solid, and “overall a phenomenal tool” and was his “control station”. You can see the details of this gig (and many more) in this community thread.
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Gigging 30 days in a month
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Dave Schulz is an American keyboardist, vocalist, producer, composer and recording artist. In this Backstage with Gig Performer episode, he reported that had an extremely tight schedule, gigging 30 days in a month!
In this extremely tight schedule, there is no room for mistakes. Gig Performer nailed it at every venue. This is a solo from The Rooftop at Pier 17 – New York City.
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A rocket-science workload with “Rocket Surgeons”
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Gig Performer user Chris Eloranta with the band Rocket Surgeons shared with us his complex setup. Chris was using Gig Performer as a routing tool, mixer, and backline for his band. The goal of his project was to allow several singing multi-instrumentalists to switch from instrument to instrument (which are all mounted on playable stands) within the course of a given song.
His complex wiring views are utterly demanding, but possible with Gig Performer. This is the wiring view of his Global rackspace:
Click here to read Chris’ complete story.
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No DAW and other VST host can do this
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Gig Performer not only includes the graphic interface (which is superior to the channel-strip model), but also includes GPScript. GPScript is a proprietary and true musician’s programming language created by the Gig Performer developers. Combined together, these features allow highly advanced setups, and most flexible MIDI processing.
As Gig Performer user Michel Keijzers noted:
My ‘proof’ that this is not possible in a channel strip model.
Let alone the 1,500 lines of scripting belonging to the wiring diagram.
While GPScript was originally intended to perform simple MIDI operations, it evolved to be a sophisticated tool for music makers. With 1,500 lines of code (or more!) these kinds of setups are best benchmark and witness of Gig Performer robustness. You can see Michel’s approach to scripting in this community thread.
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Countless hours of live generative music – streamed glitch free!
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Gig Performer user Kevin Frazer created more than 500 hours of live generative music, streamed directly on YouTube and Twitch. His generative music and soundscapes are not generated by an artificial intelligence algorithm.
It’s my intelligence, thank you very much. Could be better maybe but it’s not artificial.
100% of these were live streamed on YouTube with Gig Performer and various combinations of the VSTs I use.
All sound variations and patch changes were happening instantly and glitch free. Kevin created a genre on his own and is still doing his thing.
His whole music making experience is fluent and alluring, despite no post-processing. We feel his music could grow to million hours of streaming without any issues. To learn more about his setup and hear Kevin’s work, check this thread.
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Tips to make a rock-solid setup
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Despite being the ultimate enhancer of your setup, note that Gig Performer is still a part of your whole setup. There are many variables in your overall setup (e.g. computer background tasks, audio interface drivers, plugins…) that can affect the stability of your setup.
Have no worries! We’ve compiled many tips based on the inexhaustible wisdom of our amazing community and presented them in the blog article Best practices for a rock-solid software-based setup. We you to enjoy your music making and make the final equation most efficient and rock-solid during your performance.
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Wrapping up
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Gig Performer provides the most flexible experience for your stage or session performance. The secret behind its robustness lies in the very finest blend of programming and musical experience: Gig Performer was developed by people who are both software developers and serious touring musicians. From the very start, with Gig Performer v1, stability is considered to be one of key goals. We ourselves test Gig Performer deeply against the weirdest scenarios trying to break it.
Our community of musicians have further honed the Gig Performer feature set. With their creative use cases, Gig Performer users constantly pushed the limits of this VST host. We continue to develop Gig Performer, astonished with what our users do with it. They are our best benchmark.
To see more examples of heavy use-case scenarios, or you want to share your feedback, please visit this community thread.
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Share this article to support Gig Performer and spread the word!
Own The Stage® with Gig Performer®
Nemanja Pudar
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Related topics:
– All Gig Performer tutorials
– Why Gig Performer? Because!
– Gig Performer as an ultimate enhancer