Improved SFZ Support

Ideas & suggestions
1

When dealing with SFZ files in Renoise, I’m disappointed that some data isn’t imported or exported, such as:

  • Envelopes (Amplitude, Pitch & Filter)
  • LFOs (Amplitude, Pitch & Filter)

I’m sure there’s more missing, but those are the main ones I really miss. Many soundfonts use single-cycle waveforms and rely on the envelopes and LFOs to give the sound its character.

Here’s a short list of features included in SFZ V1.0.
Here’s a huge list of the features that have been included in the the SFZ format over the years.

Renoise being (ingeniously) designed around sample-based instruments, there’s so much potential when working with soundfonts (VEL, PAN, FX columns/commands).

Rather than relying on a tool, it makes more sense for Renoise to provide better support for this file format natively, considering Renoise already added support for SFZ import/export in 3.1. Creating a tool at this point would largely be reinventing the wheel.

I’m curious if anyone else has missed these features and would be excited for SFZ support to be further developed!

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2

Upon further examination, I think I now understand Renoise’s implementation of SFZ support.

SFZ support isn’t really intended to be used to import complete soundfonts. Rather, it’s used as a component of modularized Renoise Instrument import/export, in which the SFZ format is utilized to import/export only Sample/Keyzone layouts.

Renoise intrument import-export
Renoise intrument import-export1431×915 149 KB

Here are some of the formats used in this modularized instrument component import/export scheme:

  • Phrases: .xrnz
  • Keyzone/Sample Layout: .sfz
  • Sample: .wav, .flac
  • Modulation Set: .xrno
  • FX Device Chain: .xrnt

And of course, if one wishes to save the entire instrument as one single file, it can be exported to .xrni.

In this context, I now believe full soundfont import/export support could be appropriate as a tool, or a brand new feature in a new Renoise update.

2 Likes