SoundFont the brand name that referred to sample-based synthesis in early sound cards to playback MIDI. There was no where near enough data available on disk for an mp3! You needed the sound font stored on your sound card to turn that midi data into a more musical result. Often used in games and later mobile phones they created a generation hooked on general Midi.
Although it was never intended as a way to compose music, the sounds have become classic tools for dance and hiphop producers.
NI’s Kontakt has largely replaced the soundfont and alternatives have sprung up that enhance the concept like ReFX’s Nexus. While they replace the need for soundfonts, they are often expensive investments. Soundfonts are free, can contain hundreds of sounds from orchestral to drums and evoke the past.
We’ve collected an ultimate list of some of the best we could find from around the web so you don’t have to.
You need a VST SoundFont player but most software like FL Studio and Ableton Live already come with one. You can also drop them inside Kontakt too.
This project exclusively utilizes samples inluded with FL as well as soundfonts freely available on the web - all set up, tweaked, and ready for arrangement. The attached zip contains all files necessary for the project. Feel free to utilize this FLP for any of your future mixes. Requirements: FL Studio 8 and Fruity Soundfont player. Try for free; Sign in. 3.5Gb of HQ Orchestral soundfonts. The latest FL Studio news, articles, and resources, sent straight to your inbox. This is for all the producers who have been looking for some good orchestral soundfonts to use. These can be used for any genre of course, but ther. Orchestral Hits Sound Pack contains WAV samples that can be imported directly into your DAW, sampler or audio host of choice (FL Studio, Ableton, Logic, Reaper, Cubase, Studio One, Reason, Pro Tools, MASCHINE, MPC Renaissance etc).
- The SoundFont Library has lots of free SoundFonts available for download. If you have a SoundFont you would like to share with the world, check the 'Sounds' page for instructions. SoundDesign: The SoundDesign section has articles that'll help you design your own sounds. Several of the HammerSound users have contributed articles.
- ORCHESTRAL SOUNDFONTS can work with these samplers: There are also more.see “Sampler Compatibility in our menu”. Audigy/SBLive!. Reason NN-XT. Kontakt. Halion. EXS-24. VSampler. Gigasampler – Gigastudio Orion. FL Studio. Live synth Pro. SFZ Sampler. All our sample packs are royalty-free, so you can use our samples for.
- Soundfonts & FL Studio Soundfonts for Hip Hop, R&B, & Fruity Loops. Download Soundfont SF2 Brass, Vocal, Orchestral Soundfonts. SF2 Drum, Piano, Hip Hop, & FLStudio Soundfonts. Modern Beats offers free sf2 soundfonts for download w/ email sign-up!
The Free Soundfont List
- 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
sfArk & Other formats
Some Soundfonts use a compressed format, use the sfArk tool to open them.
Back in 1998 or so, the popular Sound Blaster series of audio cardsreceived an upgrade (the Sound Blaster Live) that turned it intoa sampler – a musical instrument that basically plays pre-recorded notes,often sounding more realistic than the synthesizers that were popular then.The format used for instrument samples is called SoundFont andthe file extension is .SF2.
In the following years the SoundFont format became tremendously popular.
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Maybe I am wrong, but I feel the SoundFont community is dying slowly.I myself have switched to free software and Linux (and I know someopen source software can use SoundFonts to a certain extent),but I still keep my old SoundFonts here so people can download them.
I wish a strong community would form to create and share opensamples (in various formats), using liberal Creative Commons licenses,but as of 2012 I don’t think it has happened yet.
Searching for free, high quality sounds on the net remains afrustrating experience.
All SoundFont loaders allow you to load layers of SoundFonts.Therefore, it is a good idea to load a nice small all-purpose GM bank and thenbetter specific instruments on top of it. With this purpose in mind,the following patches are already assigned to the correspondingprogram numbers in the General Midi convention.
Filenames begin with the patch number. Easy!
Florestan’s Free Orchestral SoundFonts
3.5Gb Of HQ Orchestral Soundfonts | Forum - FL Studio
Florestan Basic GM GS (3.3 MB) is your average general-purposeGeneral Midi bank with 128 different sounds,sampled from a Roland Sound Canvas module.
000 Florestan Piano (7.8 MB) is a bright piano,but much better piano sounds now exist out there.
- 5 small SoundFonts contains:
- 014 Florestan Tubular Bells (577.3 kB) – Realistic tubular bells.Adds a surreal “tubular bells glide” on bank 1, patch 14.
- 022 Florestan Harmonica (28.2 kB)
- 045 Florestan Pizzicato (87.7 kB) – Even now, probably the onlyfree pizzicato soundfont that sounds realistic in the whole range,with good resonant basses.
- 056 Florestan Trumpet Metallic (732.3 kB) – Not very realistic.
- 076 Florestan Contrabassoon (12.7 kB)
040 Florestan String Quartet (3.2 MB) contains solo violin, viola,cello and double-bass (patches 40 to 43). They are realistic for theirsmall size.
048 Florestan Strings (1.1 MB) is a mediocre-sounding string ensemble.
052 Florestan Ahh Choir (785.5 kB) is a very realistic and usefulmixed choir.
060 Florestan French Horns (4.1 MB) contains the heroic sound ofmultiple french horns at the unison. How many french horns? Who knows?Maybe 4... The samples come from a previous version of Fluid,a GM bank created by Frank Wen.
068 Florestan Woodwinds (1.6 MB) contains flute, oboe, english horn,clarinet and bassoon. They are realistic considering their small size.The oboe comes from Fluid, a GM bank created by Frank Wen.
070 Bassoon Ethan Nando (4.8 MB) is a professional basson – withkey-switching and a crisp attack of only 0.006 seconds – sampled byEthan Winer. Without touching the samples, I have added a mono versionto preserve polyphony. The original author even liked the idea.The mono version is at program 70.The stereo version is at bank 1, program 70.
Enjoy the downloads! If any files are down, please let me know.
Other SoundFont websites
You can send me links to your best SoundFont sites (if still any...).
- Hammersound is the largest and oldest SoundFont repository out there.
- JEUX is a fantastic pipe organ soundfont.