So, where are all the HQ soundfonts?

Ailerom

I've never been a soundfont user but Groove Rider 2 has prompted me to search.

I'm mainly after a decent electric bass guitar but after downloading all I can find, around 10 sf2 files, I'm starting to think there is nothing.

jwmmakerofmusic

https://www.dskmusic.com/

25 quid will get you a ton of high quality soundfonts. Literally hundreds of them.

michael_m

@jwmmakerofmusic said:
https://www.dskmusic.com/

25 quid will get you a ton of high quality soundfonts. Literally hundreds of them.

That’s generally the easiest path with soundfonts.

Back in the day when software became available to create them they were everywhere, and most of them weren’t recorded with great care and/or with limited sampling ability. It seems like many of those really old ones are still around, so it’s hard work to sort through everything available as a free download.

pedro

Correct me if I am wrong but the really good ones will be grand pianos and like 1Gb long.
I’d like to try some too (it’s been ages) but please not a list of all sf links again, just the f’ing awesome ones, please
I know this sounds lazy, but since some of you guys did the heavy lifting already, please help 😅

Stuntman_mike

@pedro said:
Correct me if I am wrong but the really good ones will be grand pianos and like 1Gb long.
I’d like to try some too (it’s been ages) but please not a list of all sf links again, just the f’ing awesome ones, please
I know this sounds lazy, but since some of you guys did the heavy lifting already, please help 😅

Yeah back in the day, Giga fonts, I think they were called. Giga Piano. I remember a lot of sound fonts that were rips of popular hardware sound modules like EMU stuff.

Stuntman_mike

Here you go:
https://musical-artifacts.com/artifacts/912

jwmmakerofmusic

@michael_m said:

@jwmmakerofmusic said:
https://www.dskmusic.com/

25 quid will get you a ton of high quality soundfonts. Literally hundreds of them.

That’s generally the easiest path with soundfonts.

Back in the day when software became available to create them they were everywhere, and most of them weren’t recorded with great care and/or with limited sampling ability. It seems like many of those really old ones are still around, so it’s hard work to sort through everything available as a free download.

I agree. It's difficult work. DSKMusic soundfonts are pretty much the best for the simpler, more limited Soundfonts. I also have Papelmedia's "Irina" soundfont (which is a female singing), and I have the K.K. Slider soundfont in case I wish to create something akin to Animal Crossing music. 😂 That's really all I need.

anickt

https://www.arachnosoft.com/main/download.php?id=soundfont-sf2

Ailerom

@jwmmakerofmusic said:
https://www.dskmusic.com/

25 quid will get you a ton of high quality soundfonts. Literally hundreds of them.

But no bass guitar.

Ailerom

@anickt said:
https://www.arachnosoft.com/main/download.php?id=soundfont-sf2

Will try this just to see how how much better than standard GM it is. Thanks for the link.

Ailerom

@Stuntman_mike said:
Here you go:
https://musical-artifacts.com/artifacts/912

I've seen some of these but it looks like a bigger database. I wanted to try that Thunderbird bass but alas, like many before it, sfz.

dblonde

Audio Evolution Mobile studio has some really good soundfonts as iap and you can use them in other apps too. Gigastudio had some great sounds and can be easily converted to sf2 files.

dblonde

@Ailerom said:

@jwmmakerofmusic said:
https://www.dskmusic.com/

25 quid will get you a ton of high quality soundfonts. Literally hundreds of them.

But no bass guitar.

Wrong, there are many. Look at the pdf instrument list

uncledave

You might take a look at the Nice-bass-plus-drums-v5.2 soundfont from https://sites.google.com/site/soundfonts4u. I had some other sources, but they seem to have vanished.

Dav

This site is mostly for free sfz sounds I believe, but there are also sf2 versions of most of them as well for download. There is an electric bass guitar there. https://freepats.zenvoid.org/index.html

Ailerom

@uncledave said:
You might take a look at the Nice-bass-plus-drums-v5.2 soundfont from https://sites.google.com/site/soundfonts4u. I had some other sources, but they seem to have vanished.

@Dav said:
This site is mostly for free sfz sounds I believe, but there are also sf2 versions of most of them as well for download. There is an electric bass guitar there. https://freepats.zenvoid.org/index.html

Thanks for the sites. From this thread I've just added roughly 12 new bass guitars to try. The system works! Thanks y'all.

wim

@Ailerom said:

@Stuntman_mike said:
Here you go:
https://musical-artifacts.com/artifacts/912

I've seen some of these but it looks like a bigger database. I wanted to try that Thunderbird bass but alas, like many before it, sfz.

Go get yerself KQ isfizz and embrace the SFZ goodness.

Ailerom

@wim said:

@Ailerom said:

@Stuntman_mike said:
Here you go:
https://musical-artifacts.com/artifacts/912

I've seen some of these but it looks like a bigger database. I wanted to try that Thunderbird bass but alas, like many before it, sfz.

Go get yerself KQ isfizz and embrace the SFZ goodness.

That's a great idea. I'll see what the sfz format has to offer no that I bought it.

Robin2

@dblonde said:
Audio Evolution Mobile studio has some really good soundfonts as iap and you can use them in other apps too. Gigastudio had some great sounds and can be easily converted to sf2 files.

I second this, the Digital Sound Factory soundfonts for sale in Audio Evolution Mobile are really good quality and great value.

pedro

@Stuntman_mike said:
Here you go:
https://musical-artifacts.com/artifacts/912

Very cool! Many thanks

pedro

@Ailerom said:

@uncledave said:
You might take a look at the Nice-bass-plus-drums-v5.2 soundfont from https://sites.google.com/site/soundfonts4u. I had some other sources, but they seem to have vanished.

@Dav said:
This site is mostly for free sfz sounds I believe, but there are also sf2 versions of most of them as well for download. There is an electric bass guitar there. https://freepats.zenvoid.org/index.html

Thanks for the sites. From this thread I've just added roughly 12 new bass guitars to try. The system works! Thanks y'all.

Checking out on these. Need more bass than piano 😅

michael_m

@wim said:

@Ailerom said:

@Stuntman_mike said:
Here you go:
https://musical-artifacts.com/artifacts/912

I've seen some of these but it looks like a bigger database. I wanted to try that Thunderbird bass but alas, like many before it, sfz.

Go get yerself KQ isfizz and embrace the SFZ goodness.

Or it looks like this open source software can convert them:

https://www.polyphone.io/en

Poppadocrock

There are so many out there, lot of them free. Awhile back I had a “hunt for soundfont mentality” and downloaded a bunch. Let me see if I can dig up those book marks. I know some have already been mentioned here…

Poppadocrock

Sfz basses on GitHub
https://sfzinstruments.github.io/basses/

SF on the internet archive
https://archive.org/download/free-soundfonts-sf2-2019-04

TriSamples Ultimate List of Free SF
https://trisamples.com/free-soundfonts/

ProducersBuzz with their list and downloads of top free sf available
https://www.producersbuzz.com/category/downloads/download-free-soundfonts-sf2/

Soundpacks dot com Massive free SF pack
https://soundpacks.com/free-presets/ultimate-soundfont-pack/

Musescore collection of free SF
https://musescore.org/en/handbook/3/soundfonts-and-sfz-files

Soundfonts4U
https://sites.google.com/site/soundfonts4u/

Pianobook has free Decent Sampler, SFZ, and other formats
https://www.pianobook.co.uk/packs/

Musical Artifacts is packed with user submitted SF, SF2, SFZ, ETC, just check licensing info listed if using commercially
https://musical-artifacts.com/

Hip Hop Makers - 2000 free SoundFonts list
https://hiphopmakers.com/over-2000-free-soundfonts-free-soundfont-player

SynthFont - links to SoundFonts site is not secure so run any links through a detector before downloading.
http://www.synthfont.com/links_to_soundfonts.html

Ardour Forum with same question and many answers.
https://discourse.ardour.org/t/best-sfz-sf2-instrument-sources-open-source-free-and-commercial-and-related-misc-as-of-june-2023/108831

RK Hive - a SF archive since 1995, by instrument
https://rkhive.com/

Hopefully this helps, there are many more, but I think you might find some good stuff here. Cheers!

jwmmakerofmusic

@Poppadocrock said:
There are so many out there, lot of them free. Awhile back I had a “hunt for soundfont mentality” and downloaded a bunch. Let me see if I can dig up those book marks. I know some have already been mentioned here…

I remember those days of hunting for free soundfonts. But, I have all I need with the DSK Music soundfonts, the Papelmedia Irina Brochin soundfont, and the K.K. Slider soundfont.

Poppadocrock

Zynthian Wiki Page on SoundFonts, scroll down for a decent list with links.
https://wiki.zynthian.org/index.php/Sound_Fonts

Polyphone - Free desktop software to edit/create SF, SF2, etc…
https://www.polyphone.io/en/home

Poppadocrock

@jwmmakerofmusic said:

@Poppadocrock said:
There are so many out there, lot of them free. Awhile back I had a “hunt for soundfont mentality” and downloaded a bunch. Let me see if I can dig up those book marks. I know some have already been mentioned here…

I remember those days of hunting for free soundfonts. But, I have all I need with the DSK Music soundfonts, the Papelmedia Irina Brochin soundfont, and the K.K. Slider soundfont.

Same, lol. My SoundFonts Au app is packed.

Ailerom

@Poppadocrock said:

@jwmmakerofmusic said:

@Poppadocrock said:
There are so many out there, lot of them free. Awhile back I had a “hunt for soundfont mentality” and downloaded a bunch. Let me see if I can dig up those book marks. I know some have already been mentioned here…

I remember those days of hunting for free soundfonts. But, I have all I need with the DSK Music soundfonts, the Papelmedia Irina Brochin soundfont, and the K.K. Slider soundfont.

Same, lol. My SoundFonts Au app is packed.

This one?
https://apps.apple.com/au/app/soundfonts/id1453325077

Big thanks for the above list.

Poppadocrock

@Ailerom said:

@Poppadocrock said:

@jwmmakerofmusic said:

@Poppadocrock said:
There are so many out there, lot of them free. Awhile back I had a “hunt for soundfont mentality” and downloaded a bunch. Let me see if I can dig up those book marks. I know some have already been mentioned here…

I remember those days of hunting for free soundfonts. But, I have all I need with the DSK Music soundfonts, the Papelmedia Irina Brochin soundfont, and the K.K. Slider soundfont.

Same, lol. My SoundFonts Au app is packed.

This one?
https://apps.apple.com/au/app/soundfonts/id1453325077

Big thanks for the above list.

Yea, that’s the one. I purchased it a long time ago, I think it was maybe $2.99 or $3.99 back then. Pretty good app, but not sure how it compares to some of the others that are available.

jwmmakerofmusic

@Poppadocrock said:

@Ailerom said:

@Poppadocrock said:

@jwmmakerofmusic said:

@Poppadocrock said:
There are so many out there, lot of them free. Awhile back I had a “hunt for soundfont mentality” and downloaded a bunch. Let me see if I can dig up those book marks. I know some have already been mentioned here…

I remember those days of hunting for free soundfonts. But, I have all I need with the DSK Music soundfonts, the Papelmedia Irina Brochin soundfont, and the K.K. Slider soundfont.

Same, lol. My SoundFonts Au app is packed.

This one?
https://apps.apple.com/au/app/soundfonts/id1453325077

Big thanks for the above list.

Yea, that’s the one. I purchased it a long time ago, I think it was maybe $2.99 or $3.99 back then. Pretty good app, but not sure how it compares to some of the others that are available.

I prefer Bismark myself. Reason being is Bismark didn't have any issues playing the Irina Brochim soundfont, whereas Soundfonts did. Hanging notes, and some sort of pronounced sinewave. In Nanostudio 2. I didn't bother with a refund since I indeed purchased Soundfonts for 3-4 quid.

cokomairena

It’s frustrating they don’t offer previews of anything, and the sizes are so big