Playing musical instruments and forming a band?

These are no doubt a questions with well known answers for established players but I hope you will bear with this newcomer and help me.

Some of my RL friends who are curious about SL are either RL musicians or are/were entertainers in Star Wars Galaxies (a game where both musicians and dancers exist and can perform together, although only with prescripted songs and dances (actually divided into movements for the musics and steps for the dancers)).

To them, the ability to perform in SL would be a major factor in trying out the game.

I've only been here a few days but I've already partied enough to know that dances are not an issue.

So that brings me to the music part. Are the musical instruments in the world which animate the avatar to make it look like that character is playing it? If so, where should I look for them?

What about putting on concerts where the virtual band streams "its own music"? I've heard enough about DJ's streaming music to guess that this obviously just the same thing and well supported. But is there a set-up (like scripted objects) more particular to bands to help them run a concert?

If there are shops I should check out or articles about this anywhere, I'd love to know. I ran a search here on the boards but didn't seem to come up with anything conclusive. I certainly would be looking forward to those friends joining the game and performing for other players. Any excuse to party.

Many thanks in advance for your help,
Wendel

We just had a musical instrument build contest in Athena, and the contest entries are still on display this week (in the NE corner of the Athena sim). There are a few examples of what you are talking about, for instance Minxeh Volos' Golden Harp. Robbie Dingo also has some nice marimbas on display, and he does nice scripted/animated instruments for sale.

That sounds great! I'll go visit Athena and entice my friends with screenshots of the display.

Wendel

I should have mentioned there are a lot of snaps of the instruments on SLPics.com - just search for "touched by a muse".

There a few live performers already streaming live music into SL. Astrin Few, for example, has a loyal following (I happen to be one of them). He puts together dynamic acoustic and electric sets of everything from Cole Porter to the Violent Femmes. Flaming Moe--a sax player (whom we are sadly missing)--also puts on a great show.

Astrin usually plays on Sunday and Tuesday evenings at a variety of different venues. His AV sits on a stool and holds an acoustic guitar/object.

I think live music in SL is wonderful, and I sincerely hope that you and your friends are able to realize live gigs in-world, Wendel. Count me in when you get it up and running!

This sounds great. I'll have to check out Astrin's performances!

Personally, I'm more the "member of the audience" type of person. But those friends have a real interest in music and do play instruments. Whether it be with prerecorded music or instruments that "react to keypresses" (assuming those are around), I'd love to see what they could put together too.

Wendel

Hello, sorry if i come late

Yes, i have several instruments wich are animated and they play

the system is a sequencer wich plays 8 seconds loops sounds, a setup notecard says
what loops to play, and in what order.

all the instruments are synchronized by a box names "synchro master" wich permits
to the instruments to begin at the same time, and play the master loops for make
the instruments follow.

there is some tunes with are playable by a band who owns diverse instruments.

i have guitars, basses, synthes, a drumset, a flute, a bagpipe, a grand piano.

actually i work to make stand alone playing instruments, using the 6 allowed keys to make
note by note, but due to the SL sound system, this is difficult, the first is the time between
the key pressed and the note playing, and for make polyphony.... aaaaaargh ! seems
impossible...snifff !

I recently hosted the SL Festival of Music and Arts in which people played instruments and we had a live performance. It was an extremely successful event which filled the sim to capacity. There are many excellent sample loop playing instruments available in SL and if you're making them it's possible to design them to sync together. The limitation is the length of the loop has to be less than 10 seconds. Although with some nifty scripting you can seamlessly butt loops end to end.

Well I heard that you can buy instruments at 'Scafell (41, 145)' (hehe)...

try a look at Sido (11,102) Dyoland Designs