SoundFont is a

brand name A brand is a name, term, design, symbol or any other feature that distinguishes one seller's good or service from those of other sellers. Brands are used in business, marketing, and advertising for recognition and, importantly, to create an ...

that collectively refers to a file format and associated technology that uses

sample-based synthesis Sample-based synthesis is a form of audio synthesis that can be contrasted to either subtractive synthesis or additive synthesis. The principal difference with sample-based synthesis is that the seed waveforms are sampled sounds or instruments ...

to play

MIDI MIDI (; Musical Instrument Digital Interface) is a technical standard that describes a communications protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, computers, and ...

files. It was first used on the Sound Blaster AWE32 sound card for its

General MIDI General MIDI (also known as GM or GM 1) is a standardized specification for electronic musical instruments that respond to MIDI messages. GM was developed by the American MIDI Manufacturers Association (MMA) and the Japan MIDI Standards Committe ...

support. SoundFont is a

registered trademark The registered trademark symbol, , is a typographic symbol that provides notice that the preceding word or symbol is a trademark or service mark that has been registered with a national trademark office. A trademark is a symbol, word, or wor ...

of Creative Technology, Ltd., and the exclusive license for re-formatting and managing historical SoundFont content has been acquired by Digital Sound Factory.

Specification

The newest version of the SoundFont file format is 2.04 (or 2.4). It is based on the RIFF format.

History

The original SoundFont file format was developed in the early 1990s by

E-mu Systems E-mu Systems was a software synthesizer, audio interface, MIDI interface, and MIDI keyboard manufacturer. Founded in 1971 as a synthesizer maker, E-mu was a pioneer in samplers, sample-based drum machines and low-cost digital sampling mus ...

and

Creative Labs Creative Technology Ltd. is a Singaporean multinational technology company headquartered with overseas offices in Shanghai, Tokyo, Dublin, and Silicon Valley (where in the US it is known as Creative Labs). The principal activities of the compa ...

. A specification for this version was never released to the public. The first and only major device to utilize this version was Creative's Sound Blaster AWE32 in 1994. Files in this format conventionally have the

file extension A filename extension, file name extension or file extension is a suffix to the name of a computer file (e.g., .txt, .docx, .md). The extension indicates a characteristic of the file contents or its intended use. A filename extension is typically d ...

of . SoundFont 2.0 was developed in 1996. This file format generalized the data representation using perceptually additive real world units, redefined some of the instrument layering features within the format, added true stereo sample support and removed some obscure features of the first version whose behavior was difficult to specify. This version was fully disclosed as a public specification, with the goal of making the SoundFont format an industry standard. All SoundFont 1.0 compatible devices were updated to support the SoundFont 2.0 format shortly after it was released to the public, and consequently the 1.0 version became obsolete. Files in this and all other 2.x formats (see below) conventionally have the file extension of . Version 2.01 (or 2.1) of the SoundFont file format was introduced in 1998, with an E-mu sound card product called the Audio Production Studio. This version added features allowing sound designers to configure the way MIDI controllers influence synthesizer parameters. It is bidirectionally compatible with 2.0, which means that synthesizers capable of rendering 2.01 format will also by definition render 2.0 format, and synthesizers that are only capable of rendering 2.0 format will also read and render the new format, but just not apply the new features. SoundFont 2.04 was introduced in 2005 with the Sound Blaster X-Fi. The 2.04 format added support for 24-bit samples. The 2.04 format is bidirectionally compatible with the 2.01 format, so synthesizers that are only capable of rendering 2.0 or 2.01 format would automatically render instruments using 24-bit samples at 16-bit precision.

Functionality

MIDI files do not contain any sounds, only instructions to play them. To play such files, sample-based MIDI synthesizers use recordings of instruments and sounds stored in a file or ROM chip. SoundFont-compatible synthesizers allow users to use SoundFont banks with custom samples to play their music. A SoundFont bank contains base samples in PCM format (similar to WAV files) that are mapped to sections on a musical keyboard. A SoundFont bank also contains other music synthesis parameters such as loops,

vibrato Vibrato ( Italian, from past participle of " vibrare", to vibrate) is a musical effect consisting of a regular, pulsating change of pitch. It is used to add expression to vocal and instrumental music. Vibrato is typically characterised in terms ...

effect, and velocity-sensitive volume changing. SoundFont banks can conform to standard sound sets such as

, or use other wholly custom sound-set definitions like

Roland GS Roland GS, or just GS, sometimes expanded as General Standard or General Sound, is a MIDI specification. It requires that all GS-compatible equipment must meet a certain set of features and it documents interpretations of some MIDI commands and byt ...

and Yamaha XG.

SoundFont creation software ( format)

Several editors are available: * Vienna from Creative Labs, requiring a particular sound card (such as Sound Blaster) * Viena (with a single "n"), created in 2002 * Swami is a collection of free software for editing and managing musical instruments for MIDI music composition, used mainly under

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, w ...

* Polyphone,Polyphone, free sf2 editor for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux
free editor for

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for ser ...

Mac OS X macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and la ...

and

created in 2013

References

External links

SoundFont 2.04 specification
{{DEFAULTSORT:Soundfont Audio codecs Audio software Software synthesizers MIDI standards