After you download the latest Play from Soundsonline.com, and then install it (PianoRollComposer uses VST 2.4), you'll find it in Program Data \ EastWest, and a shortcut to it in Program Files \ EastWest, and the plugin version of it in Program Files \ VSTPlugins. Read EastWest's Play System Manual (in Program Files \ EastWest \ Documentation). PianoRollComposer (PRC) isn't listed in EastWest's Play System Manual, Chapter 9, Using Play as a Plug-in. So here's how to use it: PRC uses a VST-format dll file that's really just another version of EastWest Play. This dll is loaded into PRC and becomes part of it. This is what is called a plugin. VST (Virtual Studio Technology) is a standard interface specification used between sample sounds and programs that play them. DLL stands for Dynamic-link library. Both the standalone EastWest Play and its VST plugin version can load up to 16 different instruments/instrument articulations. This is a MIDI limitation. MIDI is a Musical Instrument Digital Interface standard protocol. PRC can load up to 36 VST plugins, each of which can load instrument sample sounds. So, your first step is to run EastWest's Play by itself (not a plugin running in PRC), and load up to 16 instruments/articulations in it. To save these instruments/articulations in 16 separate channels, in EastWest's Menu, you must select Settings (the gear shape), then Other, then Automatic Increment in Midi Channel Assignment. These instruments/articulations can now be saved by selecting Main Menu in Play and SAVE AS (NOT SAVE! (SELECTING SAVE WILL OVERWRITE AN INSTRUMENT'S DATA!)), with a name of your choosing in a location of your choosing. I put everything in a folder I create (that I name PianoRollComposer) in C:\\Users\\Public. Actually, PRC will later put .ini files in that location as well. These files should all be put in the same folder: 1. play_VST_x64.dll 2. "save as" files 3. Plugin Instruments files (same name as "save as" files, except with an extension of .txt instead of .ewi) 4. Instruments.txt (holding names of all Plugin Instrument files (see below)) Next, to show EastWest's Player in PRC, select MIDI Output and VST Plugin in PRC's Menu, and open the VST DLL file (you may want to copy it to a more convenient location). Then, in that EastWest's Player window in PRC, select Main Menu and open the file you "saved as". After those instruments have loaded into the EastWest's Player window in PRC, minimize or move the Player window in PRC (don't close it because you might need it again). You won't initially see all the instrument names from EastWest's Player in PRC's Instruments window. You will first have to go to PRC's Menu and select File and then Plugin Instruments. Create a new file with the same name as the "saved as" name in EastWest's Player (this new file will be a .txt file instead of an .ewi file). Then in the window that opens, enter the instrument names, one per line, that are in the Player (renamed to simpler names). These names will appear in PRC's Instrument window when you've entered all instrument names, saved them (wherever your "saved as" file is), and closed this window. Whenever you open the "saved as" file again, you'll normally have to select the appropriate file in Plugin Instruments to display its instruments in the Instruments window. If you mistakenly select the wrong Plugin Instruments to play, just select the right one and change its Plugin Instruments to overwrite the previous one. NOW you can select an instrument in the Instruments window and play it on the Virtual Keyboard. But there's more. If, in the Plugin Instruments window, you put the lowest and highest MIDI note number after the instrument's name in parentheses, e.g. Cello (36-85), then PRC's Virtual Keyboard will show those limits. MIDI note numbers can be selected to show in PRC's Options window. This text file can also be opened and edited in Notepad, but it would have to be saved in UTF-16 LE Encoding format (not ANSI format) because EastWest's VST plugins are in 64-bit format. Repeat the above for additional groups of (up to) 16 instruments. To make it easier to load multiple VST plugins with "saved as" files into PRC, there's a shortcut: Open Notepad and enter the names of all "saved as" files (e.g. "Strings.ewi"), one per line. Save the file as "Instruments.txt" in the same folder as the VST DLL or a copy of it that you really use which should be in C:\\Users\Public\PianoRollComposer. Then instead of entering the name of a "saved as" file, press Ctrl-V to paste that name in (when you select a VST DLL, PRC loads each name into the Windows Clipboard, one at a time, from the Instruments.txt file). This method insures that music you write will see the same instruments in the same Plugins in the same order. ______________________ PRC can show Key Switches on its Virtual Keyboard, and you can select them to hear the different articulations, and then enter them into the music the same way you'd enter a note. For PRC to know which notes are Key Switches for an EastWest instrument, you'd have to write a text file (in Notepad) using this exact format: C0 Sustain Vibrato Hard (or whatever) C#0 Non-Vibrato Soft D0 QLegato D#0 Sustain Legato E0 Expressive Legato F0 Trill half-step etc. Name that file with an instrument name that's in the file that was saved in Files -Plugin Instruments. Then create a folder named "KeySwitches" in the same folder that you put the file(s) saved in Files -Plugin Instruments, and put all your Key Switch files in it. PRC will automatically search for relevant Key Switch files there. Key Switch notes (with a K on them) will only show when the Virtual Keyboard is showing. ______________________ If you have EastWest's Hollywood Percussion: To make the Vibraphone and Celesta play as long as a keyboard key is held down, you have to put an asterisk (*) just after the closing parenthesis (with no space) for Vibraphone and Celesta in the files that you created from Files -Plugin Instruments. And if you play one of them with other Multiple Instruments, it needs to be the Active Instrument. PLUS the loudness of percussion instruments in general is from the VELOCITY of that instrument.