A SoundFont is a collection of MIDI instruments;
SoundFonts effect only MIDI music. When you load a SoundFont, you are loading
instrument samples onto your sound card's memory. Instead of playing the
default instruments, the soundcard playes the instruments in the SoundFont.
To load a SoundFont, you need AWE or soundblaster live or player
sound card. Click on soundfonts option on your sound card 's control panel
and load as many sound fonts as your sound card s' memory allow.you can
classify each loaded sound font into different banks e.g one bank for drums
, one for instruments and one for effects.
SoundFonts end in .sbk or .sf2.
To edit a SoundFont, you need to use Vienna. There are three levels that the instrument sample information is in. The wave files are stored in the User Sample Pool. Wave samples and looping information are collected into a single instrument in the Instrument Pool. The Melodic and Percussive Pools store the patch and bank numbers, as well as effects such as reverb and chorus (everything you see in the lower half of the screen).
To a new instrument to a SoundFont, you need your sample to be in wave format. Click on the Options menu, drag to User Sample Pool, and select Import User Sample(s). Choose your wave file. Your wave file is now in the User Sample Pool. To make it a MIDI instrument, your sample needs to be in the Instrument Pool and the Melodic or Percussive Pool. To add your sample to the Instrument Pool, click on the Options menu, drag to Instrument Pool, and select New Instrument. To add your Instrument to the Melodic Pool, click on the Options menu, drag to Melodic Pool, and select New Melodic Preset. Vienna will ask you what bank and patch numbers you want. You have 128 patches per bank. General MIDI starts with the Acoustic Piano (Patch # 000) and ends with Gun Shot (Patch # 127). If all of your patches are full, you will have to delete some if you want to add new instruments (or you can add to another bank). To delete an instrument from the Melodic Pool, select it and press the delete key. This will not delete it from the Sample or Instrument Pools.
If you want to copy an instrument from another SoundFont, click on the File menu, and select Bank Manager. Next, click on Import Bank and choose the SoundFont you're copying from. Choose the instrument you want from the Melodic Pool and click on copy. In your target file, click on your Melodic Pool folder and select Paste from the Edit menu.
If you want to loop a sample, select it in you Instrument Pool, and click the loop button on your toolbar. If you want to add reverb, chorus, or other effects, select the instrument in the Melodic Pool. You can now edit the effects in the lower half of the screen.
Tip: Select Prefrences from the Options menu. Click on the Options tab. Check the box that reads "discard unused samples and instruments when saving." This will get rid of all the instruments that you have deleted from the melodic pool when you save the file, saving you the trouble of deleting them from the Sample and Instrument Pools.
You can find a more detailed explaination of SoundFonts
in the help file that comes with Vienna SoundFont Studio.