#Kontakt libraries spitfire solo strings series

Orchestral viola players used to have a reputation as timid ‘shrinking violets’, but today’s generation is made of sterner stuff: these guys play their instruments with authority, passion and commitment, to the extent where I once had to ask four viola players to play quieter as they were drowning out a section of 14 violins. Rather than assuming that Violin I is the ‘First Violin’, I would treat the two instruments as equals and make a point of comparing them when looking for a particular articulation. Violin I and II sound less homogenous than I expected: Violin II’s spiccato deliveries are fiercer and more astringent, and its short portatos are played longer with a more pronounced vibrato. Playing hard triggers long portamento slides, which adds an extra layer of realism. The violins’ legatos (which utilise VSL-style held-note re-triggering) work very well for agile, impassioned and romantic playing, with grace notes sounding particularly effective. In this library the vibrato is (as they say) ‘baked in’, but there’s nothing half-baked about the vibrato delivery: it develops soon after the initial note front, and sounds utterly natural and musical. Sustains and legatos are highly responsive to touch: playing quietly produces a soft attack and a subtle, expressive volume swell, medium velocities trigger an immediate attack and loud notes produce a hard accent. The library uses three dynamic layers throughout, with up to six round robins on its short notes. They’re also sonically compatible with the massive sections in Orchestral Tools’ Metropolis Ark 1 library.įirst Chairs’ solo instruments play an identical set of articulations, including a very effective true legato mode.

To that end, the players were recorded in their natural orchestral seating positions and multi-miked in the same way as the Berlin Strings string ensembles. Featuring a line-up of two violins, viola and cello, the library works both for stand-alone string quartets, and for layering and blending with larger string ensembles. Released in June 2016, the First Chairs expansion set features the Berlin Strings principal players going through their paces in the Teldex Scoring Stage, home of Orchestral Tools’ sampling projects. As they feature techniques instigated for Berlin Strings and Metropolis Ark 1, you may care to refer to those titles’ SOS reviews, published in August 2014 and September 2016 respectively. In this review we’ll take a look at First Chairs and both Nocturne instruments. In addition to expanding the Berlin Strings range, Orchestral Tools have also launched a Nocturne Soloists Series, which so far consists of Nocturne Violin and Nocturne Cello.

Though such specialised articulations are great for adding colour and excitement to scores, the expansion set liable to have the widest popular appeal is BST Expansion D: First Chairs, which adds solo strings to the library. The first two of these (BST Expansion A & B) add special bowings such as sul tasto legato and col legno to the strings’ repertoire, while a third expansion set provides entertaining played effects including clusters, effect glissandos, tempo-synced measured trills, Bartok pizzicatos, etc. Since releasing Berlin Strings in November 2013, Orchestral Tools have steadily augmented the library with expansion volumes.

#Kontakt libraries spitfire solo strings series

Orchestral Tools expand their series with a quartet of solo strings and a pair of intimately-recorded soloists.