Sample Libraries

Hello again.

Today I’m going to talk about sample libraries – digital recordings which are loaded into virtual instruments for use by composers/arrangers/producers. There are hundreds out there. Huge full orchestras, tiny finger cymbals, guitars, pianos, pretty much anything you can think of. I mainly use products by CineSamples, Spitfire Audio, Orchestral Tools and Cinematic Samples. The range and quality of the sample libraries out there is amazing. I often layer them up, so I’ll put Cinematic Studio Strings on top of Symphonic Strings or the full string staccato patch from Inspire over the Cinematic Studio Strings playing staccato. This creates a full, thick sound and allows me to choose the sort of sound I’m getting from the strings – or whatever instrument I’m using.

Sample libraries like Orchestral Tools’ collections allow you to quickly create realistic-sounding orchestras with minimal effort. There are patches that allow you to play an entire woodwind, brass, percussion, or string section in one go. There are patches that you can layer on top of smaller groups of instruments, such as legato violins, should you need a soaring string line over the top. This is great when you’re on a tight deadline, which you often are in film and television. I often have five days to write 20–25 minutes of full orchestral music, so any shortcuts to making it sound great are very welcome.

CineSamples have produced libraries that allow you to play individual instruments. You can, for instance, play each of the woodwind instruments individually (three flutes, two oboes, cor anglais, two clarinets, bass clarinet, two bassoons, and contrabassoon perhaps). They are great and allow you to decide on the balance and exact orchestration. The only downside is that this approach takes a lot longer to write, play, and mix.

VIs and sample libraries allow the composer to create music that sounds as real as possible without the need for a full orchestra. Why? So that it can be heard by directors and producers before being recorded, or in case the budget only allows for synthetically created music. That’s why they’re a composer’s best friend… but why are they also our nemesis? Sample libraries have become so good now that many people believe there’s no longer a need for live musicians. That isn’t true! No matter how great VIs and sample libraries are, there is no substitute for live musicians playing the music, feeling it, and expressing it. I always try to convince the people I’m working with of the vital role musicians play in breathing life into a score. Not every production can afford (or requires) a full orchestra, and there is a time and a place for electronic scores – but, even on a production with a small budget, I will always try to use one or two live musicians. It lifts the score so much – you can’t sample emotion.


Sam x

Virtual Instruments

Good evening/morning/January/birthday/elephant*,

I hope you’re well and looking forward to a bit of a read. In this post, I’ll be talking about virtual instruments and in my next post I’ll talk about sample libraries. These are a media composer’s best friend and also nemesis – I’ll explain about that in the next post.

Virtual instruments (VIs) are also called software instruments or software synthesisers (softsynths for short). They generate digital audio and can be standalone programmes or plug-ins that are opened within a digital audio workstation (I use Pro Tools). They can be an emulation of an existing instrument (like a Moog or Roland synthesiser), designed to create new sounds, or a piece of software designed to host other sounds (like sample libraries).

One of the industry’s leading (and one of my favourite) VI makers is Native Instruments. I use their Komplete bundle on almost everything I do. Kontakt, Absynth, Massive, and FM8 are absolute go-to instruments for me. I own and use many VIs and sample libraries but there is one that I use above all others, and that’s Kontakt. It’s a sampler that hosts sample libraries so that you can play anything from a drum to a piano to a full orchestra.

I often have dozens of Kontakt windows open to create an orchestral score. You can open multiple sounds within one instance of Kontakt (so that you can create, for example, a whole string section all in one place). Many companies make sample libraries designed to be used in Kontakt. It has a great feature called “Quick-Load” that allows you to organise your samples however you want – I categorise mine by instrument type and then the name of the library, which I find is best for my workflow. If I want a solo violin, I can look in “Strings”, then “Solo”, and take my pick.

Some sample libraries are set up so that you can have multiple techniques loaded into one “patch” (a file you load into the VI). Say I have a violin section and I need sustained notes and short notes; I can load a multi patch and use keyswitches to swap between sounds. Keyswitches allow you to change sound at the press of a, well, key. They tell Kontakt that you are switching sounds and are usually placed right at the bottom of the keyboard. Luckily, Kontakt has a keyboard display that shows you where the keyswitches are, so you know which key to press for each sound.

My other favourite VI is Keyscape by Spectrasonics. I used it exclusively on my album Cypher. Unlike Kontakt it is a standalone product – a VI and sample library in one.

You need one instance for each sound you want (unlike in Kontakt), but you can play about with those sounds really easily. There are tweakable knobs and buttons all over the place, which is great for getting exactly the sound you want out of it.

For me, Keyscape has the best-sounding pianos out there (not to mention the dozens of other keyboard instruments it has to offer).

Omnisphere by Spectrasonics is an example of a VI that allows you to play with waveforms and all sorts of settings to make your own sounds. You can do this in VIs like Massive and Absynth, too. They also come with premade patches that you can use as-is or tweak to make your own version of the sound. (In fact, Absynth has a “Mutate” button you press to randomly modify the patch you’ve loaded – it’s a lot of fun and a feature I use often). Sometimes it is necessary to use the sounds that come with a VI, but I prefer to make my own (or at least tweak them) if time allows.

Many sample library companies are now starting to make their own VIs – which is great, because they can be adapted to work perfectly for the sample library they’re hosting. However, sometimes it backfires; the VI can be clunky or drain too many resources from the computer. Spitfire Audio have made their own and it’s pretty good. It works especially well for their Evo Grid concept. An Evo Grid is a collection of samples that have subtle movement in them. They’re great for creating atmosphere and giving your music a sense of realism. You can also select different parts of the grid to change the sound so it makes it sound a little more unique.

Hopefully this has been interesting or useful or at least not entirely boring. If you have any questions or comments please do use the comment section below. I’ll be back tomorrow with a follow-up post about sample libraries.

Until then, TTFN.

Sam x



*delete as applicable

New Year, New Music

Hello all,

Happy New year. I had a great break over the holiday season and I hope you did, too. I spent it with family and then had a week away in Kielder Forest (what a stunning place). I'm now back in the studio working away and will bring you new posts about music, drinking coffee, and the dog soon (I know you're all really here for the dog).

Here's to a bright, successful and happy 2019.

Sam x

P.S. Here's a picture of the dog dressed as Santa. You're welcome.

Hi!

Hello all,

It’s just about possible you’ve noticed the lack of posts recently; sorry about that. I’ve been busily working on a number of production music (library) albums. Currently, I’m working on a superhero album. Here’s a little clip of me writing one of the tracks.

I’ll be back in a few days with a more interesting post. I promise!

TTFN

Sam x

Reflections

Hi! How the devil are you? Excellent!

Sorry I’ve not done a proper post in a while. Usual excuses plus some unusual ones, but anyway – on with the show.

Firstly, I want to say a huge “thank you” to everyone for the amazing response and kind words about my new album, Reflections. It’s been lovely to hear that people are enjoying it. I thought I’d use this post to take you through the album a little.

I first thought about making this album as I was writing The Forest. I knew I was going to be in the studio with a fantastic string quartet and thought to myself, “Why not record a second album at the same time?!” Yeah, not much work at all… I adore strings. They are my favourite instrument family. Cellos are probably my favourite instrument of all time.

I had a few pieces already written (this post will follow the timeline of when the pieces were written, not the order they appear on the album). The first was Dan and Lizzie, an imaginatively named piece written for the signing of the register at my eldest brother Dan’s wedding (can you guess his wife’s name?!). The second, my first string quartet, I wrote for my friends’ Chloë and Simon’s wedding and had always wanted to record. It starts with a lively, syncopated movement followed by a slow, more romantic section, and it ends with a busy, mostly pizzicato (plucked) movement, the middle of which has some portamento (sliding). I asked the players to play it as if they were drunk – it was a wedding, after all.

I thought I should write a second one as it had been so long and I had enjoyed the first so much, so I wrote String Quartet No. 2 (again, I hope you’ll notice the imagination that goes into my track names). When I played this one to a friend of mine he said it was “like a rock n roll quartet”. I rather like that! In the final movement, there is a nod to my favourite composer, Dmitri Shostakovich – can you spot it?

Okay, I’ll tell you. There is a way of using musical notes to spell things out called cryptograms. Many composers have put messages into their music, mostly their own names. Bach did it using B♭, A, C and B♮. In German musical notation, B♮ is written as H (B♭ is B) and E flat is written as Es (S). So B♭, A, C, B♮ = BACH. Shostakovich used D, E♭, C, B♮, or “D.SCH,” so I put those notes in, played in unison, as a nod to him. You can hear it just before the players stamp their feet. The first time they did this, it nearly knocked the microphones over, so they had to be a little more gentle with their stamping in subsequent takes.

The first movement of the title piece from the album started life as part of a score for a TV show I did many years ago. It wasn’t used in the show, so I decided to rework it into a new piece. The other two movements just followed on from there. It became a very introspective piece, hence the title.

Finally, there is an “acoustic” version of Abundant Life from The Forest. I included this because, when we were mixing the albums, fabulous mix engineer Joe Rubel had muted all the synths and electronics and was concentrating on the balance of the strings and piano. He turned to me and said, “You know, this is pretty cool as an acoustic version”. As we listened, I realised it worked rather nicely without the additional elements and decided to included it on Reflections as a sort of “bonus track”.

I’m really proud of this album. I think it’s some of the most “me” music I’ve ever written and I hope you enjoy listening to it as much as I enjoyed writing and recording it.



Reflections is now available to buy online via iTunes, Amazon and many more – and to stream on Apple Music, Spotify and other streaming platforms.

A huge thank you to the incomparable Laurie Anderson, Peter Gregson, Kirsty Mangan, Angus MacRae and Sara Wolstenholme for their amazing performances, to Joe Rubel for his fantastic engineering and mixing, and to John Webber at Air Studios for his amazing mastering skills.

Sam x

Hello all,

Sorry for the silence; it has been a very busy few months. But I'm back with a quick announcement. My new album, Reflections, is out TODAY!

It's now available to buy online via iTunes, Amazon and many more – and to stream on Apple Music, Spotify and other streaming platforms.

A huge thank you to the incomparable Laurie Anderson, Peter Gregson, Kirsty Mangan, Angus MacRae and Sara Wolstenholme for their amazing performances, to Joe Rubel for his fantastic engineering and mixing, and to John Webber at Air Studios for his amazing mastering skills.

I hope you enjoy listening to this album as much as I enjoyed writing and recording it. I'll be back soon with a more in-depth post about Reflections!

TTFN

Sam x

An Early Halloween

Hello all,

Sorry for the radio silence. It has been a very busy, very tough month or so. I’m just starting to get back to some sort of normal, but regular service should now resume.

I’m in the midst of a million (well, four) library albums at the moment, two of which I’m trying to finish in time for a Halloween release (ooooooh!!!). One of these is based on the idea of a haunted fairground and circus, so lots of creepy waltzes and scary sounds.

You may have seen this little video of me composing one of the tracks on Instagram or Twitter, but I thought I’d post it on here too. Enjoy, and I’ll be back with a more in-depth blog soon.

Sx