Soniccouture Grand Marimba v2.2.0 [KONTAKT]

A descendant of the African balafon, the modern marimba originated in Mexico, and is typified by wooden bars mounted above metal resonator tubes, which can be tuned using stops.

This Soniccouture instrument features the 5-octave Yamaha 6100, designed with marimba legend Keiko Abe.

The 6100 is state of the art, with exclusive precision tuning, Honduran Rosewood bars and welded resonators for rattle-free playing.

TREMOLO FLOW

Tremolo is such an expressive marimba technique that we’ve designed an original Kontakt module to emulate this with unparalleled accuracy. It comfortably handles 1 to 4 voices of harmony (since marimba players rarely use more than 4 mallets), and will intelligently remap the tremolo in real time based on the incoming MIDI or your playing.

The speed and velocity of the Tremolo can be modulated in real time using a MIDI controller.

The Humanise controls offer even more natural expression – vary the timing and velocity of a sequence by subtle, random amounts – allowing your composition to breathe and flow.

THE INSTRUMENT PANEL

The main Instrument panel contains ADSR controls, a filter section with envelope modulation, and stereo width with Flip. The articulation switches can be seen in the lower half of the panel.

SAMPLING THE MARIMBA

The marimba is massive, almost 3 meters across, which makes recording it a challenge;

it isn’t possible to get too close to an instrument that large and maintain any sort of sensible stereo image.

And since we were aiming for an intimate, non-ambient, recording, we needed a very large but relatively dry studio to work in.

Requires KONTAKT 6 or KONTAKT 6 PLAYER version 6.6 or later