Expressive Violin is a long-awaited addition to my sample library collection. This small yet ambitious project aims to deliver a True-Legato Violin that evokes profound emotions, capable of conveying both immense joy and deep sorrow.
In my journey to bring this vision to life, I had the privilege of collaborating with the exceptional Chilean Virtuoso Violinist, Miguel Ángel Muñoz, who holds the esteemed position of 1st Chair Violinist in Chile’s National Symphonic Orchestra. Miguel’s soulful and vibrant artistry perfectly matched the technical expertise I was seeking.
During the sample recording process, we carefully curated a musical environment that enabled Miguel to authentically express his musicality. I personally composed music references for the sessions, offering Miguel a rich musical context that heightened the emotional and captivating experience of the recordings.
Throughout his performance, Miguel skillfully used his body posture, dynamics, and vibrato to amplify the emotional impact of the music. Whether he wanted to express joy or sadness, his physicality and technique became integral parts of his artistic expression.
The entire instrument range was recorded using the True-Legato methodology (From G3 to C7). Additionally, we explored a more rhythmic approach by recording two variations of True-Legato lengths: Short and Long.
The Short Legato captures a vibrant energy, while the Long Legato offers a heightened sense of contrast. By seamlessly transitioning between these legato lengths and adapting them to the length of your notes, the resulting melodies feel as though they are being played by Miguel himself.
I believe Expressive Violin will enrich your collection and bring substantial value to your music productions, just as it has for me.
Tomás Kunstmann
Thank you for your interest in Expressive Violin, our debut product in a series of expressive instruments.
Expressive Violin is a virtual instrument designed for the free Kontakt Player sampler, focusing on delivering highly realistic, emotionally rich, and expressive melodic true legatos.
It brings melodies to life by providing two types of legato interval lengths that can be easily switched using Velocity or CC, creating a smooth and user-friendly playing experience.
Each legato interval carries a distinct expressive performance, featuring vibrato and dynamic changes tailored for specific note lengths in a melody.
To enhance musicality, the samples were recorded within a musical framework, resulting in noticeable improvements in pitch accuracy and emotional expression.
Lookahead is an intelligent control that fine-tunes the instrument’s “speed response,” optimizing its sound for faster or slower melodies.
This feature adjusts the duration of time preceding the “musical start” of the samples, which is the point where the samples align with the musical beat or click.
Adjusting Lookahead to a larger value creates a “looser” feel in the instrument, ideal for slower melodies. Conversely, setting Lookahead to a smaller value produces a “tighter” feel, suitable for faster melodies. However, both settings introduce latency to varying degrees.
To achieve the desired musical outcome, find the Lookahead value that best fits your needs, and remember to compensate for the latency by applying a negative MIDI offset on your DAW’s track.
Setting Lookahead to zero milliseconds eliminates latency, which is useful when recording with a MIDI keyboard. However, it may sound unrealistic when played back in your DAW.
To address these considerations, we have introduced the following shortcut modes:
Expressive Violin is a “True-Legato” virtual instrument that offers a realistic and expressive melodic experience. It achieves this by utilizing recorded transitions between notes, creating a seamless and lifelike legato sound. This means that when playing, the instrument captures the natural flow and nuances of a live performance, resulting in a more authentic and emotive musical experience.
To ensure seamless transitions between notes played on your MIDI keyboard, we meticulously recorded hundreds of different transition samples (music intervals). These samples were then carefully integrated into Kontakt, enabling it to play them back effortlessly as you play the instrument. The result is a fluid and natural legato performance.
Expressive Violin enhances melodies by offering two legato interval lengths that can be switched using Velocity or CC. Each interval length has its own unique expression, including body posture, vibrato and dynamics for different note lengths. This ensures an authentic and expressive playing experience.
Experience the remarkable realism of Expressive Violin as you switch between two legato interval lengths. Feel the instrument adapt to the note lengths in your melodies, bringing them to life with authenticity and emotion.
In Expressive Violin, you can switch between legato types using Velocity as the default, but you can also assign any Control Change (CC) to control it. This gives you the flexibility to customize the legato switching according to your playing style or MIDI setup.
Click on the Vel/CC button to switch between the two modes:
Right click on the “CC” part of the button to MIDI learn.
Use Dynamics to control the intensity of your performance. By default, it is assigned to CC1 (modulation wheel), allowing you to smoothly transition from silence to loudness. However, you have the flexibility to assign any Control Change (CC) by simply right-clicking the controller and selecting “Learn.”
Dynamics in Expressive Violin functions as a smart volume controller, adjusting the levels of the instrument notes and bow noise at slightly different rates. This creates a heightened sense of realism, setting it apart from a regular volume controller.
Expressive Violin is designed as a one dynamic layer instrument, which proves advantageous for solo instruments. This approach minimizes the need for extensive crossfades between samples. Moreover, the player’s expressive variations in dynamics are captured as part of the instrument’s expression, making additional dynamic layers unnecessary.
As part of the meticulous refining process, we carefully extracted the bow noise from the samples in Expressive Violin. We faced a decision on whether to include them or not, and we found a balanced solution: the Bow noise controller. This feature allows you to adjust the volume of the bow noise in real time.
The timbre of the bow noise in Expressive Violin varies with the pitch of the note. Lower notes have less noise due to lower string tension, while higher notes have more noise due to higher string tension. We took great care to ensure that the bow noise in the instrument accurately reflects these characteristics for each pitch, resulting in a heightened sense of authenticity and realism.
Expressive Violin was recorded in a studio using a close Mid/Side microphone technique, which captures an intimate and stereo sound. This technique offers a special advantage, allowing you to dynamically adjust the stereo width of the instrument by controlling the volume of both the Mid and Side channels simultaneously.
The Mid/Side technique not only delivers exceptional sound quality but is also compatible with mono playback systems, ensuring your music translates well across different audio setups.
Transform the sound of the instrument by placing it in a grand concert hall using the Reverb controller. This adjustment opens up a new dimension, expanding the detail and intimacy of the instrument’s sound by adding a sense of spaciousness through reverb.
