Can the forum recommend software that has a good selection of traditional instruments. Everything these days seems to be synthesiser sounds. I will be using it with Logic Pro. I won't limit the cost so as to get a good selection.

Tim.

"traditional instruments" is pretty vague. What exactly are you looking for?

Sorry it was a bit vague. Pianos, orchestral instruments, brass, guitars, bass, that sort of thing. In fact anything other than synths.

I’d start by looking at something such as Kontakt. They have many packages that include good samples of many instruments. For guitars you can’t go past AmpleSound (IMHO). There are any amount of really good orchestral type sounds VSL, Alpine Sounds, and many others.

For orchestras the biggest issue is disc space. It is fairly easy to use several TBytes of space. Also with some you really need to look at SSD storage or you could be waiting a while to load stuff.

Pianos, there are many some are even good. There are several good Kontakt Pianos, VSL have some good pianos, even Addictive Keys can be useful.

For Pedal Steel you can’t go past Tod’s Pedal Steel IMHO.

Have fun,

Tony

For most stuff Kontakt is hard to beat.
Its got the best or near the best of everything.
The list gets longer every month


Its not for the faint of wallet.

Spitfire Audio has a great orchestral instrument that is cheap ($50 ish) or free if you fill out a survey and wait a week or two. They also have their LABS free series of interesting instruments. Vienna Symphonic Library (vsl.co.at) also has a basic free orchestra that works well. Another good one that I got free is Miroslav Philharmonic.

Kontakt is really good and lots of free and cheap sounds for it but you'll need the full version for 90% of it. Black Friday is coming and I got it last year for half price.

Kontakt libraries are on sale right now.

If on a budget, you can go nuts with IK Multimedia's SampleTank and Total Studio products. Nearly all bundles include Miroslav Philharmonik. Once you own anything, crossgrades are quite inexpensive. Problem is that you need a spread sheet to figure out the right bundle at the best price—what to buy first and how to upgrade from there.

Total Studio etc.

I own Komplete Ultimate Collectors Edition and Total Studio Max 3. TS3 gets more use.

Thanks for all of the suggestions, there are several I have never heard of in there which I will be investigating. Space is not an issue as I have TB’s of space on external SSD available.

For anyone looking for “unusual samples” I can highly recommend pianobook.co.uk. They are supplied in varies formats and some use the DecentSampler to play them, and best of all they are free.

Pianobook is pretty fantastic - I especially love The Gimp (flanneled and unflanneled), it gives me some Trent Reznor vibes.

I double the suggestions of Komplete - honestly there isn't much else out there that has SO MUCH in it. Bonus - the plugins work great directly in Band-in-a-Box!

Native Instruments product does seem to be the way to go, but I am a bit confused. I looked at Kontakt as I already have some libraries from Spitfire audio and Sound Iron. Then I looked at Komplete 13 Select. Would Select 13 play the libraries I already have or do I need the full version of Kontakt as well.

I have not used the libraries mentioned in a few years so do not have the Kontakt player I used previously installed.

If my understanding is correct the Select 13 stuff will work in the Player. But understand the full version of Kontakt allows you to do things to the sample sets that the Player Version does not. You will most likely need the latest version of the Player.

For me I’d rather save up and get the Full Version of Kontakt. It does not take long at all and it will pay for itself. There are many Free and/or Low Cost sample libraries out there that require the Full Version of Kontakt. Most NI samples will work in the Player but check.

Say you want to make a Sample simulate Legato you can easily apply scripts that will do the task in the Full Version. You cannot do that in the Player Version of Kontakt.

Just a thought

Tony

So I buy Kontakt 6 which is on sale right now at £179.50. I am a little unsure if it is compatible with
the M1 chip though. Can anyone tell me if it works on the M1 24" iMac.

The official answer is that Kontakt is not yet supported though many NI apps are Rosetta II compatible.

M1 NI Compatibility

Many users are, if fact, using it with the beta version of Native Access.

Kontakt etc. M1 Mac

Kontakt M1

The long and short is that they're working on it.

Thanks for clearing that up Mike.

If you're looking to test the waters, Miroslav Philharmonik CE is a pretty good symphonic library on sale for $39.99.

Miroslav Philharmonik 2 CE

Besides its own player, it can be hosted in SampleTank 4 CS which is free and includes other libraries.

Upgrades and crossgrade sales abound in the world of IK including to the full version of Miroslav Philharmonik 2, SampleTank Max (which includes MP2) and many other titles. It's hard to keep track of everything I own but once you get started, it's not that expensive if you shop carefully. My wife's favorite piano VI is the Alan Parsons Imperial (Mark Knopfler's Bösendorfer 290 sampled by Mr. Parsons)—$79.95 by itself but included in most bundles.

Unlike the Kontakt/Kontakt Player where one is paid and the other free but doesn't play everything, SampleTank 4 is the exact same player whether you get CS for free or spring for TS Max 3.5.

IK Max BF Sale

To give you an idea of the confusion, the sale price for TS Max 3.5 is $599. It's $399 if you own a product worth $99 or more. The list on MP 2 CE is $149 but it's on sale for $40. $449 gets you a lot of titles.

Don't get me wrong. I also have Komplete Special Edition (nearly everything) plus a lot of UVI and other VIs. I use what I need when I need it and it took me a long time to get here.

I second the motion on Miroslav.

I own the full package and it is truly awesome. It works better in Sample Tank 4 for some reason. I think the Miroslav player has some quirks. But the library is great.

Plus, the sample tank player has some killer effects you can add to the chain from the full bank of IK Multimedia effects racks and pedals.

I am a fan of IK Multimedia products in general.

I think the Miroslav Player needs updating. Since I use ST 4, I don't care.

I wasn't hip to the fact that SampleTank itself is free. I had just upgraded to TS 2 Max which included ST 3 shortly before updating the MacOS to Mojave where it didn't work very well at all.

This caused a lot of frustration while exploring upgrade options—after all, I had just paid the money and why wasn't the new ST4 included… and so on. So, I downloaded ST4 CS for free to see how it worked—fine—so I opened up a few other libraries to see if it would—and it did.

Oh. I get it now. Instant upgrade because the new player is free and all my paid libraries work with it. So, it was a no-brainer for me to do the TS 3.5 Max upgrade to get a bunch of new instruments for a very low price.

I'll take it.

Yeah man.

I LOVE all that stuff. Love it.

Thanks for all the suggestions. I already have Miroslav Philharmonik 2, and some Spitfire libraries. I have the Kontakt 6 player but am not that keen on it, though I know others love it. I purchased Garritan Personal Orchestra 5 on Black Friday and feel it wins hands down over Miroslav. Because of all the black Friday deals my budget is now blown for a while. Having bought several Izotope products as the deals were just too good to miss.

Realitone's +++ Sunset Strings +++ is currently on sale for $199.95 US. It uses either the free Kontakt player or the full version of Kontakt.

Nuttin' wrong with GPO 5. I use it a lot in Finale.

It's too bad that NoterPerformer is Finale/Sibelius/Dorico only. It's AI handles bowing just the way I like on most of my projects.

I have GPO5 as well and use it all the time.

Miroslav to me adds some different flavors, so I like to mix and match.

But I am kinda crazy.

Last time I checked I had 897 VSTs.

No more flash sales for me for a while.