Library Instruments

The Instrument Library has 125 ready-made instruments. Open it from the Instruments window with Library…, click Preview to hear an instrument play its demo note, and click Add to put a copy in your project. This chapter describes every one of them, in the groups the Library uses.

Learn it by doing. These lessons walk you through it, step by step, in the editor:

Two kinds of instrument are in it. Most are built from nodes: you can open them in the Node Editor and see how they are made, and they start playing at once. The ones in Sampled Instruments are real recordings: they load their recordings the first time you use them, which can take a moment (a large section is several megabytes), and a note outside the instrument’s real range is silent.

All of them end with one Gain before the Instrument Output that sets their overall level, chosen so that every instrument comes out at about the same loudness at the same velocity. See Instruments and Music.

The chapter first lists the instruments built from nodes, group by group. The sampled instruments, the real recordings, are listed separately after them, at the end of the chapter.

Drums

One instrument for each drum. Most ignore the note you give them (any note plays the drum), so a drum part can sit on one row of the piano roll; harder notes are louder and snappier.

• 909 Snare: A tight electronic snare: two triangle-wave heads that drop in pitch and plenty of noise, clipped for a crack. Snappier and brighter than the acoustic snare. Any note plays it.
• Acoustic Kick: A kick drum from a real kit: a round body that drops in pitch, a little shell and the click of the beater, with no boom or distortion. Any note plays it; harder is louder and clickier. Use it for rock, blues, country and folk; for dance music take the Techno Kick or the 808.
• Brush Snare: A snare played with brushes: a soft thump under a swish of filtered noise. A short note is a tap; hold a note and the brush keeps sweeping across the head. Any note plays it; harder is louder and brighter. For jazz, ballads and country.
• Clap: A clap made of two filtered noise bursts with a short echo that follows the project tempo. Play a three-note ramp of rising velocity just before the beat for the classic flam.
• Closed Hi-hat: A closed hi-hat: a short, tight tick of metallic noise. Any note plays it; harder is louder. Play it on eighth notes for a groove, and pair it with the Open Hi-hat for the off-beats.
• Crash Cymbal: A crash: six detuned square waves make the metallic clang, with a hard first splash and a long wash that darkens as it rings. Letting go chokes it. Any note plays it; hold it for the length of the wash.
• Drum: A punchy drum: a sine whose pitch drops fast, a short noise click and a little distortion. Low notes are kicks, higher ones are toms.
• Hi-hat: One hi-hat for both sounds: a short note is a closed hat, a long note stays open. The pitch does not matter.
• Open Hi-hat: An open hi-hat: a long, shimmering sizzle that rings while the note is held and dies away when it ends. Any note plays it; play it on the off-beat after a Closed Hi-hat for the classic open-and-shut pattern.
• Reverse Crash: A cymbal played backwards: noise and metal swell louder and brighter over 2 seconds, and stop dead when the note ends. Play a note about 2.2 seconds long, ending right on the drop. Any note plays it.
• Ride Cymbal: A ride: a lighter metallic wash than the crash under a bright stick “ping”. Repeated notes build the classic ride pattern. Any note plays it.
• Rimshot: A short, dry rimshot: a sharp click of two high tones over a woody body tone. Any note plays it.
• Snare: A snare drum: two head tones that drop a little as they die, and noise for the snare wires with a quick crack then a rattle. Any note plays it; harder is louder and snappier.
• Techno Kick: A four-on-the-floor techno kick: a fast pitch drop, a noise click, distortion and a compressor. Play it at A1 (note 33).
• Tom: A tuned tom-tom: the note sets the pitch (A1 to C3 covers floor tom to high tom), with a pitch drop, a second inharmonic membrane mode, the stick and the thud of the skin.

Percussion

Hand drums, shakers and bells, and the tuned percussion (marimba, vibraphone, xylophone). The tuned ones follow the note; the rest play one sound.

• Claves: Two hardwood sticks struck together: a bright, short, dry “tock” with a hint of a second wooden resonance, the instrument that plays the clave pattern at the heart of Afro-Cuban music. Any note plays it; harder is louder and brighter. Keep the notes short; the sound dies by itself.
• Conga: A conga: an open tone with a quick pitch drop and a second, inharmonic overtone, plus the slap and palm of the hand. The note is the tuning: try A3 for a low conga and E4 for a high one.
• Cowbell: The classic electronic cowbell: two square waves through a band-pass with a hard hit and a short ring. The note tunes it; C5 (note 72) is the 808 cowbell.
• Drop Impact: The hit that lands a drop: a sub boom that falls onto the pitch of the note, a noise sweep, a cymbal-like wash and a big room. Play one low note (A1, note 33) about two bars long.
• Kalimba: A kalimba (thumb piano): a metal tine that rings for about a second and a half with a bell-like overtone, the wooden thock of the box and the pluck of a thumb. Good for gentle melodies and arpeggios. A little room is built in.
• Marimba: A struck wooden bar: a fundamental that rings, overtones at about four and ten times that die quickly (which is what makes a marimba a marimba), and the tap of the mallet. Harder is brighter. A little room is built in.
• Shaker: A shaker: filtered noise that swells over a few milliseconds and then falls away, so it swishes instead of clicking. Any note plays it; harder is louder. Play it in eighths or sixteenths.
• Sonar Ping: A single soft ping from far away: a sine that falls a hair in pitch as it rings, a whisper of air, and a long dotted-quarter echo that follows the tempo and dissolves into a room. Play one note at a time, sparsely (A4 to A6).
• Tambourine: A tambourine: the thin metal of the jingles in a quick shake followed by a shorter ring, over the tap of the hand on the skin. Any note plays it.
• Timpani: A kettledrum: the head starts a little sharp and settles onto the pitch, with overtones at about one and a half, two and two and a half times the pitch that die faster than the fundamental, the thud of the mallet and a hall around it. Tuned by the note: try it from D2 to C4.
• Tubular Bells: Tubular bells: four inharmonic overtones with their own decays, a metallic clang at the strike and a big room. A struck bell keeps ringing for a couple of seconds, even after the note ends.
• Vibraphone: A vibraphone: a long-ringing fundamental with overtones at four and ten times its pitch that die quickly, and the motor tremolo of the spinning discs. The bars keep ringing for half a second after you let go. A little hall is built in.
• Xylophone: A xylophone: a hard wooden bar with its first overtone a twelfth above (three times the pitch) and another two octaves and a fifth above, a short ring and a bright, hard mallet click. Higher and drier than the marimba. Try it from C5 to C7. A little room is built in.

Bass

Low instruments for a bass line. Play them in the lowest octaves (C1 to C3).

• 808: The 808 sub: a sine that starts high and drops to the note in 50 milliseconds, a long smooth decay and a little saturation. Play it low (C1 to C2) as a kick, or as a bass line; hold a note for as long as it should boom.
• Acid Bass: A resonant sawtooth bass: the filter snaps open on every note (harder notes open further) and then closes, with a little distortion. Try it around A1 to A2.
• Bass Guitar: An electric bass played with the fingers: a filtered sawtooth over a strong sine fundamental, a bright pluck that mellows quickly, finger noise, a touch of growl and compression. Playing harder is brighter and louder. Try it around E1 to G2.
• Boom Sub: A deep sub with a boom: a sine with a quick pitch thump at the start, a soft second and third harmonic so it is warm and not clinical, a swell that settles to a held level and a compressor to keep it solid. Nothing above the fourth harmonic, so it stays smooth. Play it low (C1 to C2) and hold the notes; for the cleanest possible sine use the Pure Sub.
• Growl Bass: The talking, wobbling bass of dubstep: a sine, a sawtooth and a square into a low-pass with a high resonance that sweeps twice a beat in time with the project tempo, then hard clipping and fold for the metal edge. Play it from C1 to C3 in long, held notes. The wobble speed follows the tempo.
• Mid Bass: The layer of an EDM bass that you actually hear: a sine one octave above the sub, with a fast pitch drop for the thump, distortion for harmonics, and a resonant low-pass that sweeps down over the start of each note for the wub. Play it from C2 to C3, the same notes as the sub an octave higher, and layer it over the Pure Sub. Harder notes are louder and dirtier.
• Pure Sub: A pure sine wave and nothing else: the cleanest, deepest bass in the library, made for a subwoofer. There is no top end at all, so on a laptop or small speaker it is faint or silent, and it needs a mid bass above it to be heard there. Play it low (C1 to C2); the lower the note, the more you feel it.
• Reese Bass: The dark, thick bass of drum and bass and heavy EDM: three sawtooth waves a few cents apart that beat against each other so the sound seems to swirl, a low sine under them, a low-pass whose cutoff drifts slowly and a little soft distortion. Play it from C1 to C3 in long, held notes. Harder notes are louder.
• Slap Bass: A slap bass: a bright, snappy electric bass with a thumb pop an octave up, a fast sweep from bright to round and a snap of string noise. Play it low (E1 to G2) in short, punchy notes; harder is louder and brighter. For funk, disco and pop.
• Sub Bass: A low sub bass: a sine for weight, with an octave of triangle, a little filtered saw and saturation on top, so it is felt on big speakers and still heard on laptop speakers and headphones. Play it low, from C1 to C3. For a cleaner, deeper sub with nothing on top, use the Pure Sub.
• Upright Bass: A plucked double bass: a round triangle-and-sine tone, a short woody decay, the thump of the finger and the string slapping the board. Good for walking lines.

Keys

Pianos, organs and the harpsichord. Play chords or single notes.

• Electric Piano: A tine-and-tone-bar electric piano: a clean fundamental that rings, a bright bell tone that only sounds at the start (and more so when played hard, giving the bark), and the tremolo of a suitcase model, with a light room. Play chords.
• Harpsichord: A harpsichord: two sawtooth ranks (one an octave up) plucked by quills, a bright start that quickly mellows, a nasal resonance, the click of the jack and a felt damper that stops each note when the key is let go. Like the organ it is not velocity sensitive. A small room is built in.
• Organ: A drawbar organ: six sine harmonics with vibrato and tremolo like a rotating speaker, a percussive third harmonic and a key click. It holds at full level for as long as the note is held (and is not velocity sensitive). A little room is built in.
• Piano: A struck string: a bright hammer hit, a quick first drop and a quiet long ring, upper harmonics that die first and two slightly detuned strings. Played harder it is louder and brighter; letting go damps it. A little room is built in, shared by all notes so fast playing stays light.

Guitar

Plucked and struck strings, from nylon to overdrive, a banjo and a pedal steel. Play chords or single notes.

• Banjo: A five-string banjo: bright, nasal and quick, with a hard pick and a short ring that dies in under a second. Play single notes or chords, and play them fast (eighth notes and up); the ring is too short for long notes. Harder is louder and brighter. For country, bluegrass and folk.
• Classical Guitar: A nylon-string guitar: soft sine harmonics whose upper part dies quickly, a warm body resonance and the touch of a fingernail. Good for arpeggios and chords. A small room is built in.
• Electric Guitar (Clean): A clean electric guitar: a bright pluck that mellows as the string rings, a pickup presence peak and a pick click. Play chords or single notes.
• Electric Guitar (Lead): A lead guitar with grit and feeling: a thick, heavily distorted tone that sustains and blooms as a held note rings, a quick scoop up into every note, a wide vibrato that grows in after half a second and a short echo. Harder playing is louder and dirtier. Play single notes, in the upper register (E3 and up), and hold the important ones.
• Electric Guitar (Overdrive): A loud, overdriven electric guitar: a thick, slightly detuned string tone pushed through two stages of heavy distortion and a speaker cabinet, with a pick attack, a vibrato that arrives after the note starts and an amp that settles as the note rings. Harder playing drives the amp harder. Power chords (root and fifth, or root, fifth and octave) sound best, and short notes chop cleanly.
• Pedal Steel: A pedal steel guitar: every note slides up into pitch from just below, with a slow swell, a vibrato that arrives late and the singing, metallic tone of the bar. Play long notes (a second or more); it is made for slow country melodies and sustained chords. Harder is louder and brighter. Add a track reverb for the full effect.
• Steel-String Guitar: A steel-string acoustic guitar: eight bright harmonics of which the upper ones die first, a quick drop followed by a long ring, the wood of the body and a pick click. Play chords or single notes. A small room is built in.

Strings

Bowed and plucked strings built from nodes (the recorded orchestral strings are under Sampled Instruments below).

• Cello: A cello: the same bowed design tuned lower and darker, with slower vibrato, more bow noise and deep body resonances. Try it around C2 to A3.
• Harp: A concert harp: six soft harmonics of a gut string whose upper part dies first, a long ring that is let go gently, a warm soundboard resonance, the touch of a fingertip and a hall. Play arpeggios and glissandos, and let the notes overlap.
• String Ensemble: A string section: four detuned sawtooth voices per note, a slow bow attack and a swept-delay chorus (the string-machine sound). A small hall is built in. Play chords; it is meant to sit behind other instruments.
• Viola: The same bowed-string design as the Violin, tuned a fifth lower with warmer, darker body resonances and a touch less brightness and vibrato speed - between the Violin and the Cello. Try it around C3 to C5.
• Violin: A solo violin: a bowed string with an irregular vibrato that fades in after the note starts, a bow stroke whose brightness opens over the first moments, five narrow body resonances that make the tone shimmer, bow noise and a small room. Harder playing is brighter.

Brass

Brass built from nodes (the recorded brass is under Sampled Instruments below).

• Brass: A sawtooth and a triangle an octave down with vibrato; the filter opens as the note is blown, and a touch of breath at the start.
• Trombone: A trombone: darker and rounder than the trumpet, with a slower attack, an octave of body underneath, and a slide up to the pitch at the start of each note. Try it from E2 to C5.
• Trumpet: A trumpet: a bright sawtooth whose brightness follows how hard it is blown, the flare of the bell as two resonances, lip buzz at the start, a touch of edge, and a vibrato that arrives late. Try it from E3 to C6.

Woodwind

Woodwinds built from nodes (the recorded ones are under Sampled Instruments below).

• Clarinet: A clarinet: a hollow, woody tone made of odd harmonics only (a closed pipe), a soft reed onset, very little vibrato and a little breath. Try it from D3 to G5.
• Flute: A flute: a nearly pure tone with a whisper of upper harmonics, pitched air and hiss, a chiff and slight bloom up to the pitch at the start, and a vibrato that arrives after the note begins. Blow harder for a louder, breathier tone.

Voice

Voices and vocal textures: choirs, a solo voice, a hum, and a few effects built from the voice.

• Choir Aah: A choir singing “aah”: three detuned sawtooth voices through vowel resonances (formants), a slow, breathy entrance, a gentle vibrato and a swept chorus that makes it a section rather than one singer, and a hall around it. Play chords.
• Choir Ooh: A choir singing “ooh”: darker and rounder than the “aah” choir, with a slow entrance, a slow vibrato, a bass voice an octave below and a hall around it. Play chords.
• Humming: A hummed “mmm”: lips closed, so one strong low resonance and little above it, with a soft entrance and a vibrato that fades in.
• Robot Voice: A robot voice: a buzzing tone held on one fixed vowel, with no vibrato, a little distortion and a short feedback delay that rings at one pitch for the metallic vocoder sound.
• Solo Voice: A solo singer: each note starts on “oh” and opens to “ah”, with a little breath, a vibrato that fades in and a room around it. Try it for melodies around C4 to C5.
• Vocal Stab: A short sung “doo”: a click of consonant, then the mouth opens from “oo” to “ah” in a tenth of a second and the note dies away quickly. For rhythmic vocal hits and chops.
• Vowel Morph: A talking synth: a sawtooth (with a saw an octave down) whose vowel swings between “ooh” and “ah” once every beat, in time with the project tempo. Great as a wobbling bass or lead; try A1 to A3.

Synth

Leads, pads, plucks, stabs and sound effects (risers, drones, engines). Some need a long note or a repeating note to sound right: read the description.

• Build Riser: An eight-bar build: filtered noise that climbs through the whole spectrum, a sawtooth stack that climbs two octaves and a sixteenth-note stutter that cuts deeper as it rises. The climb takes 14 seconds whatever the tempo, so play one long note (C4) at least that long, and end it a beat early for a drop-out before the drop. The four-second Riser is the short version.
• Chord Stab: Two detuned saws through a filter that opens and closes fast, with a tempo-synced echo. Play chords of 3 or 4 notes.
• Deep Space Drone: The floor of a slow piece: three detuned sawtooths and a sine, a quiet fifth above, and a low-pass filter whose cutoff drifts slowly (two waves that never line up) so the tone breathes. A slow attack and a long release let one root melt into the next. Play long low notes (D1 to D2).
• Detuned Pad: A slow-attack pad of two detuned saws and a sine an octave down, with a drifting filter. Send it through the Sidechain Pump and the Reverb Bus for the big, pumping techno pad.
• Downlifter: The riser turned upside down: filtered noise and a saw sweep fall from the top and die away over about three seconds. Play it on the drop or after a break. The note sets the pitch of the tonal part.
• Engine Idle: A stylized, synthesized engine idle: a thick detuned sawtooth “growl” shaped by a fast wobbling filter (the firing pulses) plus a slow drift, with a layer of filtered exhaust hiss underneath. Procedural, not a recording - it reads as “an engine” rather than any specific real one, and will not match a recorded reference. Velocity works as a throttle: louder/harder notes rev it up. Meant to be held for as long as the event plays (a sustained drone, like a pad), not triggered as a one-shot.
• Jet Engine Roar: A stylized jet-engine texture: layered filtered white/pink noise for the broadband roar, a slow bandpass sweep for the turbine whine, and a thin sawtooth layer that tracks the note for a bit of pitched “spool” character. Procedural, not a recording - real jet-engine spectra are far more complex than a few filters and noise bands can fake, so this reads as “an engine-like roar” rather than a convincing jet. Long attack/release (spool-up/spool-down); meant to be held for the event’s full duration.
• Pump Chords: Chords that pump like sidechain compression without a bus: every note starts silent and swells back over a third of a second while its filter opens. Three detuned saws and a sine an octave down per note. Play the chord again on every beat, one beat long, so the dip lands on the kick.
• Riser: A four-second build: filtered noise and a rising saw sweep up and swell, then hold at the top until the note ends. Play it for four seconds or more, ending on the downbeat of the drop. The note sets the pitch of the tonal part.
• Solar Wind: Wind between the stars: soft noise through two narrow bands that wander slowly (one low and hollow, one high and airy), a three-second swell in, a slow tremolo and a long fade out. Play long notes; the pitch is not used.
• Star Shimmer: Glass and starlight: three slightly sharp sine partials that each fade in and out on their own slow tremolo, so a chord glitters and never repeats. A long attack, a long release, a tempo-synced dotted-quarter echo and a room around it. Play high notes (C5 to C7), long, two or three at once.
• Supersaw Lead: The big detuned lead: five sawtooths spread a few cents apart, a filter that opens with each note (harder is brighter), a slight vibrato that arrives after the note starts and a chorus for width.
• Synth Pluck: A snappy synth pluck for arpeggios and stabs: two detuned saws and a square, a filter that snaps shut (following the pitch) and a dotted-eighth echo that follows the project tempo.
• Wind Swell: The same wind, built as a slow swell: it takes 12 seconds to reach full level, then fades out over a few seconds when the note ends. Play one note at least 12 seconds long, ending on a change of section. The pitch is not used.
• Wobble Lead: A lead whose filter wobbles in time with the project tempo (two swings a beat), with a tempo-synced echo.

Effects

These do not play notes: they listen to other tracks and change them. See Instruments That Process Other Tracks.

• Delay Bus: Dotted-eighth echoes for several tracks at once, in time with the project tempo, drifting a little like a tape loop with each echo duller than the last. It listens to Music 2, 3 and 4 (change its Runsheet Track nodes to pick others), so give it a Music event as long as the tracks it processes, with the same Loop length, and set those tracks to Audible Output: Muted.
• Dub Echo: The echo of a dub mix, for a track of its own: assign it to a track in the Runsheet (right-click the track’s row) and everything on the track repeats in dotted-eighth echoes locked to the project tempo, narrow and dark like a tape loop, each repeat a little quieter, with a touch of room around them. The track plays dry as well, so the echoes fill the gaps when other parts drop out.
• Guitar Amp: A guitar amp and speaker cabinet for a whole track: everything the track plays goes through two stages of distortion together and then a cabinet, so the notes of a chord mix before they distort and growl against each other, the way a real amp makes a power chord heavy. Assign it to a guitar track in the Runsheet (right-click the track’s row). It works best on the Electric Guitar (Overdrive) or on the Electric Guitar (Clean); the more notes at once, the more growl. It is level-matched: a guitar through it is about as loud as the guitar alone.
• Lo-Fi Bus: Old-tape character for several tracks: pitch that wanders and flutters, a narrow dusty frequency band, a little saturation and a faint hiss. It listens to Music 2, 3 and 4 (change its Runsheet Track nodes to pick others), so give it a Music event as long as the tracks it processes, with the same Loop length, and set those tracks to Audible Output: Muted.
• Reverb Bus: One shared reverb for several tracks. It listens to Music 2, 3 and 4 (change its Runsheet Track nodes to pick others), so give it a Music event of its own as long as the tracks it processes, with the same Loop length, and set those tracks to Audible Output: Muted. Cheaper than a reverb on every note.
• Sidechain Bus (Light): A gentler version of the Sidechain Bus, for bass and chords that must keep their weight: assign it to a track in the Runsheet (right-click the track’s row) and the track’s sound dips to about a third on every beat and swells back before the next, locked to the Runsheet’s beats so it ducks where the kick is. Deepen it by lowering the LFO’s offset and amount together (keep offset + amount at 1).
• Sidechain Pump: The pumping duck of house and techno pads: it listens to Music 2, 3 and 4 (change its Runsheet Track nodes to pick others) and drops their volume right on every beat, then lets it swell back before the next, in time with the project tempo. Start its Music event on a beat (a bar line is best), make it as long as those tracks, with the same Loop length, and set them to Audible Output: Muted.
• Track Low Cut: Takes the low end out of a track: a high-pass filter at 200 Hz. Assign it to a pad, a lead or a group of them (right-click the track’s row) to make room for the kick and the bass. Change the filter’s Frequency to cut more or less.
• Track Low Cut (Strong): The same as Track Low Cut but higher: a high-pass filter at 450 Hz, for sounds that should have nothing in the bass and low mids at all. Assign it to a track in the Runsheet (right-click the track’s row).
• Track Pump: The pumping duck of house and techno, for a track of its own: assign it to a track in the Runsheet (right-click the track’s row) and that track’s sound drops on every beat and swells back before the next, locked to the Runsheet’s beats so it ducks exactly where the kick is. Make it deeper by lowering the LFO’s offset and amount together (keep offset + amount at 1), or change its Rate to duck on every other beat.
• Track Reverb: A room around a whole track: everything on the track, or in the group, goes through one reverb (2.4 seconds, 30% wet). Assign it to a track in the Runsheet (right-click the track’s row). It suits claps, pads and leads; keep it off kick and bass.

Sampled Instruments

Real recordings, played back note by note. The orchestral instruments come from the Sonatina Symphonic Orchestra, the drum kit from the MuldjordKit and the harmonica from the Versilian Community Sample Library; see Sample-Based Instruments for the licenses and for how to build one of your own from an SFZ file.

Strings

• Violin Solo (Sampled): A solo violin: the highest and brightest of the bowed strings, singing and expressive. The natural voice for a melody, and the top line of a string quartet. Plays from G3 to C7.
• Viola Solo (Sampled): A solo viola: a little deeper and darker than the violin, with a warm, slightly reedy tone. It suits inner harmonies and mellow, thoughtful melodies. Plays from C3 to E6.
• Cello Solo (Sampled): A solo cello: rich, warm and close to the human voice. It can sing a melody in its middle range or carry a bass line. Plays from C2 to C6.
• Double Bass Solo (Sampled): A solo double bass: the deepest of the bowed strings, with a dark, round tone. For bass lines and low, held notes. Plays from C1 to G4.
• First Violins (Sampled): The whole first-violin section playing together: a wide, shimmering sound no soloist can make, and the traditional carrier of the tune in an orchestra. Plays from G3 to C7.
• Violas (Sampled): The viola section: the warm middle of the strings, filling out the harmony between the violins and the cellos. Plays from C3 to C6.
• Cellos (Sampled): The cello section: a deep, singing sound for melodies in the tenor range and for the warm lower half of a string chord. Plays from C2 to C#5.
• Double Basses (Sampled): The double bass section: the foundation of the orchestra, a deep rumble that usually doubles the cellos an octave below. Plays from C1 to C4.

Woodwinds

• Flute Solo (Sampled): A solo flute: airy, pure and agile. For light melodies and high countermelodies. Plays from C4 to C7.
• Oboe Solo (Sampled): A solo oboe: a nasal, plaintive reed, the instrument the whole orchestra tunes to. It carries an exposed melody beautifully. Plays from A#3 to D#6.
• Clarinet Solo (Sampled): A solo clarinet: smooth and woody, dark and hollow in its low notes and bright in its high ones. Plays from D3 to D6.
• Bassoon Solo (Sampled): A solo bassoon: a deep, characterful reed that can sound comic or gloomy. The bass of the woodwinds. Plays from A#1 to D5.
• Piccolo (Sampled): A piccolo: a flute an octave higher, piercing and bright. It adds sparkle at the very top of the orchestra. Plays from C5 to G7.

Brass

• Trumpet Solo (Sampled): A solo trumpet: brilliant, brassy and commanding. For fanfares and bright, exposed melodies. Plays from E3 to E6.
• French Horn Solo (Sampled): A solo French horn: warm, round and noble, halfway between brass and woodwind. Plays from E2 to E5.
• Tenor Trombone Solo (Sampled): A solo tenor trombone: a powerful, vocal brass voice that runs from a gentle hum to a roar. Plays from E2 to B4.
• Trumpets (Sampled): A trumpet section: a bright, blazing wall of brass, the heart of a fanfare. Plays from E3 to E6.
• French Horns (Sampled): A horn section: a warm, wide cushion of brass for sustained chords, the glue of orchestral harmony. Plays from E2 to F5.
• Trombones (Sampled): A trombone section: weighty and solemn, for dark chords and sheer power. Plays from E2 to F5.
• Tuba (Sampled): A tuba: the lowest of the brass, a big, round sound. The bass line of a brass band. Plays from E1 to D4.

Keys and bells

• Grand Piano (Sampled): A concert grand piano, the all-round keyboard: gentle when played softly, full and ringing when played hard. Plays from A0 to C8.
• Harpsichord (Sampled): A harpsichord: plucked strings with a bright, silvery, ringing tone. The sound of Baroque music. Plays from F1 to F6.
• Organ (Sampled): A pipe organ: a steady, powerful tone that holds for as long as the key is down. For full, church-like chords. Plays from C2 to G6.
• Celeste (Sampled): A celeste: a keyboard that strikes steel plates, giving a soft, glittering, bell-like tone. Lullabies and magic. Plays from C4 to C8.
• Glockenspiel (Sampled): A glockenspiel: small metal bars struck with hard mallets, bright and bell-like. High sparkles and music-box tunes. Plays from C3 to C6.

Percussion

• Timpani (Sampled): Timpani: tunable kettledrums. Play the root of the chord for a thunderous low roll or a single accent.
• Bass Drum and Snare (Sampled): An orchestral bass drum and a snare drum on different keys: marches, rolls and dramatic hits.
• Cymbals and Tam-tam (Sampled): Orchestral cymbals and a tam-tam (a large gong) on different keys: crashes, shimmering washes and the climax of a piece.
• Triangle (Sampled): A triangle: a tiny, silvery ping that rings on. A light accent.

Voices

• Mixed Chorus (Sampled): A choir of men and women singing together on a vowel: slow swells, hymn-like chords and big, wordless endings. Plays from G2 to C6.

Kit and harmonica

• Drum Kit (Sampled): A real rock drum kit (a Tama Superstar recorded in a room, the MuldjordKit by Lars Muldjord, CC BY 4.0), mixed from its overhead, close and room microphones. One instrument plays the whole kit by note, like a General MIDI drum track: 35 and 36 kick, 38 snare, 42 closed and 46 open hi-hat, 41, 45, 47 and 48 toms, 49 and 57 crash, 51 and 59 ride, 53 and 55 ride bell, 52 china. Hit harder for a louder, brighter sound.
• Harmonica (Sampled): A real blues harp, a Hohner Special 20 in C (Versilian Community Sample Library, CC0), from C3 to C6. Play it softly for a breathy tone and harder for a bright, edgy one. The recordings are five seconds long, so a held note dies away after that.