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Classic analog strings
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cryophonik
Just curious to know what instruments are your favorite for getting that classic 80s/90s analog string sound. Software, hardware, synth, rompler, whatever. No specific reason, just wanna know.
Trancelover03591
I have a plugin that has a set of strings called 'mellotron'. They aren't completely mono but aren't very wide stereo. This near mono spectrum gives them a warm sound.

They have an aged sound to me overall.
Teezdalien
quote:
Originally posted by Trancelover03591
I have a plugin that has a set of strings called 'mellotron'. They aren't completely mono but aren't very wide stereo. This near mono spectrum gives them a warm sound.

They have an aged sound to me overall.


Do you know what a mellotron is?
Trancelover03591
i dont know alot about it
Teezdalien
Well the mellotron could be considered one of the first commercially available samplers in a sense, it was driven by tape loops though, and has quite a distinct sound although I'm not sure if you would say it sounds analog. The history behind it is quite interesting especially if you're interested in electronic instruments. They were notorious for breaking down though and causing major headaches for musicians and studio engineers using them mostly due to tape tangles. I'd love to own a real one myself, but it's rare as rocking horse to find one that works these days.
LoveHate
as far as software goes for classic strings, the korg legacy collection is pretty cool.
Raphie
DSI P08
tehlord
Apart from the obvious 'use an analogue synth' answer, I've always found Minimonsta best the kind of sound I think you're after. Something else I do to try and emulate that sound in software is a subtle hi shelf cut to remove that crispy digital sheen that analog synths don't produce, and also some very subtle pitch modulation to either the synth itself, or perhaps any reverb you have acting on the synth.
Raphie
ITB for me nearly any synth goed, Massive, DCAM, Retrologue
Trancelover03591
quote:
Originally posted by Teezdalien
Well the mellotron could be considered one of the first commercially available samplers in a sense, it was driven by tape loops though, and has quite a distinct sound although I'm not sure if you would say it sounds analog. The history behind it is quite interesting especially if you're interested in electronic instruments. They were notorious for breaking down though and causing major headaches for musicians and studio engineers using them mostly due to tape tangles. I'd love to own a real one myself, but it's rare as rocking horse to find one that works these days.


Well, I don't have any kind of a budget for analog right now but I do hope to one day get some analog synths. The digital plugin synth I am using is not anything special and has lots of other synths on it. I think the Mellotron has several options including strings. Incidentally, my favorite preset.

stewart.m
for the short time i used it nexus had some great sounding strings
EddieZilker
quote:
Originally posted by Trancelover03591
Well, I don't have any kind of a budget for analog right now but I do hope to one day get some analog synths. The digital plugin synth I am using is not anything special and has lots of other synths on it. I think the Mellotron has several options including strings. Incidentally, my favorite preset.


I'm not trying to be a dick but there is not much of a way to broach your ignorance without having to be a little blunt. You're kind of missing Teezdalien's point, here. In fact, you're missing a few of them.

The Mellotron can be heard in the beginning of the Beatle's "Strawberry Fields Forever." When Teezdalien said it is the first sampler, he is referring to the fact that the Mellotron is literally the first instrument that had the capacity to play back sound stored on tape. More accurately, the Mellotron may be referred to as a sample-playback device - since it couldn't actually sample and relied on engineers to record what would be played back on it, in a studio, for every single one of its keys. Even by the standards for early digital samplers, it was incredibly inefficient. It had a tape-head, over which a splice of tape would cross, for each and every key, and had no loop function, what-so-ever. Once the tape ran out, that was it. While, today, you have the ability to access sample libraries containing gigabytes worth of high-quality samples on your hard-drive with a couple of mouse-clicks, the Mellotron took a significant investment of time to trawl through a very limited variety of pre-recorded material for it.



In the loosest of definitions, the Mellotron would be considered "analogue." For the purposes of cryophonik's definition for "analogue strings," however, the Mellotron is completely divorced. It wouldn't be until polyphonic analogue synthesis came along that the sound of analogue strings (so named because the presets designated as such were intended to resemble violin strings) started being used in studios. One notable but ultimately cheesy example is heard in the beginning of Alphaville's "Forever Young."



Roland's Juno was one synth that was favored for its particular sound but there is a significant distinction, which you seem to be completely unaware of, regarding the Juno, Polymoog, and Prophet synthesizers responsible for the analogue string sound and the Mellotron. When you're telling Teezdalien that you don't have the budget for any kind of analogue synth, in the context of a side-discussion concerning an instrumental rarity (it's safe to say there are more Stradivarius Violins in circulation than Mellotrons), you seem to be blissfully unaware that, even if you were the winner of the latest Mega-Millions Jackpot, you still might not be able to afford a Mellotron.
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