We are pleased to be able to collaborate with Native Instruments to produce this Kontakt 3 Player version of our Balinese Gamelan instruments. This instrument does not require a full version of kontakt, or any other sampler, to run - it is self contained in the free Kontakt Player which can be downloaded from the NI website.
Sampling the unique, magical sound of a Balinese Gamelan is no small undertaking. The 25 instruments that make up The LSO's Semara Dana Gamelan Ensemble had to be recorded in great detail, as if each were to be a sample library in its own right. Any compromise in the number of velocity layers or the round robin alternate samples could result in the whole living, breathing sound losing realism and dynamic expression.
How do you condense such a massive collection as a gamelan into an easy-to-use, downloadable sampled instrument? We scratched our heads over this one for a while, and decided to condense the essential gamelan sound into 3 plug-and-play sets.
This means that you get all the tuned instruments ( reduced versions ) - the big gongs, the wonderful paired metallophones and the kettle gongs, combined and arranged across a chromatic keyboard, ready to play.Â
What you DON'T get is the percussion - the kendang drums, cengceng, kempli, kajar, bebende, gentorak.
This set still weighs in at 2 GB, and is ideal for anyone that wants the essence of gamelan, the magical flavour - without breaking the bank or the hard drive.
Instruments Included in Balinese Gamelan Discovery :
BALINESE GAMELAN perfectly utilizes the flexibility provided by the free KONTAKT PLAYER and KONTAKT. Switch between two different pitch versions - "Original", for classic Balinese gamelan tuning, and "Concert" for a more western-friendly tuning, enabling the easy layering of Gamelan instruments with western sounds. An optional "synth" version opens up the potential to tweak various parameters within the instruments, so as to manipulate the instruments beyond their natural sound. The Jammer function works like an arpeggiator creating rhythmic arpeggio patterns easily manipulated using the parameter controls, while also included is a function for simple control over volume and panning for the two detuned elements of the Gangsa or the Core instruments.
Compatible with Free Kontakt Player and full version of Kontakt 3/4