Looking for steam organ (aka calliope) samples.

[loomchild]

Hi,

I am looking for Steam organ/steam piano samples. This instrument has been featured in circus music for ages.

It has a very peculiar sound. Somewhat half the way between an harmonium and a pipe organ.

I have been searching on google with no result. Does any of you own one?(I know it's rare but, who knows... ) or know about a librairy that would feature such sounds?

Thank you very much in advance.

[Meffy]

I _think_ SampleTank or maybe Sonik Synth has a calliope... not sure though. You might want to ask Squids over in the Sonic Reality support forum.

Or you could try the do-it-yourself approach: layer a harsh, loud, flute-type pipe organ voice with blasts of noise (with heavy, hard chiff) for "steam". Detuning individual notes would be a good idea, since these instruments travelled a lot and one suspects they rarely got proper servicing. Oh, and maybe a little low-pass filtering -- steam seems to muffle the sound somewhat -- and a bit of filter cutoff-freq flutter to imitate the slightly glitchy sound made by droplets of condensate getting into things.

Calliopes are hip. Good luck!

Meffy

[dougsyo]

If you can find a sample, you might ask Luisi over in the Dash forum, if it can be done with Peti.

I think this topic came up over in Instruments about six months ago or so, too.

Doug

[loomchild]

thank you both for your prompt replies.

Meffy: Very interesting suggestion. It might be the closer I could get.

Dougsyo:I have tried the Peti demo and found it a little too harsh(synthetic) sounding for what I was trying to achieve. I'm happily surprised to see that it can deliver a fairly convincing harmonium sound though. Yet again maybe a little too harsh. I'll try to give it another go.