Enigma - Sadeness type choir vocals

[TSV]

Hello again,

I tried to search for this but found nothing. I guess the vocals in Engima's song Sadeness are called choir vocals? I was wondering if there's a rather small sample library for choir vocals like this. I'm not looking for choir humming.

The song starts with these type of vocals


Thanks.

[Armadillo]

Sadeness uses a Gregorian choir - monk stylee.

Symphony of voices from Spectrasonics has that.
http://www.spectrasonics.net/libraries/ ... _sonic.php

[BertKoor]

Standard choir sample patches often consist only Aaahs and Oooohs. You're looking for actual chanting, which is quite different.

Two things I can think of.

1) the easy way: http://www.google.com/search?q=samples+gregorian
2) the hard way:
* come up with some fake Latin lyrics and fake Gregorian chant melody
* get like ten friends together
* practice singing for half an hour or so
* record the lot

[zircon]

SoV has chanting.

[music-tech]

From what I've read (which doesn't necessarily mean it is true), the Gregorian Chants from the first Enigma CD were all from the Spectrasonics product. Enigma made a big hit with using those sounds, but didn't give them credit.

So, if you want those exact sounds, buy the Spectrasonics product.

[jackson]

From what I've read (which doesn't necessarily mean it is true), the Gregorian Chants from the first Enigma CD were all from the Spectrasonics product. Enigma made a big hit with using those sounds, but didn't give them credit.

So, if you want those exact sounds, buy the Spectrasonics product.

Spectrasonics is over 17 years old? And if so, why would Enigma have to give them credit, it's a sample CD - you don't have to give credit for that

[xander]

2) the hard way:
* come up with some fake Latin lyrics and fake Gregorian chant melody
* get like ten friends together
* practice singing for half an hour or so
* record the lot

..

Actually, it's the FUN way and really pays off if you do it right (assuming you have the gear).

Am I being serious? Yes

Try this:

Put five friends in a big empty room or in your church or local gym. Grab yer cheap stereo cassette recorder and punch 'record'.

Get them to do this and that kinda humming and oohing and awwing and maybe grab a Latin Prayer Book from your local Greek Orthodox Church and get them all to do a few verses and so on.

And there ya go!

LAter, take the tape, plug it into an old 2-spring Stromberg Carlson reverb (ripped out of some old console stereo in the junk shop), record and edit with the free Audacity editor, and burn it to CD ROM and sell it to all your buddies. This is EXACTLY how the big boys do it - trust me

[BertKoor]

Well, apparently the guy behind Enigma used an existing record of Gregorian chants:

In 1994, Polydor Germany sued Cretu and Virgin Germany for infringing on its "right of personality" in the samples used in "Sadeness (Part I)" and "Mea Culpa". The lawsuit was settled out of court after Cretu agreed to pay compensation to the original creator of the samples.

A more detailed source confirms he ripped the choirs from a record of the Kapelle Antiqua made in the late seventies:
http://www.five.no/enigma/articles/Billboard0991.html

So SpectraSonic has NOTHING to do with it (they may wish so, or may have spread urban myths...) and their sampling library doesn't include complete chants. Listen to Enigma. That's a real complete choir performance, not edited snippets.

[xander]

Actually -- your Google tip was the best -- that shite is all over the net

[stayne]

I have an album of monks doing Gregorian chant. Found it in a thrift store. It's mesmerizing.

[music-tech]

Cool info on that song... I never googled it or looked into it more deeply. I had just read the spectrasonics thing, and has seen it in several places on the net. Just goes to show how easy it is to spread myths like that around on the net.

Anyway, I like the idea of making up your own and getting a group of friends to sing it with you. Even if you don't have a large space, just get everyone far enough away from the microphone to pick up everyone in a relatively balanced fashion, and add some nice cathedral type reverb later.

Now days, you could grab one of those relatively cheap portable handheld digital recorders, like the Zoom or the new Korg, and take it to some local churches and get some good recordings. Find out when the church choir practices and ask them if you can record them and use some samples for your music (as long as they are doing old hymns and stuff that isn't still under copyright protection). Try to find a church choir that is doing some old latin songs or something else interesting like that.

[music-tech]

Also, in the Spectrasonics copyright/license info:
http://www.spectrasonics.net/companyinfo/copyright.php
There is a line near the bottom that says "some CD-ROM sample libraries require a specific crediting in the liner notes of the music release".

The RUMOR I had read, somewhere a long time ago, was that this was because some big hit was made using lots of samples from one of their libraries, and they didn't get credit for it, and so they started putting that in their license agreement that they needed to get credit for music releases using their samples. This rumor is probably what then lead to the Enigma rumor as people started to guess that maybe it was those Gregorian chants from the Symphony Of Voices product.

But, I can't say if any of that is true or not... it's all just a rumor... and someone else already pointed out one part of it is certainly not true.

But, this is good publicity for Spectrasonics and I can definitely vouch for the quality of their libraries and VST instruments! I have Vocal Planet, which has some cool stuff in it that I've used on my own projects. As with anything, you always need to read the license agreements of any sample libraries you buy as they all are a bit different and have different use restrictions or requirements. Many older loop products don't allow you to use those loops in music for production music libraries, for example.

However, in general, if you aren't going to record the parts yourself, then it's best to get them from a sample library or VST instrument where you know that you are free and clear to use them, as long as you adhere to the license requirements. Lifting stuff from a record is never a good idea without getting it cleared first.

[satYatunes]

Cretu also ripped the samples of an Asian Artist's song for "Return to innocence". That guy also sued him and he settled it out of court. Anyway, to answer the actual question...
Spectrasonics SoV has a few samples of Gregorian Choir. Check out BigFishAudio sample cds. I believe they have a couple of CDs out with Gregorian Choirs.

[TSV]

thanks guys. It seems once again spectrasonics it is. I wish I didnt need to buy the whole 5 cd package but just the cd I need.