Need Help With Basic Latin Music Track

[wagtunes]

I'm doing a basic Latin music track. I have the percussion covered as there are more than enough Latin percussion libraries around. I'll be using the one that came with Kontakt.

I've been listening to some Latin based tracks on Youtube trying to get a feel for what kind of instrumental arrangements make up a typical Latin track. Without liner notes, I have to rely solely on my ears. From what I can make out, these are the main instruments that I hear in these tracks beside the percussion.

Bass (Sounds like a Jazz upright)
Guitar (Spanish Acoustic?)
Trumpet
Some kind of mallet based instrument
Piano

That's about it. Anything you folks can add to that and any decent quality libraries covering these things?

I'm going for traditional, 60s, 70s on this.

[funky lime]

It depends. "Latin" is not a genre.

Wikipedia

Got any examples of what you're going for?

Something common to a number of latin genres is the use of rather esoteric percussion, though it is going to vary among countries/styles/eras.

[wagtunes]

It depends. "Latin" is not a genre.

Wikipedia

Got any examples of what you're going for?

Something common to a number of latin genres is the use of rather esoteric percussion, though it is going to vary among countries/styles/eras.

The percussion I've got covered. I just need some guidelines for what "tuned" instruments they use other than the ones I've listed. Unless that's really all there is to it. The arrangements I've been hearing certainly don't use synths or Hammond B3s or heavy guitar distortion. I'm just looking for a basic guideline.

But if you need something specific, Anything off this list.

https://www.billboard.com/articles/colu ... f-all-time

[DSmolken]

Lots of genres and whatever, but some things will be repeatedly useful. 60s-70s narrows it down a lot.

For percussion, the Pulpo Audio stuff is very nice for free. Congas have enough articulations to sequence the patterns from the back of my Latin jazz fakebook.

Bass will usually be an electric bass guitar, sometimes double bass. Some specific styles use other stuff like salsa traditionally using an Ampeg Baby Bass (probably never sampled in depth anyway), but really, Fender P or J is what you can use for the most part. 5-string basses hadn't been invented yet, but if you're going for a "60s-70s music played in 2019" sound, then you can use one.

Trumpets are good, and three trumpets that can do falls and other such ensemble articulations will cover a lot of ground. Sometimes you can use more horns, up to full big band size sometimes, but multiple trumpets are very useful, especially for a more Cuban-influenced sound.

Guitar would be nylon string or various electrics. Steel string acoustic is all over modern tracks, but if you're going 60s-70s then you won't need it often.

For mallets, marimba I guess might be the most common?

And for drums, any typical 60s Ludwig/Slingerland/Gretsch kit should be right. Not sure if you want to actually use a 60s mic setup, and by the 70s, we had modern drum multitracking with a close mic on every tom anyway.

And strings. Small-ensemble, studio-recorded strings.

[wagtunes]

Lots of genres and whatever, but some things will be repeatedly useful. 60s-70s narrows it down a lot.

For percussion, the Pulpo Audio stuff is very nice for free. Congas have enough articulations to sequence the patterns from the back of my Latin jazz fakebook.

Bass will usually be an electric bass guitar, sometimes double bass. Some specific styles use other stuff like salsa traditionally using an Ampeg Baby Bass (probably never sampled in depth anyway), but really, Fender P or J is what you can use for the most part. 5-string basses hadn't been invented yet, but if you're going for a "60s-70s music played in 2019" sound, then you can use one.

Trumpets are good, and three trumpets that can do falls and other such ensemble articulations will cover a lot of ground. Sometimes you can use more horns, up to full big band size sometimes, but multiple trumpets are very useful, especially for a more Cuban-influenced sound.

Guitar would be nylon string or various electrics. Steel string acoustic is all over modern tracks, but if you're going 60s-70s then you won't need it often.

For mallets, marimba I guess might be the most common?

And for drums, any typical 60s Ludwig/Slingerland/Gretsch kit should be right. Not sure if you want to actually use a 60s mic setup, and by the 70s, we had modern drum multitracking with a close mic on every tom anyway.

And strings. Small-ensemble, studio-recorded strings.

Thank you. This is what I was looking for. Very helpful. What I'm noticing is what you didn't include so I'll be sure to stay away from that when doing this track.

Thanks again for your help.

[DSmolken]

Well, I didn't include piano from your list, but that will get used especially in jazzier stuff, usually a bright grand. That was more of a "nothing interesting or special to say about piano" thing.

I did leave out style-specific Brazilian or Mexican instruments. Like, you don't need samba instruments for anything else.