Handcrafted Mallets

THE TOOLKIT FOR THE MODERN PRODUCER

{See video at top of page}

The Handcrafted Mallets is so much more than a mallet library: With two instruments sampled in numerous articulations, different mallet materials and at an incredible depth, as well as a synth featuring 600+ presets, it forms a full toolkit with an extremely broad palette of sounds.

The instruments offer hyper-realistic and multi-dimensional control over the sound that cannot be found anywhere else: The timbre slider lets you fluidly move between nearly infinite grades of mallet hardness, going from soft to hard.

Similarly, the spatial slider positions the instrument inside the room with extreme precision, offering all colours imaginable, ranging from dry and intimate solo performances, to lush orchestral settings, up to nearly surreal far-away positions.

Unlike many other sample libraries, the vibraphone features an elaborate sustain pedal system, as well as a tremolo motor, meticulously designed based on the original instrument, modulating the volume, pitch, spatial position and spectral properties.

The synth, created entirely from the original mallet recordings, can produce nearly any sound one could possibly think of, beautifully complementing the acoustic patches.

With immense flexibility and a multitude of different sounds, The Handcrafted Mallets can be used throughout all genres and shines both as modern tool for electronic music and modern film scoring, as well as a more traditional definitive selection of mallet instruments.

Designed to Inspire

Like the Handcrafted Piano, the Handcrafted Mallets are built to respond the way physical instruments do, letting you achieve a vividness and depth rarely found in digital products. The capability to inspire, as if you were playing an analogue instrument, makes it a must-have toolkit for any composer and producer.

A single note is enough to fill an entire cinema or concert hall.

Hyper-Realistic Expression and Spatial Control

The marimba and vibraphone were sampled with extraordinary attention to detail. The instruments have a combined total of almost 30,000 samples, three microphone positions and two pre-rendered outboard reverbs. Unlike most other sample instruments that use a strictly rigid velocity mapping, here the velocities are flexible for each pitch, with the velocity range of each sample based on the loudness of the original sampling performance. This adds a significant amount of additional depth.

The sound of the instruments can be shaped precisely by using the two main sliders:

The timbre slider, the equivalent to the felt slider in the Handcrafted Piano, allows fluid movement between soft and hard mallets and almost infinite grades in between. The distance slider controls the instruments' spatial position with extreme precision - you can physically feel the instrument moving closer and further away. The range goes from dry and intimate solo performances, to lush orchestral settings, up to nearly surreal far-away positions.

The vibraphone additionally features a true pedal system that imitates the natural behaviour of the physical instrument. It also comes with an elaborate motor recreation that modulates not only volume, but also pitch, spectral movement and spatial perception and can be controlled via a speed and a depth slider.

To complete the acoustic palette, the marimba also features a muted patch, and the vibraphone features a muted patch, a bowed patch, and a patch performed with sticks.

A Unique Approach to Synth Design

At the heart of the library is a synthesiser built entirely from the original mallet recordings. The marimba and vibraphone samples, already mixed through analogue outboard gear, were reprocessed into more abstract sounds and exported into over 200 sound sources. These sound sources are then used in an oscillator-like fashion, with further modulations inside the Kontakt instrument itself, yielding over 500 available presets with pretty much any sound you can possibly think of, including pads, leads, plucks, basses, and even sound design and percussion.

This workflow ensures that the synthesiser keeps the physical integrity of the original instruments, paired with the colour of many legendary vintage audio hardware pieces such as the Fairman Tube Master EQ, the DW Fearn VT-7 compressor, the Rockrüpel Comp.one compressor, and the Lexicon 960, Bricasti M7 and Quantec Yardstick reverbs.

This chain of detailed sampling, analogue processing and inventive reprocessing makes the sound of the Handcrafted Mallets entirely unique, with no remotely comparable product on the market.

Arpeggiator and Sequencer: Endless Options and Flexible Tempo Shapes

Another highlight is the built-in arpeggiator and sequencer. The smart randomisation buttons allow you to quickly create any sort of arpeggio, velocity, pitch or panning shapes. While these patterns are generated randomly, they are done so in a smart and musical manner, ensuring that each click creates a completely unique yet inspiring sequence. This means that instead of wasting time painstakingly programming each step, you instantly get to explore endless creativity.

The arpeggiator and sequencer also include another unique feature: flexible tempo. When enabled, it can be used to easily perform incredibly complex rhythms and rubato performances that break out from a rigid grid system and add an idiomatic feeling. This can also be used in more intricate ways, for example, to achieve granular synthesis.

Learn more about Handcrafted Mallets here.