I hadn't come across Syncrosoft before now - although Arturia now use this German copy protection system for all their other software, too. The real process of installation consists of loading the Brass software, plus a management program for the Syncrosoft dongle which in turn then enables you to activate the Brass licence. In fact, there was nothing extra to be found at the time of writing, though no doubt this will change as the product develops and the user base grows. Aside from the fact you then become eligible for technical support, Arturia encourage registration with the promise that you will find further patches and other goodies to download. This number is not actually essential to install or run the program, but it is required to register on the Arturia web site as a proud owner of Brass. Opening the Brass package reveals a single, cross-platform installation CD-ROM, a multi-lingual user guide which also contains background information on how the three instruments are played and the principles of arranging for brass, a USB dongle and a swanky-looking plastic card bearing a serial number. But as you never quite know just how much earth, wind and fire goes into tweaking product demos, I was looking forward to giving these horns a blast in the comfort of my own studio. Particularly as the impressive audio demos on the Arturia web site ( indicated that the company were not just blowing a load of hot air. So it was with great anticipation that I listened for the postie's tread on my front path as he brought me Brass in its box. At this point, it's worth mentioning that the creation of Brass would have been impossible without several years of heavyweight academic research undertaken by IRCAM, the Paris-based institution which uniquely marries the science of sound with the art of music (see the box at the end of this article for more on this). As you can imagine, just analysing the physics in any meaningful way is quite an achievement, let alone number-crunching the results into a piece of mass-market software designed to be used by any Tom, Dick or Harriet with a computer and a MIDI lead. Trumpets, saxophones and trombones are acoustically complicated anyway, but there are also the infinite variations introduced by whatever human being happens to be attached to the mouthpiece. That's quite a statement, and before we lift the lid on the reality of Brass, I have to point out that even attempting a program like this is a very ambitious undertaking. I quote: ' Brass is so dynamic and easy to use that you will never go back to flat sampled riff libraries ever again.' But before you go thinking maybe this is just a bunch of clever multisamples, check out Arturia's marketing material, which claims that the instruments can be played with the same control, flexibility, and expressivity that you'd expect from a professional brass player, but 'without the years of training'. Their new program is (not unreasonably) called Brass, and it offers a trio of instruments - trumpet, saxophone and a trombone - created entirely in software. But their latest release sees them attempting to boldly go where they, and I am pretty sure no other software company, has virtually gone before - to put the expressive power of real brass instruments at the fingertips of the MIDI keyboard player. Where There's Brass.įrench company Arturia are already well established in this brave new world with products such as ARP2600V, CS80V, Minimoog V and Moog Modular V - all 'V is for Virtual' renditions of famous-name synths. We're currently awash in software that purports to model the characteristics of classic synths, legendary guitar amps and even famous empty spaces to give us the characteristic sound of the original object without its encumbering physicality. Just as brown is the new black (or is it red that's the new blue?), virtual has become the new reality for the hi-tech musician. But whatever happened to the idea of modelling instruments using synthesis techniques? Arturia haven't forgotten. Manufacturers have sought to provide expressive computer-based simulations of real instruments by releasing ever larger and more detailed sample libraries. Below the cute trombone graphic, a series of bar-graph meters show the status of the performance parameters. Brass's elegant interface allows selection of all functions from within a single panel.
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