VSL push out the boat with hall-recorded rock power drums and two top of the range grand pianos.

Vienna's Synchronhalle has had its ups and downs. Constructed in 1940 as a film studio scoring stage, it became a go-to classical recording facility during the 1960s, spawning legendary recordings by eminent artists such as Karl Böhm, Herbert von Karajan and Yehudi Menuhin. In later years it fell from grace and became dilapidated, but it was saved from demolition by a 2009 preservation order — ironically, this was mainly due to the hall's unique theatre organ, a multi-timbral mechanical marvel equipped with horses' hooves, bird calls, car horns, ocean waves and thunder sound effects (perfect fodder for your next ambient chill-out project).

In 2013 the Synchronhalle's fortunes took an upturn when the building was taken over by Vienna Symphonic Library, renowned for their vast database of orchestral samples. The company had been planning to expand for some years, and this acquisition provided a timely opportunity; according to VSL founder Herb Tucmandl, "We could not have built a building this size from scratch. We were lucky that it became available at the same time we were looking."

After two years of refurbishment, the site was transformed into a state‑of‑the‑art recording facility and re‑christened the Synchron Stage. Orchestral test recordings conducted with award-winning film music mixer Dennis Sands prompted the engineer to remark, "Truly a world class facility — certainly, one of the best rooms in the world." A rush of bookings followed, with Hans Zimmer's Remote Control Productions, Sony Pictures Entertainment and Netflix among the first clients, marking a return to the halcyon days of Vienna film scoring.

Hitherto, all Vienna orchestral libraries had been recorded in the Silent Stage, a purpose-built environment so effectively noise-proofed that even a helicopter hovering overhead failed to stir the VU meters. While this space is a great acoustic for capturing close-up instrumental clarity and detail, it lacks the flattering reverb 'wash' of a concert hall. With the Synchron Stage at their disposal, VSL could now produce their own hall‑recorded sample collections, joining the ranks of rival developers who had been taking a similar approach for years.

See the 'VSL Synchron Series' box below for an overview. In this review we'll take a listen to the three most recently released libraries, starting with a distinctly non-classical rock drum collection.

Synchron Power Drums

While it was obvious that VSL would use their new sound stage to create a fresh batch of orchestral libraries, no-one could have guessed they would also veer off into the world of heavy rock. For the Synchron Power Drums collection the company hired drummer Mario Lackner, veteran band member and professor at Vienna's University of Music & Performing Arts. Don't let the highfalutin' title put you off: this dude sports a no-nonsense beard, hits the drums hard and rocks out in a baseball cap, mercifully not emblazoned with the slogan 'Make Austria Great Again'.

The library comprises single hits, flams and rolls played with sticks (undamped and damped) and hotrods on three deep‑sampled classic drum kits: a 1975 Sonor Acryl Champion Vintage set, a 2017 Tama Star (Tama's current flagship) and a Tama Superstar set dating from 1972, widely spaced in the large Synchron Stage and sampled with up to 10 velocities and six alternations for each hit. 'In place' presets maintain the left-centre-right placement of the three kits in the hall, while 'centered' patches pan each kit into the centre of the room. The drums were recorded from 19 microphone positions, listed in the box below.

Synchron Power Drums ships with its own MIDI player and a great set of MIDI grooves in various time signatures which can be dragged into your sequencer. Each groove has a multi-kit version which assigns a different part to each kit. Since the Synchron Player holds only one kit at a time, you'll need three instances (set to MIDI channels 1, 2 and 3) to hear these multi-kit concoctions at work. The grooves feel great and are very well programmed, with an emphasis on thunderous, propulsive tom patterns.

A 'humanise delay' function lets you control the timing of each drum and cymbal, allowing you to add what VSL call "a little bit of that beautiful human inaccuracy" to the patterns. There are two schools of thought on this: some hail human timing variations as a valuable expressive asset, while others believe they should be ruthlessly eradicated. In the latter camp is my colleague Gavin Harrison, a member of the current three-drummer incarnation of '70s rockers King Crimson, whose views on so-called 'beautiful human inaccuracy' are unprintable. Personally, I feel such micro-timing issues are better handled manually, but this automated feature may occasionally be useful.

Bonham Lives

Having compared the principal samples of the three kits, I decided the Sonor is my favourite: I like its beefy snare and big, bouncy, weighty kick, and loved its clean, resonant, open-sounding and clearly pitched toms, which sound great across their dynamic range. That said, I can also see myself using the Tama Star's kick and both Tama kits' cymbals and hi-hats. Of course, these are purely subjective opinions based on personal taste!

Listening to the muscular, blasting, crunching and bollocking racket this library can produce, I felt the presence of Led Zeppelin's John Bonham.

Built-in effects include a five-band parametric EQ, convolution, plate and room reverbs, delay, chorus and a deeply psychedelic phaser. You can render the sound lo-fi with 18 different types of filter, massively squash it with a compressor, or use the brilliant saturation effect to distort it to the point of destruction. To help you get to grips with the effects and the 19-channel mixer, VSL created a useful set of presets ranging from basic room mixes to heavily processed stylings. In the latter category are the 'Doomed' and 'Bam' presets, which use parallel compression to crank up the energy levels. Listening to the muscular, blasting, crunching and bollocking racket this library can produce, I felt the presence of Led Zeppelin's John Bonham.

On a more subtle note, the mixer's 'Bleed' tab offers control of the amount of spill from each of the close mics onto other channels. This is explained in some detail in a video walkthrough, but there's no mention of it in the manual. Another useful feature is the sample mapping display, which shows the sound and playing style assigned to each key: an invaluable aid to programming. What's missing? Personally I'd have preferred mallet hits to hotrods, but that's just me. A more surprising omission is that although you can globally tune the kits a semitone up or down, there's no way of tuning individual drums. If you want to drastically detune a sample, you have to use pitch‑bend, which affects the entire kit.

Synchron Power Drums' standard library requires 76.7GB free hard drive space, while the full library needs 102.3GB.

Concert D‑274 Piano

Moving on to VSL's Synchron pianos, we come to one of the jewels in the company's crown: a magnificent Hamburg‑built Steinway D‑274 concert grand, hand picked from eight Steinway D models by Stefan Mendl, founding member of the Vienna Piano Trio. Acknowledged as one of the best makes in the world, the instrument was recorded simultaneously from 11 mic positions in the Synchron hall, adding a pleasing natural ambience to the piano's rich timbre.

The D‑274's specs are impressive: using a motion-controlled 'robot finger', VSL captured more than 100 velocities and release samples of different speeds, depending on the preceding note length. Soft (una corda), half-pedalling and re‑pedalling options are included. As a result, each mic position loads around 20,000 samples, which points to the need to run the Synchron piano libraries on an SSD drive. To cope with these demands, VSL developed a dedicated Synchron Pianos player with a built-in parametric EQ section and algorithmic reverb. Though there is no compelling reason to do so, you can apply individual EQ, volume, dynamic range and tuning settings to each note!

I enjoyed the big, expansive sound of this fine instrument; its combination of a balanced tone and distinct attack across its entire range make it highly playable, and it goes without saying that the ultra‑deep sampling recreates every nuance of the sound. While this piano's grand, stately and somewhat formal atmosphere evokes the world of classical music, there's no reason why you shouldn't use it for other popular styles.

Yamaha CFX Piano

If VSL's Concert D‑274 is the grandfather of the Synchron piano range, the baby would have to be the Yamaha CFX. This excellent 9-foot concert grand is fitted with Yamaha's computer-controlled Disklavier Inspire Pro reproducing system, which senses every movement, note-on velocity and release velocity of the 88 keys and pedals, including half-pedalling. The system also allows for accurate reproduction of playing techniques such as rapid note repetition and softly-played notes. Despite the automated playback, sampling sessions for the Yamaha CFX extended over several months and generated a huge amount of sample data.

Cutting to the chase, I found this piano to be strong and tonally well blended. Less obviously grandiose than the Steinway D‑274, it nevertheless works well for attacking rock riffs, with high velocities sounding agreeably forceful. While Yamaha pianos are known for their bright, clear, powerful and assertive tone, this model also has a very nice, delicate liquid response when played quietly, making it a good vehicle for reflective lyrical improvising. In that regard, the ability to fine-tune the velocity curve and MIDI response settings proved invaluable in calibrating the piano to my touch.

Listening to the individual mic channels, the Schoeps MK4 condenser mics used for the 'Close 1' position have (unsurprisingly) slightly more sparkle than the 'Close 2' Royer SF-24 ribbon mics — while 'Close 1' works well for pop, the more rounded, mellow, comparatively muted tone of the ribbon mics may appeal to those seeking a more traditional 'classical' piano sound. A good halfway house would be the soft‑pedal samples, which have a lighter, very pleasant tone.

Vienna Pianos Comparison

As with Synchron Power Drums, VSL provide presets which demonstrate the tonal possibilities of their two pianos, ranging from intimate close perspectives for ballads to spacious, ambient mixes for film scores and soaring piano melodies. The bright-sounding 'Pop' preset is optimised for songwriters and live band performances, while 'Player' (my favourite) gives you the direct, authentic wide‑stereo sound of the pianos with a healthy helping of hall acoustic and a dash of additional reverb.

Choosing the right sampled piano for your music is rarely a simple matter, and depends very much on personal taste. No two products are the same: the make and condition of the piano, recording techniques and room sound will make an enormous difference. To help narrow the choice, VSL have supplied useful comparisons of their six Synchron Piano presets on their respective product pages' 'Presets' tab. You can also hear the affable classical pianist Stefan Mendl putting all the Vienna pianos (including the older Bosendorfer 290 Imperial) through their paces in the Synchron Stage at VSL's Concert Grand Comparison on YouTube.

Overview & Conclusion

Synchron Power Drums runs exclusively on VSL's Synchron Player, while Concert D‑274 and Yamaha CFX require the dedicated Synchron Pianos Player — the player software is provided free when you buy a library. Unlike VSL's older Vienna Instruments player, the Synchron players have no stand-alone version: most users will install them as a plug-in inside their DAW, but it is also possible to run them on your desktop in an AU/VST/AAX host, for which the excellent Vienna Ensemble Pro comes highly recommended.

VSL's website lists identical system requirements for the three libraries, the main caveat being that you need a 64-bit operating system (older 32-bit systems are not supported) and a solid‑state drive (SSD), along with a minimum of 8GB of RAM. Each library has a standard and full version. There's no difference in musical content; the full version simply offers extra ambient mic positions, which will be particularly useful for surround mixing. However, the essential sound of the instruments and hall is fully represented in the standard versions. To save disk space, individual microphone data can be removed after installation.

VSL say their total sample count now exceeds three million. I haven't counted them recently so shall have to take their word for it, but from what I've heard so far it's clear that the creative impetus and multiple mic position opportunities provided by the Synchron Stage hall look set to engender a few million more. In the meantime, I can heartily recommend these excellent, versatile drum and piano libraries for many styles of music.