Sample Libraries

Heavyocity’s latest contender delivers a winning one-two combination.

Audio files to accompany the reviews.

As any parent with very young children knows, toys can be very noisy things, in a crude, lo-fi kind of a way. Toys In...

Modern House Beats is a slightly different take on the usual downloadable sample packs I'm asked to review, as it is as...

Clavinets are a bit like Marmite. We love to own them, to play them, and to listen to them, but we hate storing them and...

Toontrack seem to be going through a bit of a metal phase at the moment with their latest EZ Drummer expansion kit being...

Audio files to accompany the article.

Drumasonic's reasonably priced drum instrument proves that luxury does sometimes come cheap.

Over the last few years, Kong Audio have built up an impressive collection of sampled traditional Chinese instruments, which covers strings, woodwind, drums and percussion.

Audio files to accompany the article.

Anyone who has used one of Native Instruments' Abbey Road drum instruments will be aware that they are a mixture of old and...

For some listeners the cool, drifty, slightly detached sound of the vibraphone will forever be associated with great jazz...

Sonokinetic's latest orchestral venture features a flexible collection of tempo-sync'ed section phrases.

Rock Classics is a further release in Ueberschall's Elastik-based loop library series.

The recorder is an odd instrument: most of us have played it, yet it rarely appears in sample libraries. VSL have set out to remedy that by sampling four instruments of the recorder family.

The main body of the library is made up of 945 files, available in both Acidized WAV and Apple Loops formats.

The Streetly Tapes series of expansion packs for Gforce's M-Tron Pro aim to get as close as possible to an authentic Mellotron experience.

Founded in 1988, Doug Rogers’ EASTWEST company pioneered the creation of realistic, playable sample-based instruments — 25 years on they remain the undisputed market leader.

The Native Instruments Abbey Road Drummer series must be close to completion. Previously we have had Vintage, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s and Modern Drummer, and now NI have slipped 50s Drummer into the decade-sized gap.

Available as a downloadable product, in WAV, Apple Loop and Kontakt versions.

Ueberschall's Elastik-based library series now runs to dozens of titles and Bass Saxophone is one of the latest additions and features 140 samples.