A Cinematic Violin Ensemble for Kontakt

This is a review of Wrongtools’ Jasmine, a cinematic violin ensemble for Kontakt, presented by Michael Oliva.

Jasmine is a beautifully recorded string sample library featuring 12 violinists, designed for film, game, and orchestral scoring. It aims to capture the delicate, creative, and unusual textures of a live string ensemble, offering lush, evolving articulations, dynamic movement, and multiple microphone positions. The library includes 62 patches, contains 2,680 samples, is 5.9 GB in size, and runs on the full version of Kontakt.

The library’s patches are organized into several categories. “Individual” patches offer a pre-made microphone mix with faders to control three different performance layers. “Multi-mics” patches provide individual control over all microphone positions (close, tree, hall, and flank) for each layer. Additionally, there are “Mutualism” and “Tainted” patches, which feature more heavily processed and experimental sound-designed textures.

The walkthrough explores various creative articulations, starting with “Chattering Legno,” a pretty, pointillistic, and textural sound. The samples are stretched, allowing them to be played far beyond the natural range of a violin, creating unique sound design possibilities even with the more traditional patches. Other articulations showcased include “Chattering Pizzicato,” “Chattering Ponticello Staccato,” and the character-rich “Chattering Short Tasto.”

These sounds are particularly well-suited for underscore, experimental cues, or for adding unique textures to indie music. They can be used alone or layered on top of more traditional string ensembles to add a touch of icing on the cake. The library offers creative effects like a built-in delay, a “Reverb Glide” that slides between notes, and an LFO that functions like a tremolo.

A key feature is the ability to layer different performance articulations and mix various microphone positions. For instance, you can assign the close mic to one layer, the hall mic to another, and the tree or flank mics to others, giving you deep control over the ensemble’s spatial character and texture. This is ideal for composers and mixers who need to shape the sound to fit a specific context, such as moving it out of the way of dialogue.

Beyond the standard articulations, Jasmine delves into experimental territory with its “Tainted” patches, which introduce an X/Y pad for real-time sound manipulation, similar to a chaos pad. These patches transform the 12 violinists into evocative, rain-like effects, deep drones, and other highly creative soundscapes.

For the demonstration composition, a full suite of Wrongtools libraries was used, including about eight instances of Jasmine, the Osmosis cello ensemble, the Nodal double bass quartet, and Fjordheim drums for accentuation.

In closing, the Wrongtools libraries, particularly Jasmine, are described as extremely fun and satisfying to compose with. They are excellent for both underscoring and serving as a main focal point in a piece. All the Wrongtools string products work together seamlessly, with special mention given to Nodal as possibly one of the best double bass sample libraries available.