Chris Hein 5-string Solo Contra Bass released today

[mhschmieder]

I bought it on pre-sale so will download it tonight.

http://www.chrishein.net/web/CH-Solo_Contrabass.html

I had forgotten that it's a 5-string! This is quite important to me.

Although some of my other bass libraries are nice and provide variety, I still exclusively use VSL because theirs goes down below the "E" and others don't. I usually at least need to get to "D", and most players use a hip-shot.

This product completes Chris Hein's solo strings series.

I forget whether the Solo Violin has two variants for String Quartet use or not.

[mhschmieder]

Just to be clear, this is an orchestral bass.

Chris has a much older product for jazz and rock bass (both upright, in three formats for gut, nylon, and rope strings if I recall correctly, and bass guitar).

I never bought that one as I didn't care for the Guitars product and also didn't like the demos for the Bass library. But he's learned a lot over the years (and hopefully will update those products at some point), and all of his orchestral offerings are in the top tier (the jazz horns are good too, but quite expensive).

[mhschmieder]

OTOH, like the Solo Violin and Solo Viola, the new Solo Contra Bass is designed to be flexible and applicable to genres such as jazz and Gypsy, so it will probably be worth trying this out this week on works where VSL has been in play.

If it's better, I'll be thrilled, because the VSL Upright is a bit wolfy and hard to mix and cut through, even though it is by far the best recorded of my dozen or more upright bass libraries.

[David Polich]

I can't think of another solo contrabass library outside of VSL. This is great news.

[mhschmieder]

The folks at vi-control keep raving about the one from Premier Sound Factory, which traps me into visiting that site over and over again and coming away with the same nasty impression each time.

No continuity of phrasing, and what to me sound like weird miking choices, or maybe the player wasn't the best. But it's interesting to note that none of its proponents own the VSL Upright Bass.

Straight Ahead Samples also has one, which I bought along with their jazz drums (but not their horns), and haven't had time to figure out how to use properly as it keeps asserting loops/phrases.

There are indeed a few others, but most of them are old by now and not at the same level. Orange Tree Samples Pear Bass is the most flexible due to covering so many genres, including Jump Swing, and Country (both tend to use narrow-neck uprights with high action), but needs an upgrade.

Sound-wise, the best ones I have found are the German and Chinese uprights from Acousticsamples, but neither has the reach of VSL or the articulation control. Nice timbre for both. I forget their names; they are similar. But one is a Chinese plywood and the other a German spruce.

[mhschmieder]

I immediately threw the most challenging piece at this library tonight rather than pussyfooting around, and it failed on that piece, which is good because this forces me to read the manual and learn whether it's capable of doing what I need or not.

The timbre is gorgeous, and it really sounds like a quality instrument, big sound, yet not too close-miked like some. So there is a feeling that it's "in the room" without being reverby or echoey. The timbre blends very well with other instruments and the articulations cut through -- better than VSL.

Here's the nasty thing I did to it though: I tried to use it on a gypsy swing piece I wrote back in the 80's, with double-dotted rhythms and repeated notes on the pickups (though there are sufficient gaps).

What I need to find out is whether there is a selectable Round Robin feature, or other settings that would keep it from getting tripped up on the fast pickup notes.

As for VSL, I did articulation-splitting a few months ago so would have to do that over again for Chris Hein's library -- although mostly it would just require reassigning the key switches as both libraries have a gazillion articulations available. Throwing it all-pizzicato should at least not trip up on the gypsy swing rhythms though, even if the sustained notes don't sustain enough.

Overall though, for a quick first use, I already got way better results out of the library than any other upright bass library than VSL, and I have over a dozen of them at this point.

I haven't even tried this yet for arco, but due to its timbre I am excited because I've always had trouble getting a palatable tone from VSL's orchestral bass -- some say the Austrian players take a very different approach, and that wouldn't surprise me as I've generally preferred Berlin and London to Vienna when it comes to symphonic bass sounds. It's kind of a wolfy tone overall, in VSL's Bass.

The VSL Upright Bass is a different library, as it was part of the Jazz Set. Different player from what I recall, and likely a different bass was used as well than what was used for the Orchestral Bass.

Getting back to the new Chris Hein Contrabass Solo library though, this is far and away the best timbre and most realistic sound of any upright bass library so far, to my ears. It's the sound I've been striving for all along, so I am motivated to study it and see if I can work with it for jazz as well as orchestral work.

Oh, and I haven't even gone down to the low fifth string yet to give that a run!