[Review] 'Completing' the SoundIron vocal suite

Hi gang!

Disclaimer: Several images in this post are the intellectual property of SoundIron (website here); a company which is specialized in creating sample based instruments. They also provide sample libraries for use with Kontakt, which is how they ended up in this post. But credit where credits due.

Isn't this just beautiful?​

Editorial

You know what's so awesome about working with (digital) audio? When done right you can actually trigger emotions with your work and that has always fascinated me a bit, especially because I don't consider myself a musician (more of a sound engineer). And of course, what better "trigger" than human voices?

Ever since I re-kindled my passion for sound (by upgrading all my gear to the current trends) I also discovered voice synths. The very first was "Humana", an instrument within Reason (= a DAW) and which was developed by.... SoundIron. Wanting to know more I started exploring the web and eventually discovered (and bought) Vocaloid; a sound synthesizer developed by Yamaha. While this is an awesome piece of work the main emphasis lies on Asian based languages where English is also supported but.. there is a steep (but very satisfying) learning curve and then we have the issue of things still sounding a bit artificial. After making sure that this is what I wanted to dive into I also added Melodyne & VocalSynth to my library and that made quite a difference. But still...

SoundIron Vocal suite

And then Native Instruments introduced us to the SoundIron vocal suite; a collection of sample based ("Kontakt") instruments with an obvious emphasis on vocal usage. I was sold! The awesomeness here comes from the fact that while these instruments are obviously sample based they still provide you with a lot of control over the voices. When looking at Requim Light for example you have the obvious "chorus ensemble", so basically a group of men and/or women who sing notes together, but you can also apply variations. A solo soprano or tenor for example, or (one of my favorites): getting people to recite specific vowels or (Latin) phrases.

My attention also got quickly caught by what seemed to be a series of some sort: "Voices of..."; the NI bundle contains "Voices of Wind: Adey", "Voices of Gaia" and "Voices of Rapture". Could there be more?!

Well....

Voices of RAGE!

(product page here)​

This instrument is not for the faint of heart. Meet Aaron, Evan, Jason (all male) and Mixi (female) as they scream, shout and cry out loud in a nice variety of (obviously) angered (or twisted) voices. Seriously, if you ever wanted to start a virtual death metal band then this might be a good starting point

The male voices shout / scream a large variety of phrases where there's "a bit" of an anxiety underneath. From "YOU BETCHA, AAAARRRGGGHHH" to shouts I can only describe as angered (battle?) cries and of course my favorite: "WELL SAID, YAAAARRGGGHHHH" (was he pleased or is he about to chop me up with an axe of some sort? ).

Although every voice has a specific selection of phrase types some re-occurring ones are "Death", "Scream", "Spoken" and "Singing". Though there are exceptions.. "Jason" for example only has a selection of phrases, vocal effects and...

Wordmaster

All voices have a "wordmaster" section where every key on your keyboard will make them say something. Words like "His", "Fear", "Night", "Lick", "I", "Flesh", "Must", "Grave" and so on... Yes, you can make some really interesting and/or quite obscene sentences with this (I'll spare you the details ).

If you need angered voices, if you need battle cries, if you need a sense of an angered atmospheric background ("soundpad") then this is the instrument to get. But I have to warn you once again: this isn't for the faint of heart, get ready for some harsh vocal brutality.

Voices of Wind: Kimba

(product page here)​

Not only does it turn out that there is a "Voice of..." collection of some sort, there's even a series "within" the series, as you can see here. "Voices of Wind" is a series of 3 Kontakt instruments which provide a nice variety of female (solo) voices which say or sing specific vowels or verbs. The classic "Ah, Ee, Eh, Mm, Oh, Oo" (in different articulations) but also whole phrases in a bright or dark atmosphere (as well as humming).

It's actually quite simple to "chain" some of these phrases in a song of some sort. You won't really hear what they're saying or singing because the custom phrases are mostly phonetic, but still... it can make for an awesome voiced background nonetheless. The main trick here is to get a good overview of all fo the phrases so that you'll know what to use together.

And to add a bit of perfection nearly all instrument types also provide a "breath" section which allows you to add bit more realism to your material. But of course.. only if you really need or want it.

Voices of Wind: Audrey

(product page here; and I still think that's one heck of a logo! )

As mentioned above the 'Voices of Wind' is a series of instruments which provide you with female (solo) voices to use in your work. As such the main difference here between 'Kimba' and 'Audrey' is obviously the female voico which is being used. As before we have the same articulations being sung / used (Aa, Ah, Mm, etc.) within the styles of Legato, Staccatto and Sustained. There's also a phrases section again which provide bright. dark or humming phrases as well as a custom section.

But this is also where the similarities end. SoundIron didn't merely sell us the same instrument with a different voice, no way, they also made sure to provide phrases and such which truly match that particular type of voice. For example: 'Audrey' has a (somewhat) lower sounding voice than Kimba (which, in my opinion, is actually somewhat noticeable by looking at the artwork). Therefor you'll find certain custom FX sections here which have (some) overlap ("Heartfelt" vs. "Heartfelt MW") as well as sections which vaguely resemble the other. Audrey's "Robots MW" for example uses the same vowels and roughly the same ways of expression as in Kimba's "Eethereal Delay", however.. that's also where the similarities immediately end because they most definitely do not sound the same.

So these two new instruments don't give you "more of the same", instead they add more variety and more phrases using two more female voices and it really complements this series quite well. But, at the same time it also raised my satisfaction with the SoundIron vocal suite as a whole because it's truly a really good selection of what SoundIron has to offer.

You're certainly not missing out without the instruments in my current review, but having said that they do add some really impressive material.

Olympus Choir Elements

(product page here)​

This instrument is actually a smaller ("elementary" ) version of SoundIron's Symphonic Choir which is the "full" instrument (and has a pretty hefty pricetag attached). In my opinion this instrument is perfect if you don't need the full detailed scale of a chorus but instead can settle for the important parts. And if this is still a bit too much then SoundIron also provides a Choir Micro.

But don't let that earlier "smaller" comment give you any wrong ideas here, there's nothing "small" or "simple" about this one!



There are 'Ambiences' which can provide some really good atmospheric background, you have choral effects which as just that.. need a group of women to shout "ah, eh, i" or "o"? This one has you covered. From 'risers' to cheering to whispering, you'll find it all in here.

Marcato, phrase master, staccato's.. all different ways in which you can utilize a choir of males, females or a combination thereof...



Duel of the Fates? That legendary Skyrim song? Conquest of Paradise?

Yah, if those ring any bells and/or interests then this could be a solid way to start working on such scores. Do note that I'm not claiming that you'll be able to play those songs "just like that" using this instrument and only your keyboard. That's not going to work, not even if you have a Komplete Kontrol (which is fully supported as you can see). But this instrument will give you a solid basis to build on such material. You'll have some serious tweaking and customizing to do (not to mention sequencing), but you can honestly pull scores (a)like that off with 'Olympus'.

And there you have it!

A closer look at 4 other Kontakt instruments made by SoundIron. As implied by my choice of forum these instruments are not available from the NI website but from SoundIron themselves, here is an overview of all their Kontakt instruments.

If you want to use some realistic vocals in your work then I strongly suggest you look at SoundIron. Maybe start with their vocal suite bundle (which is available on the NI website) and if you need more.. well, then maybe any of these instruments can help.

Thanks for reading, I hope this was useful for some of you.