Arturia BRASS

What Can I do in BRASS?
With three instruments at your disposal, you can pick one and start playing. You will instantly feel like you're playing a real instrument, not a set of recorded samples layered and static. BRASS also contains an extensive performance-based riff library which is entirely configurable and expandable. Organized by styles, these riffs are a great way to get started if you are not used to programming a horn. They can even be triggered during live performances.

Choose, create, import and modify riffs to match your needs or play the modeled instruments directly in LIVE mode with a keyboard and other real-time controls; in both cases BRASS will revolutionize the way you create music. Below we have listed just a few of the other features you will find in BRASS.

• Specialization:
  Recording parameters, or let's say the ambiance of the room in which the instruments are played , are certainly an important factor of how a saxophone solo or trumpet section will sound in the end. In BRASS, place the instruments where ever you want in a room for effect. Place them far away and have a sound that echoes in the distance, or set the instruments in the front of the room for an in your face result.
  
• Parameters:
  The parameters offered in BRASS are a range of attributes that can be adjusted so that you can specify your sound to the smallest detail: Attack, Pressure, Pitch, Timbre, Noise, Vibrato, Vibrato Frequency, Mute.
  Whether you want to set a parameter to a particular level without changing it, program automation to a parameter, control it by the velocity of your keyboard, or assign it to a real-time controller, you will find the possibilities offered by this interaction with the instrument extremely easy and impressive. Just like a human performer who has studied horns for years, you will be able to express yourself and add emotion to your music.
• Instrument Configuration:
  Fluctuate the playing style of your instrument and really bring the piece to life with Humanization settings ("Beginner", "Human", or "Computer"). Change the material of your instrument if you want to go for a creative type of sound. Play with a variety of different mutes on the trombone and trumpet, or you can even change reeds on you saxophone. In BRASS, you are the creator of your instrument.
• How do you play the instruments?
  You can use BRASS as a virtual instrument and program your sound track in your favorite sequencer. Since all the main formats are supported, you will not have to worry about compatibility.
  
  You can attach a MIDI keyboard for those who are more at ease playing the music directly. Real time controls such as foot pedals, breath controllers, and other physical interfaces will give your arrangement that extra punch.
  
  
  BRASS is based on a new kind of physical modeling technology. All of the characteristics of the real instruments have been analyzed and modeled through extensive research at IRCAM, a world-renowned institute based in Paris. Arturia has partnered with IRCAM to bring this groundbreaking technology to your studio; you will never worry about sacrificing sound quality.
  

Live Mode:

Play your instrument with maximum expression like a soloist would do! All parameters can be modulated in real time: you can assign any MIDI controller to any parameter, you can switch automation to some parameters, and obtain a lively and realistic sound.

Choose a preset in the library, play through keyboard, and use the controllers to add modulation. You want to go further? Configure your instrument: make a wooden trumpet, add a mute, humanize: physical modelling is flexible. In LIVE mode you have access to a wide range of intuitive qualities to control your instrument.

• Attack: a really important parameter for accentuation, articulations and use of different playing techniques. Set the attack force high for faster and stronger attacks and lower for a slower and softer attack.
• Pressure: Set the pressure of the air entering the instrument. Allow variation of tone and value of the instrument at the same time, in the same way a musician would blow stronger in the instrument. Make smooth transitions and go for maximum expression.
• Pitch: Make glissandos, slides, or legatos; you can even automate the pitch moves for each note you play or vary the notes around the notes played. By default, the pitch parameter is set in the middle of its range to the 0 value.
• Timbre: Set the sound of the instrument in order to obtain a variation in the timber of the sound. You can program subtle changes in Riff Mode or control the parameter in real time.
• Noise: This parameter controls breath or air that integrated into the sound of the note. It is subtle but makes a big difference in the realism of the sound.
• Vibrato: Different types of vibratos are offered here, allowing one to change the speed of the vibrato and its range. And once again if you want to automate a vibrato to certain notes, after a delay, or according to a certain curve, this is possible.
• Vibrato Frequency: This adjusts the frequency of the vibrato. Mute: Accessible uniquely for the trumpet and the trombone, and in the case where a "muted wahwah" effect is chosen the parameter allows us to set the intensity of the effect, otherwise said the position of the hand for a muted wahwah or the position of the mute plunger. When no mute is activated, or a static mute is chosen, the real time controller is disabled.

Arturia BRASS