What do you think is the best ethnic library that has instruments from all over the world in one pack?
Obviously buying separate plugins for each instruments would be the best option, but that would cost a million dollars, and Eduardo Tarilonte’s libraries, which are awesome, only usually cover an era or certain section of the world, and buying all would, again, cost a million dollars. I’ve come to the conclusion that it would be best (for me, at least) to buy a bundle with lots of instruments, and then buy a few separate instruments for the hardest to replicate ones (lead instruments, bowed and so on) I’ve done some research lately and I’ve found these ones:
EastWest RA, 74 instruments (and silk, but it’s quite limited with only 25 instruments)
Best Service Ethno World 6, 320 instruments and voices
UVI World Suite, 320 instruments and voices
Garritan World Instruments, 350 instruments
All of these are in part quite old, since they’re so massive and it has taken a long time to make all of the instruments (except RA which is all old), some samples are from 20 years back, but at least Ethno World 6 has some instruments from two years back and I hear some are almost as good as separate instrument vst’s.
Do you have experience with these libraries, or do you have any other libraries to add to the list?
I discussed a similar topic with another member earlier @Fredrik, and it depends on what kind of “Ethnic Sound” you are looking for. Eastern, Arabic, African, Caribbean, Celtic?
Yup, I noticed the thread, but since it was about looking for a library with three specific instruments, it was a bit different.
I’m looking for a complete package that sounds fair for a decent price, which I can expand later on with separate lead instruments, so I’m not looking for any specific region, I’m looking for all the regions. I’d like to have the means to make music from anywhere around the world, with not having to download a million separate plugins from million different vst producers.
I’ve listened to some demos and lots of the instruments in these packages are quite usable, since they’re a background instrument, or easy to make into a vst (winds, percussion, plucked etc.)
This track was made with Ethno World 6 (with some cymbal swells from Heviocity Damage) and I think it sounds quite alright
After the last thread I bought Eduardo Tarilonte celtic era. I know you asked for something more complete but I thought I’d give you my thoughts on this library anyway in case that developer has other plugins that suites you since they mostly do ethnic. I used EW RA before.
The sounds in Celtic era filled my needs 100%.
Pros: The samples are great. Flutes, pipes, whistles, strings, perc, pads and soundscapes amazing.
Many articulations. Tweakabilty.
Very good price for what you get.
Really gets you the ethnic mystical feeling with not so much effort(in this case celtic sound)
Cons: Not so good engine
Many keyswitches
Also, now that I think about it, it’s also a workflow thing, having everything in one place, not having to think “do I have the instrument x or do I have to go online to search for one”, and when needing an instrument, knowing exactly where it is so I don’t waste time trying to browse through folders with kontakt and then remembering that the one I’m looking for isn’t a kontakt instrument and simultaneously forgetting what I was going to write, and yet having a decent sounding instrument and not having to write with a piano sound.
I have a handful of Eduardo Tarilonte libraries and I’m planning to buy more in the future, but they’re still a bit on the expensive side if I would buy them all (and they still wouldn’t cover the world so I would need to get the missing sounds from other plugins). But yea they’re exceptional for their tiny slices of the world’s sounds.
Yea, I don’t think I need top quality in everything since I’m not selling music to people who make music, but to regular consumers, If it doesn’t make me cringe, and a random person from the street hears a track and doesn’t immediately say “that instrument sounds fake”, It should be fine. Top quality in the lead instruments is important though.
I’ve already decided to buy one of the libraries, after reading reviews, most likely Ethno World 6, just waiting if there will be any valentine’s discount.
People in VI Control and KVR forums thought that Ethno World and UVI World Suite complement each other since even though they have some overlapping instruments, the programming approach is different. Most people thought Garritan was a waste of money, and the vote on RA was split 50/50 between buy / don’t buy, uvi/best service is better. I just don’t know personally anyone with any of these libraries (except RA I’ve tried through composer cloud) so I would like to hear opinions if anyone here has any of those!
Ah, yes then I think you will be good. Personally I have been gravitating more towards “specialized (as in focused) libraries and plugins” the last years. But of course, that means I need a LOT more of them lol
I haven’t really personally tried any ethnic library though, but I am looking forward to what Strezov Sampling is working on next, which seems to be focused on the east and asia. I would love a nice erhu for example!
Erhu is just the kind of instrument which I would buy separately. Hard to make and needs true legato to sound good. But lots of plucked instruments sound just fine without fancy programming
I’m after Instruments you hear and can immediately place to a specific region, cliches kind of, caribbean->steel drums, ireland->tin whistle, france->accordion, russia->balalaika and so on. I have lots of libraries but if I wanted to use mostly authentic instruments for each region, I couldn’t produce much without using other sounds as fillers
Ah, yeah I can see why you would want a package then. I am personally avoiding EW since they are subscription. Eduardo’s libraries, even if I don’t own any, sound so damn amazing. But yes, as you mentioned, you would need a lot of them.
I guess I would look more into the UVI world suite if I were you. I mean, they cover the whole world, and from the demos it does sound pretty good. Even though those audio only demos always seem to do haha.
I’ve pondered between UVI World Suite and Best Service Ethno World 6, what I’ve read from other forums is that they actually have even some of the same samples on some instruments, but the programming has taken it to opposite directions so the instrument might sound different. Ethno World 6 has gotten a bit more votes usually on the forums.
UVI World Suite $299
pros: more instruments, instruments categorized with continents instead of instrument types (might be a con for some)
cons: some instruments old and outdated, some different instruments combined to one with keyswitches, works only in UVI Workstation, does not support different scales unless you buy UVI Falcon also
Ethno World 6 (259e+259e or 449e together)
pros: some better instruments, kontakt library, can be bought as instruments and voices separately,
cons: some instruments old and outdated, more expensive if buying both instruments and voices (though, best service has buy 1 get 1 free discounts sometimes)
I’ll probably buy one soon and if I ever see the other with a heavy discount, buy it too.
There’s an Epic Bundle by Eduardo Tarilonte 56% off at Audio Plugin Deals, containing Epic World and Desert Winds, does anyone know how many actual playable Instruments there are in these? Seems to be mostly soundscapes and phrases but someone said there are playable Instruments also but didn’t specify how many.
Also Eduardo Tarilontes vocal libraries are ’buy one get one free’ at Best Service if someone’s interested
I bought Ethno World 6 Instruments a few days ago and it feels great so far! There are some instruments that don’t have many velocity layers or are a bit limited in some other ways, but the recording quality is from usable to excellent in everything I’ve tried so far. And most of the instruments are just fine, the amount of completely unusable things is quite low.
I actually also found a second hand copy of UVI World Suite from KVR market and got it for $130 so I bought that too, I havent yet completed downloading it though, but Ethno World 6 Instruments gave me lots of ideas also and now I can just pick pretty much any world instrument I happen to need at any specific time and start composing instead of trying to find a vst from the internet or compose by piano sounds.
