Miroslav Philharmonik

The end of August ’05, IK Multimedia announced it was releasing the Miroslav Philharmonik, a virtual instrument combining an amazing set of orchestral sounds with the power of their SampleTank engine. OSXRecording.com is pleased to present this review. When the package from IK Multimedia arrived on Friday afternoon, I knew exactly how I would be spending my weekend. It didn’t take long to get the box open, my afternoon’s work done and head straight to my studio (after dinner, of course!)

Inside the Box
The Miroslav Philharmonik box contains three disks, one to install the program and the two DVDs of the sample collection. There is also a dongle for copy protection that uses the Syncrosoft schema. Fortunately once activated and registered you can have it live on the same dongle you have other Syncrosoft license authorizations on because my poor Mac is starting to look like a porcupine with all of them sticking out! Installation was smooth, but it did take a while, I estimate close to an hour to do the whole install. Following that you have to go through the registration process, which isn’t painful, but isn’t a whole lot of fun. I don’t know anyone who likes reading and typing registration codes off of a card. Fortunately you only have to deal with that one time. So, from the time I opened the box to the time I got started in Nuendo with my first MIDI orchestration, it took about 90 minutes.

Virtual Instrument Benefits
IK Multimedia has released this library within a virtual instrument workstation that really is customized toward classical music sounds and the environments they are performed in by an orchestra and choir. This is what separates the concept of working with sounds in a sampler program and working with a virtual instrument.

IK Multimedia’s Miroslav Philharmonic has brilliantly been thought out with features particularly relevant to the sounds in the library such as:
16 part multi-timbrel sample-based orchestral workstation.
20 Classic DSP effects
4 insert effects per instrument.
4 Master effects with separate sends
Hi-quality master reverb derived from CSR
Multiple synth engines including STRETCH™ and Pitch-Shift/Time-Stretch.
Mix view allows full mix parameter control.
Zone feature for accurate single sample editing.
Full MIDI control of performance parameters.
Part preset and combi preset customization features.
256 notes polyphony.
Available as a VST, RTAS, DXi, AU plug-in for Mac OSX and Windows from the same box.


Extreme Value
Knowing I could now affordably work with the same sound collection that has provided the score to hundreds of movies and countless television shows was frankly pretty inspiring. Buying this collection of samples would have originally run over $4000.00 before IK Multimedia created this product. But wait, there’s more! It isn’t just the entire collection previously available as separate disks; this collection with the Miroslav Philharmonik also contains previously unreleased high-resolution sample material and additional instruments! If that value of the library alone isn’t enough to make you want this in your musical arsenal, nothing is enough.

Because the virtual instrument is based on an enhanced version of the SampleTank architecture, you get full control over the pitch and tempo of each sound, and sixteen multi-timbral parts. Each part can be loaded from one of more than 1,300 sounds included in the collection on the two DVDs provided with the package. That comes to over 7GB of sounds. That’s over one thousand; three hundred incredibly recorded, amazingly edited and obviously painstakingly assembled sounds from every instrument used in an orchestra, along with choral parts that give you goose bumps when you hear them. IK Multimedia uses the words “lush” and “beautiful” to describe these sounds. No offense, but I don’t think even those words go far enough to describe the authenticity of this collection and the intensely striking, moving trueness of the sounds. My words are not enough. Maybe there are not words to describe them.

The Library
I can’t possibly detail all of the strings, brass, woodwinds, percussion, concert piano, harp, harpsichord and cathedral organ sounds included in the Miroslav Philharmonik release. It is massive. It isn’t just the amount of them or the sound of them that is impressive; it is the way they have been edited. You can effortlessly use them so that they sound the way they should even though you are triggering them with a MIDI keyboard rather than say, playing the violin or oboe, or whatever you’re choosing. The sensitivity to the after-touch, the way they naturally cut-off, build, decay, everything about them makes you want to create wonderful music.

The choirs are extraordinary, even somewhat spooky. I can see a film music composer having a grand time creating an eerie score with the male and female parts provided in separate notes, giving you full ranges of ahs, ohs, uhs, mms, in staccato, glissando, portamento and more. You could easily create your own version of the music to The Exorcist! I haven’t even mentioned how cool it was to include the sounds of paper shuffling so you can simulate the sound of the musicians turning the page, or the sound of them tuning up, or other background noises such as coughing, sneezing, talking, etc.

I got a real kick out of those extras having recorded dozens of hours of choral and symphony performances for a local college, where I was certain they bused in old ladies with hairballs, the flu or emphysema and assigned them seats nearest the room microphones used when I was recording. The only sounds I used to encounter that Miroslav didn’t capture were the sounds of jingling car keys, children running, crying or asking “when are we going home” or the sounds of distance cell phones ringing or audience members saying “Shhhhhh!” to the people making all of the above noises.

Dances with Peter and the Wolf
Orchestras and symphonic performances are something that I have loved since childhood, when my first real exposure to them was a recording, and later a concert, of Peter and the Wolf. I guess I was an odd child (OK, some say I still am odd!), but at around nine years old I was buying recordings of performances of music written by Beethoven, Mozart, Liszt, Brahms and others right along with Beatles, Kiss and David Bowie albums. I even belonged to the “Classical Club” of the Camelot Music Store chain of record stores in the southern US. My tastes then and now have always been all over the map, and if it is music, there is some place on my spectrum of interest that it fits. While I grew into other less civilized genres of musical expression, I never stopped loving the symphony and appreciating the beauty of an acoustic space with un-amplified, pure performances by brilliantly trained musicians.

When IK Multimedia announced they were taking the now-legendary collection of the Miroslav Vitous Orchestral library and were combining it with their SampleTank technology to create the Miroslav Philharmonik release, I was pretty excited. Even though I’ve got a ton of samples, I don’t have any like this, and I don’t have them in a virtual instrument plug-in. I’ve recorded live symphony performances and still love the music, but never created it or worked with it directly via samples before. There are several reasons, like, I’m a guitarist and play mostly rock, blues, bluegrass and country styles, and I’m a “songwriter” but a little afraid of the term “composer.” I’m a “keyboard owner” and enough of a player to get my ideas across until I bring in real keyboard players to replace my parts.

Since I just don’t personally compose classical styles of music, I never had an impetus to sit down and dig into an orchestral library. Sure, I’ll call up strings or other individual orchestral sounds for recording projects; but these are not typically full orchestra pieces and symphonies. My use of the Miroslav Philharmonik on my own music is going to be much more limited by the genres I work in, but the concept of this being a plug-in really grabbed my attention for more than pop music possibilities and had me thinking about ways to expand what I’ve been doing in the studio for my own projects as well as for others. But before I went there, I figured the best way to dig into this plug-in was to get the kind of music it was meant for and that meant thinking back to the composers I’ve love since childhood and making their music mine again. The first thing that came to mind was to go get some of my favorite classical scores in MIDI format from the web and have some fun. That’s exactly what I did.

Completing the Classics
With everything running I loaded up a MIDI file gleamed from The Classical Music Archives website, where a free membership allows five downloads a day of full-on classical MIDI files by every composer you’ve likely ever heard of and a lot of others you have not. I chose pieces that I enjoy and that were not previously used on the IK Multimedia pages for the Miroslav Philharmonik examples.

There are so many choices up there that it took a while, but I settled for Mozart’s Magic Flute Overture, which is more than six minutes long and one of the shorter ones on my list. I continued on with his Quartet for Piano and Strings in Eb, which was over sixteen minutes long so I’m not posting it here as it’s a pretty big file, even as an MP3!

There was something really cool about taking an accurate score of a classical music composition and getting to decide which instrument sample was used and how it was going to be mixed. It was also a bit scary. I mean, my purist classical music friends are certain to come up with something I did wrong since this isn’t my forte. However, one thing is for certain, with this sample collection, they won’t ever say the sounds are “cheesy” or unauthentic. It was quite easy to become impressed with oneself using somebody else’s MIDI files and this awesome library combined with the features of working in a virtual instrument environment to control them.

In all, I worked with nine different classical music pieces, eight of which I am featuring here so you can listen to what I was able to do with the Miroslav Philharmonik virtual instrument from IK Multimedia. I reached back and went for the ones I loved best as a child, and probably some of the more familiar pieces to people who are not usually too exposed to this genre of music.

Magic Flute Overture – Mozart
Flight of the Bumblebee - Rimsky-Korsakov

Themes from Peter and the Wolf - Prokofiev
Peter
The Cat
The Duck
The Grandfather
The Hunters
The Wolf

Why this Philharmonik Rocks!
This strikes at the heart of what makes this a great product. Not only do you get what is arguably the best collection of symphonic sampler on the market combined with the benefits of a virtual instrument application, but also being authentically musical with it is relatively easy. This is important to genuine composers of musical scores seeking to hear what their works will sound like with a real orchestra without having to become a recording engineer to do it. This is important to people scoring for TV, DVD, films, games or even radio commercials who might be called upon to either compose original music or use traditional, classical music pieces from the masters. Additionally there is no reason why with this application and sample collection that somebody with exceptional arrangement and performance skills cannot deliver an authentic symphony performance.

Even somebody with my marginal keyboard skills should be able to sequence some pretty great instrument parts and even round out an arrangement with instruments one might not have tried before. It’s inspiring to try it. I’m not ready to reveal my attempts on my own stuff, but keep an eye on the site’s Member Music Uploads area and I will soon enough. The feel of the instruments is in the samples, so you really don’t even have to be quite as conscientious about how you play them as you would have been in days past when trying to pull off the aural illusion of a real symphony. When trying out the sounds on my keyboard, I actually had to unlearn some things I was doing with lesser quality string samples in order make them do what these samples do on their own. Wow, this is simply amazing, Miroslav. You are a genius!

The Advantages of the VI vs. Samplers
While the library of sounds Miroslav created has been available for a while, creating a virtual instrument with them was sheer genius on IK Multimedia’s part. They have made this library instantly accessible, organized and added features that allow you to customize each of the sounds all in one dedicated package.

Sure, I could have bought the sample libraries previously and opened the Giga, Roland, Akai, EMU EOS, SampleCell, or Kurzweil formatted sounds in my MOTU Mach Five Sampler Software, but it would have cost a lot more money to get this sound collection in the sample format delivery package being sold before, plus it would simply have not given the same user experience as working with the collection as a virtual instrument. After all, I have over 70,000 loops and samples in my library and included in that are plenty of orchestral sounds (though none as brilliantly done as this collection).

The thing that makes this so much better than just adding more files to that massive, unwieldy collection of sounds on my drive is the organization, implementation, and pre-thought strategy by the software designers of using these particular sounds for a particularly suited purpose in an accurate environment. It is a big plus to have this collection presented as a virtual instrument, with presets already correct for the realistic use of the instruments, and effects presented that combined in one package leave me more in creative mode than technical mode. Nothing will get in the way of your creativity when you use this sample library in the virtual instrument application that IK Multimedia has put together with Miroslav Philharmonik. It is the perfect marriage.

Miroslav recorded the string, brass and woodwind sections in the proper acoustic orchestral positions in the Dvorák Symphony Hall in Prague. So while the software gives you the ability to pan and place the instrument anywhere you want in your mix, the samples were already placed as they should be if an orchestra. This makes it easier if you want to be certain you’ve created an authentic placement and are trying to emulate a full-on orchestra performance with your composition. I had fun making minor tweaks to the panning while working with classical pieces and this program and library, especially if working with scores containing fewer instruments.

Another advantage to using this as a software instrument rather than loading up a sampler is the way that IK Multimedia has organized the folders with the sound in the app’s browser window. When I was working with the pieces in the review, such as Mozart’s Magic Flute Overture, which had twelve different instruments used in the MIDI file, I was easily able to go through the application’s browser windows and quickly load up the sounds. In fact, the sounds load up very quickly, which was great as I was auditioning each sample to find the one I wanted to use with the composition. And, when I was done loading all of the sounds for the piece, I was able to save the set I had loaded as “Magic Flute” so I could go back and instantly load all of the sounds used.

Who is Miroslav?
Miroslav Vitous is an amazing jazz musician and bassist with a fascinating history I couldn’t possibly detail in this review, but if you take time to first learn about his career and how he came to record the Czech Philharmonic and create the sample library to begin with, you will have an awesome respect for him and the sounds in this package. I highly encourage you to visit his website and learn more.

Final Thoughts
What is in it for you if you drop $500 on this package? Honestly, it may be the only orchestral library you will ever need to own in your lifetime and that there is enough of a reason to buy it. Next, the interface is easy to get around in, intelligently laid out and you won’t need to crack the manual to figure out anything. The plug-in loaded quickly in Nuendo 3.1., CubaseSX3, Digital Performer 4.6 and Tracktion 2 without a hesitation and even loaded the high-resolution samples quickly. IK Multimedia did a great job of creating an intuitive interface with great sounds, effects, lots of customizing flexibility (though if you never touch the natural state of these samples, you’ll make wonderful music!).

Miroslav Philharmonik is musical right after install. It doesn’t require a technical degree to learn or use, and its elegant simplicity allows you to concentrate on making beautiful music rather than tweaking all day and forgetting what you were trying to create to begin with. I am confident that I will be working on a song of mine, a co-writer or client and when the need for any of these instruments arises, within minutes be able to load up the plug-in, open the sound set and get right back to making music. And that is really at the heart of why I am giving this thing a top rating. The application is solid. The CPU meters barely moved when using it, the sounds are world-class, and the application is easy to learn and get around in. This may be the perfect marriage of a sample library. I only wish it were also able to act as a stand-alone instrument application so I could work within it without having to open the DAW application. Even with that one minor complaint, this gets our highest rating.

Technical Info
Miroslav Philharmonik sounds are based on an enhanced version of the SampleTank engine, and IK Multimedia states that they cannot be opened from the current version of SampleTank, but that this feature will be available in the next upgrade

System Requirements
Macintosh®
Minimal: 667MHz Power Macintosh®
G4, with 512MB of RAM, Mac OS X 10.2.8 or later, 1024x768 screen thousands of colors.
Suggested: 1.25 GHz Power Macintosh® G4, with 1GB of RAM.

Platforms
RTAS, VST, DX, and Audio Units

Price
Miroslav Philharmonik

$ 499 / € 419 introductory price (VAT excluded)
Regular MSRP of $ 599 / € 499

Visit the IK Multimedia Website.

Visit the Miroslav Philharmonik Website for more details and additional examples of music created with this virtual instrument from IK Multimedia.