Quantum Leap RA - PLAY Edition provides composers with access to
a variety of rare and unique instruments from Africa, Europe, India,
the Americas and Australia, the Far East, and the Middle East and
Turkish Empires. Musicians will find that RA has an amazing sound
quality and they’ll marvel at the articulation of each instrument which
has a wide range that goes from controlled to expressive. All of the
instruments and ensembles featured in the collection were sampled
extensively as a means of preserving the true character and expression
of each instrument. For the first time with the
Quantum Leap RA - PLAY Edition,
users will have more control over the sounds offered in the collection
along with the ability to load even more instruments than ever before
“With ethnic instruments, the key to authenticity of sound is expression,” says Quantum Leap Producer Nick Phoenix.
“Now
with the incorporation of our advanced PLAY sample engine, with its
built-in sensing technology that monitors a player’s style and adjusts
the software and sounds accordingly, users will experience a level of
detail that was lacking in other products in the market, making their
projects come to life with range and emotion.”
Details:
In ancient Egypt, RA was regarded as the creator of everything, the god
of the sun. RA is usually represented with the body of a man and the
head of a hawk, holding an ankh & sceptre. The chief location of RA
worship was Heliopolis (a Greek word meaning city of the sun). RA is an
appropriate name for the largest, and most comprehensive rare and
ethnic virtual instrument ever made.
RA was born a few years ago, as a sample library called “Rare
Instruments.” All of the sounds from Rare Instruments are included in
RA, but this only represents approximately one-tenth of the content.
The other ninety percent of RA was recorded at a top studio in
Hollywood. Because of the size and complexity of the project, I brought
in two talented producers, Pacemaker and Tony Austin to co-produce RA
with me. They have worked on some other Quantum Leap projects and had
some great ideas for RA. We spent time hunting down the best ethnic
artists on the West Coast. Los Angeles is so ethnically diverse and
blessed with excellent institutions like Cal Arts, it is actually the
ideal place to record a rare and ethnic collection.
You will find RA has amazing sound quality. RA was captured with a
phase accurate 8-mic setup that gives a complete 3 dimensional image of
the instrument. It is this type of sound that takes to artificial or
sampled reverb extremely well. The sound is clear and broad. Mics used
were Neumann U67 (U47s as alternates), Neuman M50, AKG C12 and Shoepps.
Another cool aspect of this virtual instrument is the fact that we
recorded ethnic ensembles. This was done with African drums, bagpipes,
gamelan and a Middle Eastern string section. The sound of these
ensembles cannot be realistically simulated by layering solo
instruments.
RA was a very expensive project, but well worth the cost. A lot of
thought went into selecting instruments that would appeal to composers
of all types, from dance music, to film. You might want to put the
middle eastern string section in your next pop tune, or the hardanger
fiddle in a sweeping romantic score ala LOTR.
You might also be surprised at how little percussion is included in
this giant ethnic collection. The reason is, we already covered much of
this in Quantum Leap Stormdrum. Stormdrum is the ideal companion to RA.
The percussion in RA compliments Stormdrum perfectly.
You can have a lot of fun with RA. The possibilities are simply
endless, especially when you mix the sounds of different cultures
together. Load up the middle eastern string section, apply an Indian or
Egyptian tuning from the micro-tuning presets and play octaves. Make a
really cool groove with the didgeridoo fx and the Vietnamese jaw harp.
Take a classical filmscore piece and replace all of the instruments
with their ethnic counterparts: strings with middle eastern string
section, solo violin or cello with electric baritone violin, hardanger
fiddle or erhu, french horn with alpenhorn, flute with dizi, oboe with
duduk, percussion with taikos and African percussion, harp with kora,
trombones with rag dung etc. etc.... Or perhaps try the hurdy gurdy,
hardanger fiddle, washburn guitar, mandolin and the dizi and make an
interesting folk ensemble or the gamelan ensemble with the ney flute,
duduk and esraj. And don’t forget the reverb!
In addition to PLAY’s intuitive custom interface,
Quantum Leap RA - PLAY Edition includes many other features, such as:
64-bit* with 32-bit compatibility for PC (*see system specifications).
Full memory access with MAC (requires 64-bit MAC).
Mac Intel compatibility.
Intelligent performance section including portamento, repetition, legato.
Features round robin reset.
Offers improved articulation window and controls.
State-of-the-art convolution reverb with pre-delay.
Improved micro-tuning.
Improved sound quality with high-resolution audio engine.
Hi-fidelity one pole filter for natural cross-fades.
Stereo image editing is now possible using channel sourcing.
The instruments featured in the PLAY Editions are newly-programmed for PLAY from the original recordings
System Requirements:
- 14GB Free Hard Disc Space
- DVD Drive
- iLok Security Key, not included
For Mac
- Required: G5 or Intel Processor, 2GB RAM, Mac OS 10.4 or higher, DVD drive
- Recommended: Core 2 Duo 2.5Ghz or faster processor, 4GB+ RAM, DVD drive
For PC:
- Required: P4 2.5Ghz or faster, 2GB RAM, Windows XP SP 2 or Vista, sound card with ASIO drivers, DVD drive
- Recommended: Core 2 Duo 2.5Ghz or faster processor, 4GB+ RAM, sound card with ASIO drivers, 64-bit OS and host, DVD drive
Included for both Mac and PC:
- 32-bit standalone and plug-in versions included
- 64-bit PC VST (host must support 64-bit VST plugins) and standalone versions included