The Viola da Gamba is an old orchestra string instrument with 6 nylon sides and a range from C2 to C5. Its sound is rough and coarse - a wonderful addition to classical strings.
Cinematique Instruments' goal was to digitally recreate the Viola Da Gamba and give it another modern expression was a success. Their Viola Da Gamba has become an amazingly independent instrument with its own unique character and a very organically rough sound. It is a great alternative to conventional orchestral string instruments.
Viola da Gamba contains roughly 1200 samples compressed down to around 600 MB.
What do you get in Viola Da Gamba?
An exciting mix of microphones: the velvety sound of the Schoeps mics, Neumann U87 as was a Coles 4038 ribbon
Six articulations: beside arco, pizzicato, staccato, and spiccato there are also unconventional articulations like arco-fragile textures and xylo-mallet-hits
An extensive number of round robins: up to 16 with up to four dynamic layers
The ability to play different amount of instruments: all articulations can be played either as solo viola da gamba or as an ensemble trio with three instruments
Additional fx: delay, chorus, amped and drive
Nine reverb types: beside several different sizes you get special types such as infinite and deep valley.
The Viola da Gamba is a historical instrument from the Renaissance and Baroque periods. It belongs to the family of string instruments and was mainly built and used in Italy, France, Germany and England. Today the Viola da Gamba is mainly used in "early music", which is gaining more and more attention today.
It has 6 strings tuned in the typical baroque tuning of 415Hz. All strings are nylon strings. Due to this special mixture of strings the Viola da Gamba has its own character, which clearly differs from violin and cello. Especially because of the nylon strings the Viola da Gamba has its own unmistakable rough sound.