Vital Arts Announces Plectrum
Ilio has announced that it will be distributing, Vital Arts, a newly founded company. The first product from Vital Arts is called Plectrum – we kid you not. We’ve heard some really bad product names in our day, but Plectrum, which rhymes with Rectum, could take the cake. The virtual instrument library contains 185 original acoustic instruments, underpowered by Tascam’s GVI streaming sample playback engine. Plectrum is the brainchild of Geoffrey Gee, pianist, composer, and former Senior Soundware Engineer at Kurzweil Music Systems. Plectrum contains 7.5 GB worth of content, some of which is at 24-bit / 96kHz resolution, and optimized using Tascam’s wave acceleration feature.
Doctor: I’m sorry sir, but your Plectrum has become infected, and must be removed immediately.
Patient: I didn’t even know I had a “pal-ec-trum”
All joking aside, a Plectrum is actually a small flat “pick” used to pluck or strum a stringed instrument. But come on marketing department, do you really want to call you first product a Plectrum?? Anyway, back to our regularly scheduled programming…
Gee created his Plectrum instruments from sounds made by plucking, strumming, tapping, scraping, and flicking a range of stringed instruments and found objects (Hence, the name… —Ed.). Collecting thousands of full length high resolution samples, he voiced and tuned the sounds into full-range, expressive keyboard instruments.
Plectrum’s interface presents these instruments in nine categories based on these sound sources: Strummed Strings, Struck Strings, Plucked Strings, and String Harmonics; Glass, Ceramics, Metals, and Found Objects, and Habitats. Each instrument features looped playback that enhances the organic feel and texture of an acoustic instrument. The instruments in Habitats use this feature to offer ever-evolving sound environments with names such as August Morning, Afternoon Rain, Forest Stream, and Crickets.
Vital Arts Plectrum costs $299 and is being released as a PC version (VSTi, RTAS, stand-alone), with Mac support expected in the Fall. More information on Vital Arts Plectrum.
