# Spitfire Masse - WOW!!!



## Lee Blaske (Jan 12, 2017)

Just downloaded and installed Spitfire Masse. What an incredibly beautiful piece of work from Spitfire. This library should almost be made illegal, because it's going to be SO addicting. Lives are going to be ruined because people will not be able to pry themselves away from their keyboards to eat or sleep.


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## ClefferNotes (Jan 12, 2017)

I 100000% agree with you, first patch I loaded up was the Tutti Staccato and slammed my fingers on the keyboard I almost fell off my seat in awe! I will be using this beauty a lot!! Hnnnnnng!!!


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## Lee Blaske (Jan 12, 2017)

It's great loud, but it's also great soft (and anywhere in-between). You can load up a tutti long patch and improvise a Randy Newman score in real time.  In some ways, kind of like a Symphobia preset, but with much more variability and capability for nuance (dynamic range, vibrato, etc.), plus some serious attention to fit and finish (because these patches have been assembled from massive libraries). 

We've certainly got a lot of great products out there to choose from these days, but it's nice to see that it's still possible for a company to step up to the plate and really hit one out of the park.


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## Polkasound (Jan 12, 2017)

After listening to the Masse demos, watching the walkthrough video, and wiping off a bit of drool, I found myself talking to God, "So... you just _had_ to make me a polka musician. Thanks. Thanks a lot."


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## higgs (Jan 12, 2017)

Lee Blaske said:


> Just downloaded and installed Spitfire Masse. What an incredibly beautiful piece of work from Spitfire. This library should almost be made illegal, because it's going to be SO addicting. Lives are going to be ruined because people will not be able to pry themselves away from their keyboards to eat or sleep.


Those blokes (CH in particular) enjoy testing the bounds of our marital vows.


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## Marko Zirkovich (Jan 12, 2017)

Polkasound said:


> After listening to the Masse demos, watching the walkthrough video, and wiping off a bit of drool, I found myself talking to God, "So... you just _had_ to make me a polka musician. Thanks. Thanks a lot."



Lucky you. Lots of money to be made as a Polka musician in certain regions of the Alps.


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## Polkasound (Jan 12, 2017)

Marko Zirkovich said:


> Lucky you. Lots of money to be made as a Polka musician in certain regions of the Alps.



Well, if they ever build a Milwaukee-to-Matterhorn high-speed train service, I'll be in business. Actually, I already do make a living as a polka musician right here in the Midwest, and if Spitfire should ever decide Masse needs divisi concertinas, I'm their man.


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## BachN4th (Jan 12, 2017)

Polkasound said:


> Well, if they ever build a Milwaukee-to-Matterhorn high-speed train service, I'll be in business. Actually, I already do make a living as a polka musician right here in the Midwest, and if Spitfire should ever decide Masse needs divisi concertinas, I'm their man.



I've heard some amazing transcriptions for Accordion Band, I want to say the most recent gem I listened to was from Vivaldi's Four Seasons.


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## ClefferNotes (Jan 12, 2017)

Polkasound said:


> Well, if they ever build a Milwaukee-to-Matterhorn high-speed train service, I'll be in business. Actually, I already do make a living as a polka musician right here in the Midwest, and if Spitfire should ever decide Masse needs divisi concertinas, I'm their man.


Or how about a new Albion V Evo: Polka Bellows!


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## studiostuff (Jan 12, 2017)

Yep. I got mail from SA today with this in it... SA is great; I love the samples, and they keep updating and sending stuff...


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## robgb (Jan 12, 2017)

I'm with SilentBob on this one.


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## Saxer (Jan 13, 2017)

I watched the video and the string pads sound really nice. But I don't like restrictions like: "and now we compose only slow long notes". What for? Sketching slow music? If there's a dead line composers don't need eighth notes any more? There are already tons of flexible strings out there and they sound beautiful.


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## Hybrid X (Jan 13, 2017)

Hey there! I own already SSS & SSB. So if I would go for the new SSO, I´ll get SSW for the "Complete-Your-Bundle-Price" (€499,78 incl.VAT) and (that´s the really important point) MASSE on top for free? Am I right?


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## Baron Greuner (Jan 13, 2017)

Listened to the videos a couple of times when I got the chance and there are some nice patches. No legato patches at all. Some of the sounds are almost like synthesisers. Great free present if you own the required material. Other than that, I personally can't see why I would buy this for $300 plus VAT though.


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## EvilDragon (Jan 13, 2017)

It's pretty clearly stated what it's good for. To get shit done quickly without faffing about. And it's superb for that.


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## Thorsten Meyer (Jan 13, 2017)

Hybrid X said:


> Hey there! I own already SSS & SSB. So if I would go for the new SSO, I´ll get SSW for the "Complete-Your-Bundle-Price" (€499,78 incl.VAT) and (that´s the really important point) MASSE on top for free? Am I right?


As soon you upgrade to SPITFIRE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA you get free Masse


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## Hybrid X (Jan 13, 2017)

Thorsten Meyer said:


> As soon you upgrade to SPITFIRE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA you get free Masse


Awesome! Thanks!


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## khollister (Jan 13, 2017)

SilentBob said:


> Perhaps time to complete my spitfire orchestra. Hard to resist. But not because of Masse. Some nice and inspirational strings (no surprise because of the excellent source material), perhaps some useful prebaked orchestrations in the short woodwinds. But the wind longs, especially the brass, sounds very unsatisfying and synthy in my opinion. Typical for treating single instruments as a combined ensemble. A step backwards. I can hardly imagine using this apart from quick sketching. As this is the main purpose of the lib Masse seems to hit the point.
> 
> But perhaps I will be able to value this when I put my fingers on it and hit the keys. As it is a bonus if I buy the package I can only win.



The more powerful brass (and to a lesser extent woodwind) longs, e.g. Beast Long, Power Long, can start to sound "synthy" in chords, but that is not surprising since these are tutti voices - the same thing can happen with Albion ONE. I can assue you that using these as they were probably intended (solo or octave unison) sounds great. The choir voices though are wonderful for choral playing. My general observation of all sample libraries is that using tutti samples to play dense chords either ends up sounding like a Prophet V (brass) or an accordian (woodwinds) - it's the nature of the beast. You have to have some awareness of orchestration and use things in ways that don't deviate too much from real orchestral practice if you want realistic results. It is the curse of ensemble/tutti patches regardless of developer.

While I suspect SA has "bundled" this with SSS/SSB/SSW for marketing reasons (enticing one to complete the SSO collection to get Masse for free), it does make sense in that Masse doesnt really stand alone in the way Albion ONE (or Tundra) does - it is augmentation in the same way that Albion III and IV are.

I got this for free since I owned everything else and there is some very cool and useful stuff in here. However, I would not expect to compose using only Masse (just as I personally don't use just Albion) - of course Oliver illustrates I'm full of s**t in his video for Masse


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## WindcryMusic (Jan 13, 2017)

khollister said:


> I got this for free since I owned everything else and there is some very cool and useful stuff in here. However, I would not expect to compose using only Masse (just as I personally don't use just Albion) - of course Oliver illustrates I'm full of s**t in his video for Masse



Oliver certainly has a way of making things work to a degree that others (like me) sometimes can't. I wasn't overly impressed with Masse in my first, brief trials of it this morning, but I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt for a while because of Oliver's video example.

Symphonic Brass, on the other hand, was the reason I bought the collection (I'd already owned Strings and Winds), and I have been in no way disappointed by that one thus far. Spectacular, absolutely spectacular, just as the other two Symphonic libraries have proven to be.


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## markleake (Jan 13, 2017)

I'm still downloading, but the video walkthrough impressed me. Sure, it's not for everyone, and some of the patches will be better than others, but it sounds great to my ears. The more paddy slow strings will be very useful for me with some recent stuff I've been experimenting with. And the softer choral brass will also. From the demos and walkthroughs it sounds like a great sketching or quick "mockup" tool. I don't expect I can get it to sound as good as Oliver though.

Generally I think the usefulness of this kind of library depends a lot on the type of music you write and/or what your workflow is.


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## SeattleComposer (Jan 13, 2017)

Very nice that they gave it to us for free. They certainly know how to keep a customer loyal. 

The Nutcracker patch = delight.


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## NoamL (Jan 13, 2017)

Spitfire really seem to be testing how many times they can market the same samples.

Mural is (was) Mural. SSS is Mural. SSO's strings... are Mural. Masse's string section.... is Mural.

I don't say they're ripping people off, at all. They have retired redundant product lines, offered discounted or even free upgrades, and Masse is a very nice freebie for owners of SSO. In fact their general trend has been to make these samples lower cost and more competitive, with better UIs and many bug fixes. All of which is welcome.

But if you're impressed by hitting the keys, you know you can just load a bunch of BML Kontakt instruments into one instance and have them all listen to MIDI channel 1 right? That, with some added orchestrational sophistication and probably some good mixing, is what Masse is.


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## procreative (Jan 13, 2017)

NoamL said:


> Spitfire really seem to be testing how many times they can market the same samples.
> 
> Mural is (was) Mural. SSS is Mural. SSO's strings... are Mural. Masse's string section.... is Mural.
> 
> ...



I think you are in the main right, however I think loading one patch of Masse will be much lighter on the CPU than loading several patches to achieve the same thing. 

But its kind of irrelevant as its a freebie and not for sale in this instance. For those only who invested in the SSO package either bit by bit or just now.

I don't get though why they announced it as a product. They did a similar thing making Mural Evolutions only available to Mural owners, but they still had to buy it which is why it had a price. Guess this is intended to frustrate and/or tempt the rest of us to buy in.

If I did not have so many options for Strings, Winds and Brass already...

But then I have Sable and have not jumped to SCS either as it works for me as is.


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## Quasar (Jan 13, 2017)

I wish they would offer it to everyone, rather than make some bourgeois, exclusionary members-only club thing out of it... This is just my opinion, which I fully realize is unimportant.

Sounds great, as Spitfire libraries generally always do.


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## airflamesred (Jan 13, 2017)

It's a 4 for 3 offer with a cloaking device.


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## mac (Jan 13, 2017)

I wonder, if Masse was released as Albion 6 what peoples reactions would have been?


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## NoamL (Jan 13, 2017)

FWIW I did not intend that post to be read as terribly sarcastic just an observation 

Yes Masse seems more like a competitor to Symphobia than anything else but the broadly oriented orchinabox libraries quite possibly help pay for the crazy risk taking oddball stuff like Swarm!

Spitfire are quality, they seem to have devoted 2016 to going over their existing libraries with a comb like people have wanted for years, now let's see what 2017 brings!


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## WindcryMusic (Jan 13, 2017)

mac said:


> I wonder, if Masse was released as Albion 6 what peoples reactions would have been?



Not too good, I should think. IMO Masse has a far more limited scope and utility than any of the Albions, and to be honest I can't imagine myself making nearly as much use of it as I have any of the Albions that I own (1/2/ONE/5).


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## robgb (Jan 13, 2017)

I don't really get the point of MASSE.


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## jononotbono (Jan 13, 2017)

robgb said:


> I don't really get the point of MASSE.



Speed of workflow when you have an insane deadline.


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## robgb (Jan 13, 2017)

jononotbono said:


> Speed of workflow when you have an insane deadline.


I suppose. But it seems there are other tools that would serve you better. Whatever.


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## jononotbono (Jan 13, 2017)

robgb said:


> I suppose. But it seems there are other tools that would serve you better. Whatever.



Well, it depends whether the other tools can blend well with what you are using. If you are using Spitfire Libraries Masse will blend instantly saving even more time. And it's free.


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## markleake (Jan 13, 2017)

I finally finished downloading it last night. As per comments from @jononotbono it seems well suited to fast deadline work. Here's my observations so far:

Tutti: A bit difficult to use as they have a lot of dense instrumentation. You can't really get away with playing full chords as it doesn't sound real. The shorts I think will be more useful than the longs.

Brass: Again, some articulations you need to be careful with chords, but it is easier than the tutti patch. Certain arts will be very synthy if you don't know what you are doing, like the beast and power longs, but I think in a mix these could actually sound pretty great. I like the choir and super-choir patches, and with these arts you can use fuller chords and not have them sound fake/synthy. The super-choir I think is great. The "slow" patches are very effective at pad or underscore sounds. All of the various short arts sound great.

Wood: Similar to brass, although I think it is harder to get an attractive sound with the wood longs compared to the brass; the low woods can sound very good sometimes though. The orchestrated art is good if used right. Again the short arts sound good, and the slow patches seem to work quite well for pad/underscore (surprisingly well, given my initial mixed impressions of the other long wood arts).

Strings: This is where the library shines and you no longer have to be careful about the chords you play - everything you play sounds great. I can see so many uses for the long arts of cool strings and slow strings. Some arts have a long evolving sound. I'm not sure what the mixes are on the cool strings, but they sound great. Unlike when I try and mix SSS stings myself for ensemble sounds, these *don't* seem to sound too full, and they don't end up sounding like mush like the original SSS ensemble patches can sometimes. The shorts for the strings I found were a bit temperamental, but sound good when you play them right (obviously, given the source material) - the mondo plucks don't seem to have the mix balanced right when you go a few notes below middle C.

I think if you have some of the Albions, it's not going to replace them. But it also offers different material. If you are conscious of instrumentation/orchestration, it can sound great. It provides easy shortcuts for a number of things. The shorts are great and useful. I can see the longs, particularly the strings, finding a lot of use for me as "cheat" underscore. The more paddy sounding longs I think can be glue for many a track. I can see them being used live also.


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## ctsai89 (Jan 13, 2017)

WindcryMusic said:


> Not too good, I should think. IMO Masse has a far more limited scope and utility than any of the Albions, and to be honest I can't imagine myself making nearly as much use of it as I have any of the Albions that I own (1/2/ONE/5).



I think it covers some ground that albions don't have. The slow string patches for example have are useful for swells and the tutti orchestra is pretty good too. You can't improvise and get a tutti sound from albions unless u put in a lot of work and combine the patches carefully. IMO it's a good addition to the SSO but not much better.


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## procreative (Jan 14, 2017)

I think that the sound of AIR is indeed beautiful, instant gratification. However I think when playing anything other than monophonic lines, you get an unrealistic build up of ambience, (but then again this is also true of the amount of players as you can end up with maybe 90 players if playing a Violin 1 triad).

This is also true of noisy samples in the lower dynamics. If you were recording real players of a section, they would be mic'ed up as a section, so any ambience or noise would be picked up just the once.

So technically the VSL approach allows the most flexible and realistic effect.

But in the end, if it sounds good, who cares?

But this is a reprogramming of existing sample content, a bit like Mural Ensembles. But only difference is patches with combined articulations. Does sound good, but too bad for me as I cannot buy it (until they one day decide to make it available in some Black Friday/Summer Solstice/RJ Mitchell* Anniversary Day type sale).

* The inventor of the "other" Spitfire, hint, hint.


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## Consona (Jan 14, 2017)

So, for the €359 price tag on the site, can anybody buy Masse or is this just some price for those who don't own the whole bundle or what? It's somewhat confusing...

And yea, I have to agree I liked the sound of Albion I era of SA much more than the modern sound. That's the reason I did not invest into the Mural, the strings sound too over-polished to me, like really semi-synthy, I don't know how to better describe it. I've bought Cinematic Strings 2 instead and I'm really happy with the sound.


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## Vovique (Jan 14, 2017)

Tugboat said:


> I wish they would offer it to everyone, rather than make some bourgeois, exclusionary members-only club thing out of it... This is just my opinion, which I fully realize is unimportant.
> 
> Sounds great, as Spitfire libraries generally always do.


My bet's it will be available as a separate purchase in a month or two.


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## Scamper (Jan 14, 2017)

Consona said:


> So, for the €359 price tag on the site, can anybody buy Masse or is this just some price for those who don't own the whole bundle or what? It's somewhat confusing...


The price tag is supposed to show the value of the library. You can still only get it with the Symphonic bundle for free.


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## khollister (Jan 14, 2017)

markleake said:


> I finally finished downloading it last night. As per comments from @jononotbono it seems well suited to fast deadline work. Here's my observations so far:
> 
> Tutti: A bit difficult to use as they have a lot of dense instrumentation. You can't really get away with playing full chords as it doesn't sound real. The shorts I think will be more useful than the longs.
> 
> ...



Pretty much my initial observations as well. Awesome as a freebie for us with SSO. I view Albion IV & V and now Masse as augmentation for the basic SSS/SSW/SSB/SCS orchestra.


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## Quasar (Jan 14, 2017)

Vovique said:


> My bet's it will be available as a separate purchase in a month or two.



Especially if it continues to receive mixed, qualified reviews. I watched the demo, and while the longs do sound synthy, isn't this just the natural, inevitable consequence of having a large orchestral patch that can be triggered by a single keyboard note?

The sketchpad concept, by definition, provides shortcuts which bypass the complexity and nuance required for deep, "realistic" sounding orchestration, so I don't see how you can have it both ways. Appropriate comparisons might be to Impact Soundworks Orchestral Colors or Cinesamples CineSymphony Lite.


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## jononotbono (Jan 14, 2017)

It's kind of like the Ensembles in SCS. I didn't think I would use them but in fact I sketch all initial String ideas out with the Ensembles and then re do everything with Separate Sections and instruments. The difference in detail is incredible but the amount of time saved by sketching with Ensembles is amazing. I can imagine Masse having a similar affect. I just need to buy SSS and SSW and I can't wait to try it out!


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## robgb (Jan 14, 2017)

Consona said:


> So, for the €359 price tag on the site, can anybody buy Masse or is this just some price for those who don't own the whole bundle or what? It's somewhat confusing...


It seems to be a marketing gimmick. After visiting the site, I was under the impression that since they put a price it could be bought separately. But no. So I think it's simply a way to say "look at this bonus value you're getting when you buy our percussionless orchestra for only $1699!" I could, of course, be wrong. And I'm sure someone will tell me if I am.


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## Baron Greuner (Jan 14, 2017)

Worth remembering ensembles in SCS (which is great btw) is just strings, and smaller string sections at that. The trouble with tutti type patches when they involve large sections OR large sounding instruments like brass, they can get very synthy. Woodwinds in ensembles are always a problem I've found.
Playing chords on a keyboard is a problem.


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## Vanni (Jan 14, 2017)

I absolutely love spitfire libraries and own 2 (would love to buy more), but I agree this masse "pricing" is a little pushing it too much and not reputationally positive.

Pricing something without putting it on sale is absolutely meaningless: why not price it 10k then...a price has a meaning when someone buys the thing, implying that it accepts the valuation: without facing the market there can be no pricing.

I would remove it, it gives me the impression of a company that might try to rip me off (and I absolutely do not think of SA like this, on the contrary I think they are among the very very best).


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## jamwerks (Jan 14, 2017)

Who knows, maybe one day it will go on sale.


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## Raphioli (Jan 15, 2017)

Can anybody confirm release trigger problems with the E2, F2 note within the Masse c-Brass.nki "Super Choir Long" articulation ? The release trigger sound seems to be bigger and stands out too much.
I want to confirm if its a problem on my side, or if any other user is experiencing this as well before submitting a ticket.

Also, are users able to edit and fixed this on their own?
Like edit volumes of individual release samples?
I really love the Super Choir Long articulation, so I really want to fix this.

Thx.


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## mickeyl (Jan 15, 2017)

Raphioli said:


> Can anybody confirm release trigger problems with the E2, F2 note within the Masse c-Brass.nki "Super Choir Long" articulation ? The release trigger sound seems to be bigger and stands out too much.
> I want to confirm if its a problem on my side, or if any other user is experiencing this as well before submitting a ticket.



Same here, tweaking the release slider to either side keeps it under control, but the balance on the default setting should be fixed.


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## markleake (Jan 15, 2017)

Raphioli said:


> Can anybody confirm release trigger problems with the E2, F2 note within the Masse c-Brass.nki "Super Choir Long" articulation ? The release trigger sound seems to be bigger and stands out too much.
> I want to confirm if its a problem on my side, or if any other user is experiencing this as well before submitting a ticket.
> 
> Also, are users able to edit and fixed this on their own?
> ...


Yes, I can confirm the same issue. Both the E and F below middle C have release triggers that are (a lot) too loud when playing at a higher dynamic.

Another issue... I've found many of the articulations in the Strings patch don't seem to have anything other than tree mic samples. All the mics seem to have the same tree samples that play, instead of close or ambient. The only ones I've found so far that don't have this issue are the Giant Epic Long and Short articulations. If you blend together two mics at the top volume level, you just get a louder result. The issue seems to be present both when adjusting the mix via the easy mix or the individual mic mix (ie. it doesn't seem to matter how you adjust the mic mix).

I'm assuming this is not by design? Does anyone else have this same issue?


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## Raphioli (Jan 15, 2017)

mickeyl said:


> Same here, tweaking the release slider to either side keeps it under control, but the balance on the default setting should be fixed.





markleake said:


> Yes, I can confirm the same issue. Both the E and F below middle C have release triggers that are (a lot) too loud when playing at a higher dynamic.



Thanks for confirming =) I'll submit a ticket then.



markleake said:


> Another issue... I've found many of the articulations in the Strings patch don't seem to have anything other than tree mic samples. All the mics seem to have the same tree samples that play, instead of close or ambient.



I can confirm this. I tested it with Cool Strings 1 and Close and Ambient mics sound the same as the Tree.

One other thing I found is a pop/click sound in the "Ligeti Strings" articulations in the b-Strings.nki on notes G2 and G#2. After pressing down the key for a sec or two, I hear a pop/click. 
I've tried reloading the samples and rebooting Kontakt, but so far, this only happen with these two notes within this specific articulation "Ligeti Strings", so I'm going to submit this too.


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## jononotbono (Jan 15, 2017)

Baron Greuner said:


> Worth remembering ensembles in SCS (which is great btw) is just strings, and smaller string sections at that. The trouble with tutti type patches when they involve large sections OR large sounding instruments like brass, they can get very synthy. Woodwinds in ensembles are always a problem I've found.
> Playing chords on a keyboard is a problem.



Fair enough Baron. I really must stop thinking out loud.


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## markleake (Jan 15, 2017)

robgb said:


> It seems to be a marketing gimmick. After visiting the site, I was under the impression that since they put a price it could be bought separately. But no. So I think it's simply a way to say "look at this bonus value you're getting when you buy our percussionless orchestra for only $1699!" I could, of course, be wrong. And I'm sure someone will tell me if I am.


I don't think you are wrong. That's kind of what Spitfire actually said. They just didn't use the word "percussionless" in their statement, or put that kind of anti-marketing slant on it.


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## markleake (Jan 15, 2017)

jononotbono said:


> Fair enough Baron. I really must stop thinking out loud.


If I get what @Baron Greuner is saying, I agree. But don't dismiss Masse because of that though, I think it just means you need to be a bit more careful with how you use it.


Raphioli said:


> Thanks for confirming =) I'll submit a ticket then.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


OK, thanks for verifying. I can confirm your "Ligeti Strings" issue on those notes also. The sample seems to cut out for a 1/4 second and then pop back in.


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## Raphioli (Jan 15, 2017)

markleake said:


> I can confirm your "Ligeti Strings" issue on those notes also. The sample seems to cut out for a 1/4 second and then pop back in.



Thx! I submitted a ticket regarding these bugs.


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## Baron Greuner (Jan 15, 2017)

You shouldn't need to be that careful with anything that's marketed for speed of use.


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## markleake (Jan 15, 2017)

Baron Greuner said:


> You shouldn't need to be that careful with anything that's marketed for speed of use.


I think you do need to be a bit careful, because especially with the Tutti patches you can't play full chords and expect it to sound normal (I mean like a normal orchestral arrangement). As good as the library sounds, it can't do everything for you.


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## Baron Greuner (Jan 15, 2017)

You can never play chords on anything apart from a guitar or piano and ever expect to sound 'normal'.

That was my original point. 

Anything that starts sounding synthy or like an organ should have an APB put out against it.


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## markleake (Jan 15, 2017)

Sorry Baron, I don't really understand what you are saying. You've lost me.


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## Vischebaste (Jan 16, 2017)

It's a nice touch that they've added an imaginary "inc VAT" onto the imaginary price, to make the imaginary price seem like even more of a bargain.


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