Quiet Music has released Serenity, a freeware virtual instrument for playing relaxing pads and soothing audio textures. The instrument is available in VST, VST3, and AU plugin formats for compatible DAWs on PC and Mac.

MangledVerb by Eventide. MangledVerb combines reverb and distortion to give you a. Aethereal by Psychic Modulation. Features include over 100 sounds, 4 oscillators each with. 2010-07-17: Sophia has made a universal build of Ambience for Mac OSX with support for both 32-bit and 64-bit systems! 2007-10-12: Sophia has made a universal build of Ambience for Mac OSX! 2006-04-25: New version of MjCompressor released for both OSX VST and Win32 VST. The new version is a result of all the feedback I have got, especially from. VST 2.4, VST3, Audio Unit and AAX Native plug-in formats; 64-bit DAWs are recommended (32-bit is supported) 500 MB hard disk space is required; At least 8 GB of main memory is recommended; A dual core i5 processor or above is recommended; Host-based iLok licenses are not supported.

When I was a kid, I used to have a CD of dolphin sounds. I don’t know what sort of weirdly specific cult my parents were into at the time, but I remember loving the thing. Relaxing dolphin sounds wouldn’t usually be the sort of “music” one would listen to as an adult, but something about those dolphins clicking and squeaking over a distant, low drone really resonated with me.

See also: Free Synthesizer VST Plugins

It’s from this New Age music tradition of mashing foley with ambient music that Quiet Music’s virtual instrument called Serenity comes from.

Quiet Music’s offering boasts ten different layers of sound. Four of them are pads and textures made with Behringer’s DeepMind synth, and there are six layers of field recordings recorded at 24-bit kHz which include crickets, bird noises, wind, rain, waves, and rustling leaves.

For what it is, the Serenity plugin is surprisingly full-featured. It takes full advantage of the Maize Sampler, the sample-based platform that was used to develop the Serenity plugin.

Serenity has an ADSR envelope, an LFO, multiple audio outputs, and a built-in reverb effect that really helps the whole thing come together. The field recordings can be triggered by pressing C-1 to F-1 and the synth sounds fit perfectly, even with more dissonant chords.

I was honestly surprised by how quickly I could come up with pleasing results when playing Serenity. It almost feels silly writing this, but it was genuinely calming.

While you probably won’t be using this virtual instrument to write your latest EDM banger, I can almost see Serenity having a very specific use case.

It is like one of those plugins that’s just a notepad. A long session of writing and mixing music can not only get emotionally taxing, but ear fatigue can creep in before you even realize it. Having something like Serenity on hand is an easy and effective way to give yourself a bit of respite.

It’s also very useful if you ever need to imagine that you’re hiding from the rain at Brian Eno’s private aviary.

More info:Quiet Music Serenity(167 MB download size, ZIP archive containing the plugin, 32-bit & 64-bit VST/VST3/AU plugin formats for Windows & macOS)

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If you’ve been producing music for a while, you probably know that a lot of the commercial guitar VSTs or libraries out there are pretty expensive and not always easy to use. Although I own a few commercial guitar libraries, I also wanted to see what free guitar VSTs and sample libraries are available these days. I have to admit I was surprised by the number of interesting instruments I found. So, I’ve put together this list to talk about the best ones.

For this article, I looked at both acoustic and electric guitars but left out guitar amps and other effect plugins (I will cover these in an upcoming article).

Free Acoustic Guitar Plugins

Ample Sound: Ample Guitar M II Lite

Format: AU, VST, AAX, RTAS / 32 bit + 62 bit
OS: Mac, Windows

Audio examples:

Ample Sound is a Beijing-based company that has been creating guitar and bass VSTs since 2011. The Ample Guitar M II series aims “to bring the Martin D-41 Acoustic Guitar sound to your studio.” Luckily for us, the company also released a free lite version of the instrument, which comes with a reduced sample rate, fewer articulations and features and a lower sample count than the original (by now, version III has been released already).

This doesn’t prevent Ample Guitar M II Lite from being the best sounding (non-Kontakt) acoustic guitar in this list, though. The samples sound full and lively and can be triggered directly through MIDI (or your DAW) as well as through a built-in sequencer, the “strummer.”

The strummer makes it super easy to build patterns out of single notes, up and down strokes and mutes. Additionally, there are a bunch of effects and features available to change the tone. One of my favorite features is the doubling switch, which adds width to the instrument in an instant.

Another particular useful feature of Ample Guitar M II Lite is that it shows you which string corresponds to the note you’re playing. This quickly helped me create more realistic arpeggios.

If you also use Guitar Pro Tab, you can even import your tabs into Ample Guitar M II Lite. Note that you are limited to the first four frets of each string when you’re using the lite version.

There are so many fully functioning knobs and switches in this free plugin that I didn’t manage to get to all of them in my 45 minutes of playing around with it. What more can you ask for in a free guitar?

You can get Ample Guitar M II Lite on the Ample Sound website.

This is a quick introduction to the instrument:

DSK Music: Dynamic Guitars

Format: AU, VST / 32 bit + 64 bit
OS: Mac, Windows

Audio examples:

This guitar VST has gotten a lot of attention lately, especially since the release of LifeStyleDidIt’s video “I FOUND THE BEST FREE GUITAR VST” (see below). DSK Music is a project by a Spaniard named Víctor who has been making hundreds of free virtual instruments since 2002.

DynamicGuitars contains three different instruments: an acoustic guitar, a nylonguitar and a steel guitar. It also offers control over the envelope of thesamples as well as the dynamic range and the voice mode (poly, mono, legato). All the included guitars feel smooth, warm andthick but could use a little EQ action for clarity.

In this video, you can see the plugin in use:

You can download DSK Dynamic Guitars here.

Pettinhouse Free Acoustic Guitars

Pettinhouse is a project by Andrea Pettinao. The company sells a wide variety of guitars and also offers a handful of free guitar sample libraries. Let’s take a look at them!

FreeAcousticGuitar

Format: Kontakt 3 and higher (full version required!)

Audio examples:

Free AcousticGuitar is a simple but well-recorded and programmed acoustic guitar Kontakt library. The samples are loaded as a multi and are separated into attack+ sustain, releases and fret noise sounds and come in different velocities. The samples are well mixed and sound wonderfully natural.

FreeClassicGuitar

Format: Kontakt 5 and higher (full version required!)

Audio examples:

When you open the free version of Pettinhouse’s Classic Guitar, you’re getting a multi consisting of two instruments: classic guitar and noises. These work well together and offer a realistic and nice warm sound.

Yummy Beats: Modest Guitar

Format: Kontakt 5 and higher (full version required!)

Audio examples:

Yummy Beats is a platform for drums, loops and Kontakt instruments. You can also find a few free instruments on this site, including the free Modest Guitar. This Kontakt library delivers a present sound with round robin and three articulations: acoustic guitar, flageolets and fx guitar. Unfortunately, I found that the fx guitar produced noticeable crackle sounds (might have been my setup!). However, my favorite part is the flageolets with their well-rounded tone, anyway.

I found the steps to get Modest Guitar a little complicated. You have to open a Yummy Beats account, go to this page and enter the unlock code that you find here. If you’re looking for a free, quality flageolet sound, this is a good instrument to try out, though.

Here’s an example of a song that use

Ambience Vst 64 Bit