EastWest Quantum Leap Gypsy – Part 1

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EastWest Quantum Leap Gypsy – Part 1

Posted by Peter Alexander on March 27th, 2009 3 Comments Printer-Friendly

One of the mistakes that’s easy to make about Gypsy, and I know because I made it, is to wonder why you’d ever want a library to recreate Gypsy music. Thinking that way can cause you to overlook this powerful and highly useful library loaded with colors to spice up existing orchestrations or add to new ones.

What’s particularly impressive about Gypsy is the outstanding collection of guitars useful in any style from jazz to country picking. If you needed to financially justify to yourself why you should purchase Gypsy, the guitar collection, along with the solo violin, are enough.

I make this assessment having compared the guitars within Gypsy (see the list below) to that which is available from other libraries including Omnisphere, which also has a very strong collection.

Since I have most all of the solo stringed instrument libraries, including the Solo Strings in the Vienna Instruments, I can attest that there’s not another solo violin like this one. In fact, the depth of tonal quality reminded me of Howard Shore’s use of the Hardingfele in The Two Towers (LOTR).

What can be produced with this library is quite something. There are no words that can adequately describe it which is why I’ve made Part 1 of this review a musical presentation of the instruments and styles inherently represented within Gypsy.

Here’s a list of the instruments that come with Gypsy.

Violin (true legato intervals) classical and gypsy style

Classical Guitar

Spanish Steel String Guitar

Flamenco Guitar

Django Style Guitar

Campana Accordion

Silvestri Accordion

Excelsior Accordion

Bandoneon (tango accordion)

Trombone (true legato intervals) classical and gypsy style

Cimbalom (Eastern European Hammered Dulcimer)

Flamenco Dancer foot stomps and castanets

Gypsy percussion

Fast Overview
Accordion Article – The instrument is sometimes considered a “one-man-band”, as it needs no accompanying instrument; the performer normally plays the melody on buttons or keys on the right-hand manual, and the accompaniment—consisting of bass and pre-set chord buttons—on the left-hand manual.

Campana, Silvestri and Excelsior are all individual accordion makers.

Accordion Links

Bandoneon
The Bandoneon page
From Wikipedia

The Cimbalon
The cimbalon is an amazingly versatile instrument used in film, rock and modern composition including the Hary Janos Suite by Kodaly. One of the great surprises was “discovering” cymbalomist Marius Preda and his Mission Cymbalom proejct. His jazz performing on this instrument are both amazing and inspirational.

The Acoustic Guitars
There are three: classical, flamenco and Spanish steel-stringed guitar.

Classical Guitar
Classical Guitar Article
Classical Guitarist Homepage
Classical Guitar Radio from Sky.FM
Classical Guitar MIDI Archives

Flamenco Guitar
Main Article
Flemenco Guitar Homepage
Flamenco Guitar Transcriptions
Flamenco Guitar Maker

Steel String Acoustic Guitar

http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Steel-string_acoustic_guitar

Django Reinhardt
Bio
Wikipedia
Django and Gypsy Jazz

Flamenco Dancing
Flamenco Dance History
Wikipedia

MUSICAL CONSIDERATIONS
Just scanning the links and watching a few videos should demonstrate how much you can produce with Gypsy. Suffice it to say, you can go as deep as you want to go. At the same time, there’s also the great challenge in learning just how to produce effectively with Gypsy.

Because there is so much here, I feel there’s something missing. And it’s the same thing that’s missing in libraries from other companies including Best Service’s Ethno World 4 - the romance of learning and doing.

Gypsy is a library that just cries out for an Apple-styled MacWorld-like presentation visually demonstrating what’s possible and how to get there. This library even has two different “Senorita” dancers and castanets. In your mind’s eye, can’t you just imagine a split screen with the dancer on the left and a keyboardist on the right mimicking the dance pattern!

In the absence of that I’ve tried to do the next best thing.

YOUTUBE VIDEOS
In the absence of the presentation I’ve wished for, below are a number of YouTube videos I researched that give you a basic overview of what’s possible to produce if you go the distance and really get into this library.

Now, is it necessary to learn castanet and flamenco dancing patterns that you can execute on a MIDI keyboard controller? No. But why not!

GYPSY VIOLIN
In watching these videos, you’ll see great close-ups of violin fingering technique. The broad sound of the Violin included in Gypsy enables you to capture many of these playing techniques. An excellent reference is The Strings Position Booklet.

Sandor Lakatos