In this review, we’re going to find out together if Hans Zimmer Strings can deliver what its large-scale marketing campaign promised and how much of HZ’s magic is really hiding in this unique new library.įor Hans Zimmer Strings, Spitfire Audio adopted the film composer’s concept of capturing unusually large groups of instruments to achieve massive and hyper-realistic sounds. We got our hands on a copy of Spitfire Audio‘s controversially discussed Hans Zimmer Strings and put it to the test. As the godfather of orchestral sampling himself states: “ The true magic of sampling is when you are creating something that’s impossible in reality.”įor the freshly introduced Hans Zimmer Strings, this meant gathering not less than 344 of Britain’s top string players to capture their large-group performances in London’s iconic AIR Lyndhurst Hall. Having scored iconic soundtracks for Oscar-winning films like Gladiator, Pirates Of The Caribbean, The Dark Knight, Interstellar or Dunkirk, Zimmer is well-known for integrating electronic and sampled sounds with traditional orchestra in order to achieve his trademark bombastic, larger-than-life sound. This is one I’ll recommend without a moment’s hesitation.As probably one of their most ambitious projects to date, award-winning British sample library developer Spitfire Audio just released an orchestral string library that carries the name of one of the best and most successful film composers of our time: Hans Zimmer Strings. Yes, its sweetspot is cinematic scoring, but those beautiful samples excel in seasoning virtually any music with striking percussive elements, be it subtle or overt. Between the mic positioning and the reverb amount you can finely control the width and size of each sample so while you might have it sounding cavernous for cinematic passages, there’s nothing stopping you from winding it back and throwing a darbuka or surdo on that folk acoustic song you’re working on.Īfter having this library at my disposal for several months, it has found its way onto every track I’ve produced without fail. The reverb is gigantic and lush - no wimpy room verbs here. There’s a clarity and intentionality in each hit from the softest to the loudest velocity. Each is sampled with up to nine round robins. There’s plenty of ‘standard’ stuff too, like epic cymbal hits and snare rolls. You’ll find darbukas, tombeks, dhols, boobams, tamtams, surdos and more.

These fed into a Neve 88R console then into HDX and Prism converters at 192k.

The Percussion Library is essentially a re-release, combining HZ01 and HZ03 inside a redesigned GUI with extra manipulation options.Īll samples (nearly 50GB of them) were recorded through 96 microphones from AIR Studios’ arsenal, with up to 60 used at any given point. Hans has previously teamed up with UK-based sampled instrument developer Spitfire Audio to release Hans Zimmer Piano and HZ02 (Jason Bonham playing his DW Vistalite kits at legendary locations in LA). Given just how big a role percussion plays in the majority of Zimmer’s scores - even assembling his own league of 12 extraordinary drummers for the Man of Steel soundtrack - a percussion-focused pack is a welcome addition. Hans Zimmer Percussion Library is exactly that. If his name is attached to something, you know it’s going to be big, bold and dramatic.

With a seemingly bottomless creative wellspring, Zimmer is renown for his emotive and dramatic scores that weave sound to sight with the bombast of a floor-to-ceiling tapestry. Hans Zimmer is the godfather of modern Hollywood film scoring.

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