SPITFIRE AUDIO Ricotti Mallets

Tuned mallet percussion, performed by a legend

A beautiful selection of tuned percussion instruments — Marimba, Glockenspiel, Xylophone and Crotales — performed by master of percussion Frank Ricotti. Expertly sampled on our dry stage at Spitfire Studios, we give you a definitive collection of mallets with the greatest amount of control.

Frank Ricotti is one of the most in demand percussionists in the world. He has played on innumerable film scores, including Inception, Skyfall, Twilight, Madagascar, Interstellar, Narnia, Fantastic Mr Fox and The Dark Knight.

An encyclopedia of mallet instruments, expertly recorded in Spitfire's dry space to give you a choice of sonic possibilities. Each instrument is super deep sampled with multiple round robins, dynamic layers, beaters, bows and articulations. A microscopic study of these instruments is also provided by numerous microphone channels to give you various different perspectives, mixing options and sonic aesthetics.

Marimba

The marimba is a direct descendant of the xylophone and looks very much like its ancestor. Although composers have only written extensively for this instrument since 1950, it has recently started to come into its own as part of the contemporary orchestra. The playing technique is identical to the xylophone’s, but the marimba’s mellower, deeper sound has generated a different kind of music.

Glockenspiel

The Glockenspiel is not easy to record well or make truly convincing, so our extensive array of microphones gives you choices beyond plugins to get the sound you're looking for, from mellow and bell like to bright and sparkling.

Crotales

Crotales are small bronze disks arranged in a keyboard style layout to produce chromatic pitches. As one of the brightest tuned percussion instruments, they will cut through even the biggest orchestral arrangement, for moments of magical beauty.

Xylophone

A bright sounding wooden barred instrument similar to the Marimba. Whether it be scaling a staircase in the Tom & Jerry cartoons, providing the top end for an awesome systems percussion session, or providing a darker malevolence in a Jon Brion score, a mallet collection would be incomplete without this primordial tuned percussion instrument.

The overview panel

This is the main interface for melodic instruments. Its default view displays all available playing techniques, has a simple microphone mixer and includes the main feature controllers.

General controls panel

This view allows further in-depth control of the instrument, showing all available signals and feature controllers, as well as the ability to purge techniques from memory to reduce system usage.

The Ostinatum

In this view you can add notes to a pattern sequencer, select which key it triggers on and then play for instant ostinato creation. It’s like an arpeggiator on a synthesiser.