With the holiday season around the corner, the number of new hardware and software synths is sure to increase. From new releases that are now available at a discounted price to upcoming releases available for pre-order here’s what’s new from Soundiron, ISLA Instruments, and Behringer.

Harpsichord
By Soundiron

Price: $49 (Regular price $69)

Soundiron has announced the availability of Harpsichord, a library built for the full version of Kontakt 6.2.2 or later. For those unfamiliar with this unique instrument, it featured in a lot of Renaissance and Baroque compositions with the height of its popularity lasting from the 16th to mid-18th century. 

For this library, Soundiron sampled a prestigious 18th-century Italian Bizzi Harpsichord. Its owner, Cladia Ferror, is an acclaimed teacher and renaissance performer in Europe. Soundiron carefully recorded the instrument in a warm studio based in the beautiful countryside of San Raffaele Cimena, Italy, to preserve the unique sound characteristics of both the instruments and the room. Using two stereo mic positions they faithfully sampled every interesting sound they could get out of the harpsichord, including the piano and forte registers, glisses, slides, percussive impacts, plucks, scrapes, and taps. 

Specifications
 

• Piano & Forte registers, Glisses, Percussion, SFX in two mic positions: Bridge, Soundboard
• 20 ambient pads and evolving drones created from the source content
• 22 Powerful Kontakt .nki instrument presets
• 24-bit / 48 kHz uncompressed PCM wav samples
• 20 Custom Sound-Designed FX and Ambient presets
• 3,448 stereo samples
• 5.37 GB Installed
• Flexible and intuitive multi-layer user interface controls, with LFO, filter, glide, and arpeggiator
• Full FX rack with convolution reverb with custom rooms, halls, chambers & FX environments

Check out the video below for a look at all the sounds and features of the new Soundiron Harpsichord library and visit the official website (https://soundiron.com/products/harpsichord) for more information or purchase a copy.

Caladan
By ISLA Instruments

Price: $949 - $1,149 (Pre-order) 

ISLA Instruments has announced that they are opening tier Caladin synthesizer for early-bird pre-orders. The pre-order price includes the Caladan Synthesizer base unit with either two or four Improved Parva voice cards as well as a power cable. 

For those unfamiliar with Caladan, it is an expandable 8-part analog/digital multi-timbral desktop synthesizer module featuring voice cards for multiple synthesizer engines. According to ISLA Instruments, it shares much of its DNA with the S2400 desktop sampler and the Futuresonus Parva MPE Synth, released in 2015. 

Caladan has its own internal digital synth engine even without any voice cards installed. It supports SoundFont and SFZ multisample formats along with the ability to run a plugin-based synthesizer in VST, LV2, and CLAP formats. Caladan can be any type of synthesizer thanks to the voice cards and it features internal slots for up to eight of them. ISLA Instruments has stated that other designers and developers will be able to create synthesizer cards for use in Caladan as the voice card API will be open-sourced and development kits will be made available. 

Specifications

• MPE Support
• RGB led rings enabling simultaneous viewing of parameters across different voices/cards per knob.
• USB Host and Device ports, both class-compliant for MIDI controllers
• Standard MIDI DIN In/Out/Thru
• 4 x independent CV & Gate inputs
• 8 x Stereo output busses
• Main & Sub Mix outputs
• High-quality steel/aluminum enclosure, comparable in build/looks to the S2400 (and compatible with the same side panels for wood lovers)
• Universal mains powered (100-250v AC)

Check out the video below to see the first audio tests for Caladan in action and visit the official website to pre-order (https://www.islainstruments.com/product/caladan/). ISLA Instruments expects Caladan to be shipping by July 2024.

Chaos and Vector

By Behringer

Behringer has announced a few new products, such as the Victor quad vector morphing oscillator module and Chaos analog random sampler module for Eurorack. The Victor boasts four vector oscillators that can be manipulated and shaped by moving the joystick. It offers up to 128 waveforms, which makes it extremely versatile, and features an inspiring OLED oscilloscope for waveform visualization. Behringer describes Choas as an “amazing powerhouse to create random rhythm and musical ideas” with its sound engines based on Mutable Instruments Marbles. 

Viktor Specifications

• 4 Vector oscillators featuring wavetable synthesis with 128 waveforms
• Authentic reproduction of original Prophet VS * sound engine
• Creative morphing of all 4 oscillators via joystick
• Inspiring OLED oscilloscope for waveform visualization
• Synthesis models designed for pitched sounds like ripping leads, lush chords, and ethereal pads
• Morph control to seamlessly change the character of the selected sound sources
• Separate joystick CV outputs for external control
• USB connector for easy firmware update
• Eurorack specs: 14 HP, 130 mA +12 V, 10 mA -12 V

Chaos Specifications

• Amazing powerhouse to create random rhythm and musical ideas
• Sound engines based on Mutable Instruments * Marbles
• t generator creates a ”warped“ clock source by simulating the missteps of a musician trying to play to a click
• X generator provides 3 random CV sources, clocked by the t generator
• Memory function recalls the order of each preceding clock aberration, voltage, or rhythm
• 2 separate audio outs for both the main sound and a dynamic variant
• Eurorack specs: 16 HP, 70 mA +12 V, 40 mA -12 V