Review
Chris Hein Horns Pro Complete from Bestservice.de B����� Chris Hein did his homework, now it is our turn. The whole library is very big, very complex with a great number of included instruments and an impressive number of articulations accessible as a key-switch through the lower part of the keyboard. The library uses the Kontakt player as a host, but nevertheless the user interface, or the main instrument window is divided into a few quite complex editors which are ranked in a neat order with plenty of tweaking ability.
instrument should play and what not to achieve semi-realistic results, but I was not sure if that would be enough. I've heard audio demos which sound like a real brass section with all those dirty details and was a bit skeptical as to whether I would ever be able to recreate something similar just by playing my poor old keyboard without being a brass player. I watched carefully all the included video clips, a lot of them, learning everything about articulations and how to use them, how to change or add effects, how to tweak and adapt even the smallest part of the library, every small detail representing all that we can do with the library. All this stuff even increased my fear. The first day of my Horns Pro Complete experience looked like a total disaster.
At first I thought – Holly ham with all the chickens, how do I manage all this? I've programmed brass in the past, also over all those years I've co-operateed with a good number of brass players, but I'm not one of them. I know how a brass section sounds and also I'm aware of the role that a particular A���� wind instrument has in a brass band and I have some very basic So, I wrote to Chris to ask if there knowledge about what particular are any midi files to go along with 26
the library, to see if this would be a "Mission Impossible" for me or not. The same day I got his answer with a link to three songs which were composed to show all the abilities of C. H. Horns Pro Compact, which is just a part of the Complete package. Although Compact is not Complete and Kontakt 4 is not Kontakt 5 I loaded at least the midi files, loaded the Kontakt player and then a few basic brass instruments, Solo Trumpet, Trombone, Saxophone... after that I tried to figure which instrument should be used for which particular track. Trial and error, but thankfully after fifteen minutes, I got decent results. First things first. I started with the trumpet. Even with the basic sustain articulation it sounded surprisingly realistic, especially if you use it with an appropriate background playing a melody that fits the instrument. It sounds far away from the programmed brass instruments that we are used to