Tutorial · · Tomek Piskor-Ślesicki
Creating string textures that move
There are a ton of sampled string textures on the market. Some give you the sound of a certain artist, others the sound of an entire genre. Whether you sketch parts to replace later or use samples because you don't have the real thing, an inspiring sound is what keeps you in the flow.
The idea behind Blisko was a plugin that feels like inviting friends who happen to be virtuoso string players to play on your tracks. It isn't tied to a genre, and it isn't designed to make you sound like somebody else.
It's built to bring that spirit of collaboration into your DAW, and thanks to the vintage signal chain it went through, it sounds like a record right out of the box. Whether you're an experienced strings arranger or starting out, here are four techniques worth trying.
1. Movement, texture, emotion
Blisko is built around three things: movement, texture and emotion. The mod wheel isn't there to draw loudness onto a static performance with a mouse and CC automation.
It works like a session with real musicians. You tell the players how dense and how emotional you want it, and they do what musicians do best: interpret that into music.
Try it. Open Blisko, click the underlined 'Arks' at the top left to see the articulations, and pick any icon from the second or third row. Sul Tasto Pulse is a good place to start.
Play a chord. Sit with it. Then push the mod wheel up. No mod wheel on your controller? Draw it in the DAW instead.
Hear how it opens up? Denser, and more like somebody means it. Movement, texture, emotion.
Now imagine that under a track. A held, subdued texture through the verse, opened up for the chorus. Or a drone shimmering under dialogue, with the scene deciding how far the players lean in.
You can build your own blend of up to three textures and crossfade between them. Click any playing technique name in the middle of the interface and choose from the list. The three small squares just above it set how many layers you're working with, from one to three.
2. Bring in more players
The mod wheel isn't the only thing worth moving while a note rings. Two knobs do as much work.
Players sets the size of the section, from one performer to three. Automate it and you're deciding who is in the room at any moment. Start on a solo line and bring the second and third in as the scene asks for more. Each one thickens the texture, and because they were recorded in a semicircle rather than on a normal stage, it widens too.
Mic Blend moves between close and far. Hard left is the close microphones, right up against the strings. Push it right and the room comes in.
Now put the three together. Hold a simple chord and automate the mod wheel, Players and Mic Blend at once. Reading about it is one thing. Under your hands it's another.
For Blisko we recorded every player separately, so you can easily control how many play on each note - from solo strings, all the way to an intimate chamber ensemble.
3. Cascade the entries
At the bottom right there's a small cascade control for each player. It offsets when that player comes in. Think of it as a delay that repeats nothing: it tells a player to join the note half a bar or a bar after the others. Click OFF and drag right to set it.
Load the Arks patch and press a key to hear it as it comes. Now cascade it: leave the first player at OFF, set the second to half a bar, and the third to a full bar.
Play any note and listen to the performance ripple under your fingertips. Because the players sit apart in the recording, each one arrives from a different place in the stereo picture, so a single held note travels across the room while you hold it.
On the Arks and Rises, velocity controls both the expression of the performance and the length of the note. Play the same cascade with an uneven hand and the rhythm moves with it.
4. Three players, three bows
The three players aren't three copies of one performance. Each bows differently. Player 1 plays normale, the ordinary position. Player 2 bows over the fingerboard, sul tasto. Player 3 plays right up by the bridge, sul ponticello.
If the Italian means nothing to you: where the bow sits between the bridge and the fingerboard decides which of the string's harmonics you hear. Three positions, three different instruments.
To hear that on its own, take the room out first. Move Mic Blend hard left, then in the mixer at the bottom pull the little pan knobs under P1, P2 and P3 (P for Player) back to centre.
Bring Players 2 and 3 down and play a note. Now bring Player 1 down and Player 2 up, and play the same note. Then Player 3, a third character again.
Played together, the three give you one sound with three textures inside it. Kept apart, with the room out and everything centred, they give you three times the articulations. A whole other way to use Blisko: avant-garde solo strings rather than a section.
Marta Zalewska performing intimate string recordings for Blisko textural strings.
Like a collaboration
One of the good things about running a small plugin label on my own is that I get to talk to you. The line that comes up most is that people re-recorded every string part on the record with live players, and left the Blisko ones alone.
I don't think that's only the sound, or the articulations Marta and I chose. I think it's the dialogue. You put something in, you hear it come back interpreted, and you answer that. It's what a live player gives you, and it's the part I've never managed to draw in afterwards.
So: hold a chord and move something while it's still ringing. That's the whole method. Everything above is four places to put your hand. The trial lets you play most of the patches, free.
Plugins mentioned in this article:
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