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[Kyle Preston]

From the film "Enemy At The Gates",

is the song. It's the aggressively picked/plucked instrument that carries the melody for the first 35ish seconds. It's one of those instruments I've heard in so many different contexts but I'm not sure how to recreate it. I'm assuming it's Eastern European or Russian, maybe just a violin played with a pick? Anyone know?

[ArnoldSavary]

Isn't that just a mandolin?

And if we're playing the instrument game, I have a question too:


at 1:40 onwards, what is happening with the chords exactly? I can hear a piano on there, and a bass probably, but I'm not sure what's playing the high notes. Maybe an electric guitar?

[Kyle Preston]

After doing some more detective work, I'm pretty sure it's a Domra, a Russian mandolin, demonstrated beautifully

; my god she can wail!

Wow, beautiful Man Of Tai Chi song. Totally did not notice it when I saw the film....shame on me! As far as that high part that plays with the bass and piano, it sounds like a synth pad with a higher delay output than input, which kind of mimics the Ostinato technique. Kind of what's used heavily in this Coldplay (apologies, first band I could think of)

.

[rj]

this thread is literally only five threads below yours as of this writing

[ZackParrish]

More likely a balalaika than a domra. Balalaika, considering it's used more frequently in folk Russian music, and usually played with a lot of tremolo picking. The tone of it is pretty much on point with the sound of the instrument in the opening of the track you linked...

[Kyle Preston]

Thanks Zack,

The Balalaika seems to really match the timbre of the instrument.  Nice detective skills; all this talk of Russian instruments makes me want to spend the day on Wikipedia doing loads of research.

[ArnoldSavary]

This isn't so much a "what instrument is it" question, more like a "how can I get this sound" question.



How can I get such a sweet sounding contrabass / drums combo?

For the contrabass, at the moment I'm using Kontr from the Acoustic Samples free collection. It sounds okay but are there any better ones?
About the drums, I don't actually have anything to emulate drums played with a brush. I've recently heard of the "Roots" expansion for Superior Drummer which might be pretty cool. Are there any good sounding alternatives?

[ZackParrish]

http://www.orangetreesamples.com/corebass-pear-upright-bass <-- Perhaps this might interest you for the bass...

For drums...
Battery 4 has some nice brush kit sounds, can't say how anything outside of that will sound since it's the only percussion set I've come across in the past 10 years that has any extensive sampling of brushed hits included with it. :\

http://www.native-instruments.com/en/products/komplete/drums/battery-4/

If you want free stuff... can't help you there.