Zak Sound releases Ibiskus, a FREE rare wind instrument plugin for macOS and Windows.
Sometimes the best ideas we have are the ones we don’t see coming, and there’s an element of that in the creation of Ibiskus. The devs at Zak Sound saw an opportunity to turn a random find at a local market into a versatile virtual instrument.
The random find was a small collection of rare wind instruments (pan flutes and whistles).
Although unusual, if we take something like the Siku (Peruvian panpipe), it’s a sound we likely know better than we think.
The Siku is the authentic sound of Andean culture and can be pretty magical.
Unfortunately, it’s also common to hear buskers on busy city streets slowly chipping away at that culture by blasting out tunes like Celine Dion’s My Heart Will Go On.
Sometimes, people think the sound is limited to traditional Andean music or the cheesiest of instrumental cover versions.
But, the Siku and other flutes/whistles lend themselves very well to a wide range of Ambient music, lo-fi beats, and Hip Hop, amongst other things.
Ibiskus is a collection of 23 sounds recorded through experimentation with these instruments. The sounds are split into two categories: Shorts and Endless.
Shorts are staccato articulations, and Endless presets are looped long notes that are perfect for cinematic soundscapes.
Between the two categories, you can create everything from choppy/stabby lines to atmospheric textures.
The plugin features controls for Lowpass filter, Reverb, Delay, Chorus, Expression LFO, and Envelope.
With the right idea and a little tweaking, you’ll steer clear of the cheesy cover version territory. Although, if you are determined to play Celine Dion, no amount of tweaking will help you.
If you make music in any of the genres mentioned above, or anything at all with a chilled, ambient feel, it’s worth giving Ibiskus a shot.
If you haven’t tried Chair Audio’s Exc!te Cymbal yet, it’s worth giving that a go, too!
Ibiskus is available in AU and VST3 formats for macOS (El Capitan to Ventura) and Windows (7, 8, 10, and 11).
Download: Ibiskus
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1 Comment
Mr Snowman
onVery nice! Together, they provide a lovely mix of very pleasing tones. The combination of long and short samples is great too. Add in some useful FX parameters and a nice GUI, all for the very reasonable price of free … what’s not to like! A big shout out to Zak Sound :-) Thank you