Urakami Pipe Organ Samples

Key features

• The real pipe organ
  • the 1996 Mander pipe organ from the Urakami Cathedral, Nagasaki, Japan
  • 52 stops, 3 manuals (with 61 keys) and pedal (with 32 keys)
  • 3 tremulants (tremolos)
• The recording
  • All stops were sampled chromatically
  • Advanced Pipe Organ Measurements (APM)
• The sample set
  • 48 kHz / 24-bit format, 4-channel surround samples
  • Natural sound image — the samples authentically preserve all spatial information
  • Multiple loops and releases per sample/key stroke
  • Sampled Tremulants
  • One-click assignable keyboards to divisions supporting your console configuration
  • Optional organ engine sounds and noises
  • Touch sensitive keyboard noises
  • Multiple pages and touchscreen-optimized for 4:3 landscape displays
    • 4K resolution landscape and FHD portrait graphical interface included for 16:9 displays
• Shipping
  • download

Details

Urakami Pipe Organ Samples is a fully playable, freely configurable, intuitively manageable and MIDI-controllable virtual pipe organ for the Hauptwerk™ virtual pipe organ software, for PC and Macintosh computers, delivering the sound of the 52-stop Mander French romantic-style pipe organ from the Urakami Cathedral, Nagasaki, Japan, to your computer.

The sample set

The real pipe organ has been entirely virtualized, including all sounds of all of its pipes and all functions. With the KeyboardMass functionality, the inertia of the mechanics of the key action is modeled. By providing the additional feature of adjustability the response speed of the pipe speech when a key is released can be changed to your taste. Thus you can make the keyboards feel very heavy by increasing the slider values, or extremely responsive by decreasing.

Sample format

The final sample set has been made available in 48 kHz / 24-bit 4-channel surround. Multiple lengthy loops were carefully selected for each sound sample.

Acoustics - multiple perspectives and adjustability

The natural room acoustics representing the recording conditions are embedded in the samples with multiple release sample layers; the acoustics heard in the sample set corresponds to the sound heard in the Urakami Cathedral. The sample set is recorded in a way that it is also fully compatible with dry acoustic spaces and additional convolution reverberation.

Multiple recording locations were used to combine the sound of the sampling library. The "organ" sound obtained from closer to the organ supports the semi-dry recording approach, meaning that it is perfectly applicable for professional installations both dry and reverberant places. The church acoustic perspective is more reverberant and captures the sound as perceived in the nave. By using the provided sliders on the graphical interface of the virtual pipe organ and mixing the two acoustic perspectives you can achieve a balance that fits your actual taste or purpose whether it is professional performance or practicing.

Multiple release samples and multiple loops

Multiple loops and release samples are provided for each sample. Triggered to play back randomly, this elaborate looping results in sustained notes of unmatched realism. The loops were calculated in a well-planned way, yielding both shorter and longer loops for each sample. Multiple release samples provide realistic, note-off-triggered pre-recorded reverberation for different lengths of notes. For example, a short note, with sound not fully developed will produce a different reverberation than a long sustained note. This quality is preserved in the sample library by providing multiple release sample layers.

Sampled tremulants

Stops with the tremulant engaged were recorded separately on this pipe organ. This model is providing the real tremulant sound of the organ of the Urakami Cathedral, Nagasaki.

Advanced Graphical User Interface (GUI)

The graphical interface of this organ was carefully modeled by employing hundreds of photographs and measurement in full 3D and the interface was implemented in a non-orthographical, perspective console view that is fully photo-realistic and operational at the same time. The keys move while you play, and every button responds appropriately to your actions. Both multiple- and single-screen operation is possible: the large number of stops can be operated conveniently from a wide choice of interface pages displayable on multiple touchscreens. Alternatively, 4K resolution landscape and FHD portrait graphical interface provided for 16:9 displays.

Availability and shipping

Urakami Pipe Organ Samples is available now in download.

Editions

Feature type	Feature	Trial Edition	Professional Edition
General features	Stops	14	52
	Keyboard compass (manual/pedal)	61/32	61/32
Acoustics	Multichannel format	surround 4.0	surround 4.0
	Available acoustics	church, organist	church, organist
	Adjustable microphone perspectives
	Combination memory for adjustable microphone perspectives
Samples	Chromatically sampled
	Multiple loops
	Multiple releases
	Tremulants	sampled	sampled
	Engine noise optional
	Touch sensitive tracker noise
Graphics	Single touch screen support
	Multiple touch screen support
	Portrait screen support
	High resolution support (4K landscape, FHD portrait)
	Neutral view support
	All functions MIDI & GUI controllable
On-screen combination actions	General combinations
	General combination memory frames	512	512
	Divisional combinations
	Divisional combination memory frames	8	8
	PerformanceSequencer™, a combination action for organ settings
	Remembering sliders
Advanced features and helpers	Single-click keyboard to division assignment
	Additive crescendo and EasyCrescendo™ programming
	Programmable crescendo banks	4	4
	Dynamic KeyboardMass™ feature
Swell	Swellboxes	1	1
	Swell pedals	1	1
	All divisions enclosed
Voicing	Advanced on-screen voicing
Size	Download size (GB)	16,2	50
Delivery	Delivery	Download	Download

The organ and the church

Urakami Cathedral (also known as the Immaculate Conception Cathedral)

In 1867, the catholics of Urakami who had returned after having been banished from the city, purchased the piece of land where the residence of the former representative of Nagasaki village stood and in 1880 built a temporary church there. In 1895, the parish priest, Father Theodore Fraineu, started construction work on the red brick Romanesque cathedral. A consecration ceremony was held in 1914, and later in 1925 the belfry-towers were finally completed. At that time the cathedral was said to be the largest in Asia.

Unfortunately, the tragic events of WWII completely destroyed it, when the atomic bomb hit Nagasaki on the 9th of August, 1945. The reconstruction of the building was completed in 1959 and then remodeled with brick tiles to its current form resembling the original neo-roman style in 1980. The cathedral has a central role not just in the city, but also in the region.

The organ

The organ of the Urakami Cathedral was built by the organ building company of John Mander, in 1996. According to the builder, instead of a French nineteenth century appearance, the console was given curved and terraced jambs that were conceived as part of the contemporary design of the organ as a whole. The organ builders were faced with a unique challenge as the spatial restrictions of the cathedral did not make a conventional, horizontal layout possible. Instead, they needed to  build the instrument in a vertical layout, which meant installing the Récit with a reasonably higher wind pressure behind the Grand Orgue. The Pédale ranks are situated on the sides of the organ.

The organ has 52 stops on 3 manuals, a pedalboard, and a 64-stage combination action.

Specification of the Mander organ at the Urakami Cathedral, Nagasaki

Specification of the Trial Edition

System requirements and recommendations

It is intended (and required) that the Urakami Pipe Organ Samples be operated within Hauptwerk, a virtual pipe organ host software application (purchased separately). The Urakami Pipe Organ Samples work with Hauptwerk V and later, and a valid license for Hauptwerk is required to load the organ.

The Trial Edition requires the presence of a Hauptwerk USB key / iLok key with a valid license for Hauptwerk V.

For further information, please refer to Hauptwerk's detailed requirements on Hauptwerk's website.

Detailed RAM and polyphony guidelines

Hauptwerk loads all samples in the computer's RAM, with several loading options available according to your computer's specification. For wet sample sets offering built-in long reverberation, most of the RAM usage is due to the release samples. If you have convolution or other reverberation technology available, less RAM and polyphony will allow you to load and play the full organ. If you have more RAM, you can load the full organ with the release samples and enjoy the original sound. We recommend using Hauptwerk's built-in lossless memory compression to reduce the loading size. Below we have summarised the RAM requirements with their corresponding quality options.

RAM requirements for the Urakami Organ
Edition	Loading setup	Bits	Loops	Acoustics	Releases	Required RAM	Computer RAM*
Professional Edition
Recommended	Full organ, 52 stops	24	all	original, 4-channels	all	62 GB	72 GB
					single	39.3 GB	48 GB
For convolution reverb					250 ms (all)	33 GB	40 GB
	Full organ, 52 stops	24	all	original, 2-channels (front)	all	31 GB	40 GB
					single	24.1 GB	32 GB
For convolution reverb					250 ms (all)	22.4 GB	32 GB
	Full organ, 52 stops	16	all	original, 4-channels	all	38.2 GB	48 GB
					single	25.8 GB	32 GB
For convolution reverb					120 ms (single)	20.8 GB	24 GB
	Full organ, 52 stops	16	all	original, 2-channels (front)	all	21.4 GB	24 GB
					single	17.9 GB	24 GB
For convolution reverb					120 ms (single)	16.8 GB	24 GB
Trial Edition
	All 14 stops	16	all	original, 4-channels	all	15.6 GB	24 GB
	All 14 stops	16	all	original, 2-channels (front)	all	11 GB	16 GB

*The Required RAM column above is the memory requirement that also includes Hauptwerk™'s own memory consumption, so this represents the RAM the sample set and Hauptwerk™ together will use, but some additional RAM may be required for the operating system itself, (not included in these figures). The measures were obtained on a Windows-based computer. The Computer RAM column shows a recommendation on the amount of RAM your computer should have as a minimum for a given loading setup assuming that some additional RAM is used by the operating system. This value might be different for each case so we recommend the maximum possible amount of RAM installable in your computer for this sample set, except if you are working with external reverberation or in a dry acoustic environment. Also note that on the Mac you may require more RAM in the computer than the value indicated above, due to the Mac OSX RAM allocation behaviour. Also note that Windows is capable of loading more content than your available RAM, loading (paging) the additional sample data to your hard drive, reading it once the sound is needed (played). In some cases this will cause glitches in the sound when played in real time since the hard drive is slower to access than the computer's RAM, but makes the full library usable in offline music composition and recording even if you do not have the required amount of RAM.

Licensing

Hauptwerk V or later

• iLok account and license is required for the operation of the sample set
• Internet connection required for license activation (one-time only)
• Activation Code issued by Inspired Acoustics upon your purchase to redeem and activate the sample set license via the PACE iLok License Manager software
• Downloading and installing the latest licensing package file from Milan Digital Audio

This sample set comes in an encrypted format compatible with Hauptwerk v5 and later and requires a PACE iLok license for the operation of the sample set.

For download delivery products, Inspired Acoustics will automatically and instantly set up the download access to your product after your purchase, and assign you a unique Activation Code that you can locate under My Products. Enter this Activation Code to the PACE iLok License Manager to redeem your license.

For retail box deliveries Inspired Acoustics will provide you with a unique Activation Code allowing you to access the downloads and updates to this product. The Activation Code can be found in the box in a printed form. This Activation Code is a unique license voucher for your product identifying your purchase and legitimate use, so please store it in a secure location.

Read more about the license update procedure for Hauptwerk v5 sample sets.

For migrations from previous Hauptwerk versions a one-time sample set migration procedure needs to be done once the previous version of Hauptwerk is upgraded to Hauptwerk V. An Activation Code is not required in this case since the license will automatically be downloaded to your iLok account during the migration process.

Modifications and customization

If you are planning a custom or commercial application that requires a different setup what this sample set offers out-of-the-box, please contact us for making a customized version for you. 

Modification or disassembling the contents of this sample set through the CODM interface of Hauptwerk is not supported since the variety of functions and the availability of the sample set's certain special features already offers most of the functions the CODM interface may offer. The complexity of the Organ Definition File shipping with this sample set is uniquely high and building custom variants requires a certain amount of special expertise. Legally, the end-user license of this sample set is permitting using the samples as a whole, as they ship. 

Urakami Professional Edition