Please help ID this iconic electronic music instrument sound!

November 14, 2022 4:21 PM

There's a high-energy/punchy string patch that pops up lots of places in late 80s House and early 90s electronic music, especially in rave. Say, at around 2:10 in John Etkin-Bell's Disco Italia or at around 0:46 into Black Box's Strike it Up. I imagine it comes from a Roland box, but I don't know which and I don't know what the patch is called. What 80s electronic music instrument makes this iconic sound, and what is the patch called?
posted by They sucked his brains out! to Media & Arts (4 answers total)

Response by poster: Bonus points for identifying the instrument and showing a synth plugin making that hit sound!
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 4:21 PM on November 14, 2022

Best answer: Sounds to me like an orchestral “hit” or “stab”. There’s a good Vox video covering it here
posted by ageispolis at 4:29 PM on November 14, 2022 [3 favorites]

Best answer: It's a classic "orchestral hit" - it was a standard sample on the Fairlight.

Supposedly sampled from a performance of Stravinsky's Firebird Suite: https://www.vox.com/2018/5/17/17366456/orchestra-hit-1980s-music-stravinsky-bruno-mars

https://youtu.be/TEohvxCyp68
posted by niicholas at 4:37 PM on November 14, 2022 [8 favorites]

Best answer: The sample is widely available as orch5.wav, dumped from the Fairlight's sample disks
posted by scruss at 7:31 AM on November 15, 2022