SWAM Alto Trombone

What it does

The alto trombone in Audio Modeling’s SWAM brass line, modelled rather than sampled, so tone follows the controller for the length of the note. Expression, dynamics, vibrato, growl, flutter tongue and breath noise sit on the panel and nearly all take MIDI learn. Mutes run from straight through cup to a movable hand mute with its own distance control.

In the demo

Jade MIDI learns the alto from scratch on an Arturia KeyStep 37, with an iRig Stomp IO pedal on the floor doing the expression and a sustain pedal switched to vibrato. She finds its bottom and top notes, then sets it beside the tenor trombone, where the gap at the top runs four semitones.

Worth knowing

Sold on its own and inside a Trombones bundle with the tenor, tenor bass, bass and double bass trombones. Played from plain keys with no continuous controller the expression stays flat. Under 30 MB installed.