SWAM Clarinet

What it does

A physically modelled clarinet rather than a sampled one, so expression, velocity, vibrato, growl, breath noise and key noise do the work while the note sounds. Every control takes MIDI learn, a timbre page steps through warmer and brighter versions, and a compressor, EQ, early reflection and reverb section sits behind the effects tab. It runs standalone or as an AUv3, and enabling virtual MIDI ports in the settings lets other apps play the standalone version.

In the demo

Jade sets it up in AUM driven from GeoShred, then swaps to an Arturia keyboard with an expression pedal, MIDI learns growl to a knob and plays over a jazz backing. Later she unplugs the keyboard and plays the same app from a Korg nanoPAD, which needed no configuration and passed velocity and pad vibrato straight through.

Worth knowing

The controller matters more than usual here, since a keyboard on its own gives a flat result. It is sold separately, with a Clarinets bundle covering it and the bass clarinet together.