Spitfire BBC Symphony Orchestra Professional

Spitfire BBC Symphony Orchestra Professional

One of the sample libraries I use with e.g., Dorico, Cubase, and Komple Kontrol S88 is the Spitfire BBC Symphony Orchestra Professional (BBCSO), which is created as a universal starting point for composers and music creators of every level. The BBCSO includes the Discover and Core version. BBCSO Professional is the definitive, comprehensive collection for writing professional, world-class orchestral music, featuring 67 different instrument presets recorded on world-class Millennia preamps, including groups and soloists, and 468 techniques, including 45 legatos, for each melodic instrument — as well as a staggering 20 microphone and mix signals. Spitfire support the Native Kontrol Standard (see below) and can therefore be used with the Komplete Kontrol software and my Komple Kontrol S88 keyboard.

I extended BBC Symphony Orchestra with the BBCSO Piano Professional (Steinway Model D grand). In addition, I use EPIC Choir, EPIC Strings, and Intimate Strings from Spitfire Audio. The Spitfire libraries also nicely complement the EastWest Hollywood Orchestra OPUS Edition sound library.

Figure 1. The interface of Spitfire Symphony Orchestra Professional showing few of the articulations for the viola section. The two sliders control ‘Expression’ (cc 11) and ‘Modulation'(cc 1). See table below for list of midi controllers.

Figure 2. The interface of Spitfire Symphony Orchestra Professional showing few of the 20 microphone positions.

Figure 3. The interface of Spitfire Symphonic Orchestra Discover showing the different section of an orchestra. 

Templates
Templates for Dorico, Cubase, and other DAWs are available [here]

MIDI CC Chart (from [here])

When I use the library with my Komplete Kontrol S88 keyboard, then the modulation wheel is used to control Expression (cc 11) while I use a volume pedal to control Modulation (cc 1). The pedal is assigned to CC 1 in the Komplete Kontrol software.  Midi controllers CC 1 and CC 11 correspond to the two main sliders on the plugin (see Figure 1).

Native Kontrol Standard (NKS)

Native Kontrol Standard (NKS) was introduced by Native Instruments and has now become an industry standard. It is an extended plug-in format that enables a unified creative experience across hundreds of virtual instruments and effects from Native Instruments and other leading developers. It offers tag-based browsing, instant sound previews, and seamless integration with Komplete Kontrol. Many instruments from many leading manufacturers (including Spitfire) currently support NKS.

Microphone positions

See Microphone positions Symphony Orchestra and Piano

Videos

Listen here to some demos:

Spitfire BBCSO

List of instruments and mics

Settings

Maximum voices

A voice is one sample that is playing at a particular moment.

For example:

• One note played by Violins 1 = several voices (because multiple samples and dynamic layers may be active).
• A 10-note chord with legato and three microphone positions can already consume dozens of voices.

The Maximum Voices parameter limits how many voices the player may play simultaneously. When the limit is reached, the player starts to steal voices, meaning older notes are cut off to make room for new ones.

Many users increase this setting to avoid note dropouts in large template. Typical recommendations:

• Small projects: 256–512
  Large orchestral templates: 512–999
  Full tutti with many mic positions: 999

Preload size

This setting determines how much of each sample is loaded into RAM before playback starts. Conceptually:


RAM
┌────────────┐
│ beginning  │ ← Preloaded
└────────────┘
SSD streams the remainder


When you hit a note, the first part of the sample is already in memory, allowing the note to start immediately.

Small preload

• +lower RAM usage
• +faster project loading
• – more pressure on SSD

Large preload

• + fewer disk-streaming problems
• + useful for slow SSDs or HDDs
• – much more RAM usage
• – longer loading times

The Spitfire manual explicitly recommends increasing this setting for slower drives. The default is around 12,888 sample values.

Example

Suppose you load:

• 500 articulations
• average preload = 200 kB

Then:

• 500 × 200 kB = 100 MB

Double the preload size and your RAM consumption roughly doubles.

Stream Buffer Size

After the note starts playing, the remainder of the sample is streamed from disk. The Stream Buffer Size determines how much data is kept in memory while the sample is being streamed.

• SSD → Buffer → Audio Engine

Think of it as a safety cushion. Note that the stream buffer (or cache) is actually stored in RAM. The difference is that RAM refers to all available system memory, whereas the stream buffer is a small, dedicated portion of RAM that the Spitfire player reserves specifically for streaming samples from disk. Data is not streamed directly from the SSD because SSD access is not perfectly continuous. The SSD delivers data in bursts, while the audio engine requires a continuous stream. The stream buffer smooths out these bursts. Thus, preload and stream buffer are both stored in RAM, but they serve different purposes. Preload stores the beginning of every loaded sample, while the stream buffer stores only the data this is currently being streamed.

Small buffer

• + lower RAM usage
• + lower latency
• – SSD must work harder
• – greater risk of clicks/dropouts

Large buffer

• + safer playback
• + useful for large templates
• + useful for slower drives
• – higher RAM usage

The Spitfire manual describes this as “the number of sample values kept in memory for each audio recording stream at any time.” The default is 65,536.

Interestingly, many users report that increasing the stream buffer is often more effective than increasing the preload size when trying to eliminate audio dropouts

Putting it together

With modern NVMe SSDs, there is usually little reason to set an extremely large preload size because the drives can stream samples very quickly. The bottleneck is more often CPU scheduling and the number of simultaneous voices than raw disk speed.

For my particular setup (BBCSO Pro + Vienna Ensemble Pro + Cubase/Dorico), I start with:

• Maximum Voices = 999
• Preload Size = 12,888–25,000
• Stream Buffer Size = 65,536–150,000

and then increase the stream buffer only if you encounter crackles or note dropouts.

Example song produced with BBCSO

Once in a lifetime (see also [here])