David Oliver’s extraordinary percussion
featured on
now available in multiple virtual instrument libraries*
*please note all virtual instrument library recordings are uniquely very different from all project recordings and are royalty free
David performing live in 2023 for Going, Going, a new collaboration between choreographer Kyra Norman and Emmy-award winning film and TV composer Barnaby Taylor, both based in West Cornwall, UK
David Oliver - Rhythmatist
David Oliver is an esteemed percussionist known for his brilliant and expressive soundtrack work on numerous award winning films and television programs.
David is an avid rhythmic explorer who has made a number of his own percussion instruments such as UDU, bamboo slit drums, rainsticks and waterdrums. He is a keen proponent of music for well being.
Hot on the tail of a series of high end recording projects, some of which are listed below, David created a huge catalogue of unique and experimental layered percussion recordings teaming up with Soundiron to create Rhythmic Odyssey, a huge unconventional virtual instrument library of 1000's of live percussion loops uniquely pioneered by Soundiron into an exciting user friendly format.
This fruitful collaboration with Soundiron was followed by Shake, David Oliver’s Drum Kit and a huge dynamic set of samples of his extensive ethnic percussion collection called Rhythmic Origins. This eclectic range includes unusual found and home made instruments.
Testimonials
“Working with David (and his ridiculously extensive collection of instruments) I could sense his enthusiasm and professional ethic from the very start of the project.
A real pleasure, and the results speak for themselves.”
Ed Watkins - Film/Game Composer
“Working with David has been fantastic. He is a gifted, highly skilled percussionist who brings immense creativity to a project.”
Will Goodchild- Film/TV Composer and Orchestrator/Conductor
“I've found David to be not just creative and incredibly talented but fast and efficient too.
A real pro and a pleasure to work with.”
Barnaby Taylor- Film/TV Composer
“David has a style and flair which come through on his recordings. Receiving a percussion track from him is like discovering an amazing sample, except it’s completely bespoke and unique to the project!"
Dan Brown - Producer / Songwriter
“David’s drums and percussion have lifted my album Meditteraneo (for Universal) massively. What a find. I thoroughly recommend working with him.”
Al Lethbridge - Film/TV Composer
“David is a real pleasure to work with, superb musicianship stunning performances and recordings always top notch!"
Ian Livingstone - Game/Film/TV Composer
Rhythmic Odyssey
Rhythmic Odyssey is a unique and highly-customizable loop-based virtual percussion instrument for Kontakt Player and a huge open-format modular loop library.
Featuring Soundiron’s pioneered user interface for Rhythmic Odyssey loops making it unique in the market. For use with any software or hardware you choose.
David unleashed his massive collection of drums, percussion and rare world instruments, with powerful, authentic and spirited performances that are carefully and perfectly hand-crafted for easy direct use in films, games and all other forms of multimedia. He captured an incredible variety of percussion instruments and objects, exploring more than 130 distinct instruments from drum kits to raw pine tree logs.
This library spans a huge range of styles and genres, with 100 percussion track sets ranging from traditional ethnic arrangements and combos, to raw, hard-driving percussion beds and huge rock grooves.
Also available as individual loops on Splice
EXPLORE AND BUY NOW at Soundiron
5/5 Stars
“An excellent choice for those needing a quality source of inspiring hand percussion content”
“Sound Iron and David Oliver have created a real gem here”
Rhythmic Origins
Rhythmic Origins is a comprehensively multi-sampled catalog of 73 different percussion instruments of all shapes and sizes offering a variety of primary and effect articulations.
This library features many of David’s globe-spanning collection of rare, specialty, ethnic concert drums and hand percussion instruments as individual hits.
You can custom mix your sound with close and room microphone positions, along with additional mic positions for Bell Music's giant 54 inch Verdi Taiko Drum, David's custom Gran Casa and several African hand drums.
The tonal and dynamic balance for each instrument has been carefully engineered to bring out the full bodied bass, rich tonality and high-end clarity in each sample, from the most subtle hand percussion to thunderous concert bass drum strikes.
Product Specs
- Deeply sampled concert drums, hand percussion, and auxillary rhythmic instruments
- Bass drums, Calabash, Box drums, Large & Small hand drums, Metal, Tonal, Wood, Miscellanous
- 11 Powerful Kontakt .nki instrument presets made for the full retail Kontakt 6.5.3+
- 24 bit / 48 kHz uncompressed PCM wav samples
- 77,156 stereo samples in unlocked .WAV format
- 30.4 GB Installed
- Flexible and intuitive multi-layer user interface controls, with LFO, filter, glide, and arpeggiator
- Full FX rack with convolution reverb with custom rooms, halls, chambers & FX environments
EXPLORE AND BUY NOW at Soundiron
Shake
Shake is a comprehensive collection of 95 shakers, tambourines, rattles, and bells from all over the world.
An essential library for any serious composer.
Shake has everything you need for your next composition, thousands of live loops in multiple time signatures and tempos plus individuals hits.
Instruments in this collection include; tiny soft plastic and raw hide egg shakers, filled ping pong ball rattle, raw hide, plastic and wooden maracas, small and medium sized instruments made from natural materials such as reeds, seed pods, gourds, vines, rattan, coconuts, nut shells, bamboo, wood and metal.
There are also many unique instruments made or improvised by David like the bamboo rainstick shaker, mung bean shaker, cocktail stick shaker and pad box multi effect shaker (a flat wooden box containing ball bearings) and multiple Caxixi combinations. With our intuitive multi-layered modular UI, you'll enjoy complete freedom to mix, layer, affect and customize each sound to your heart's content.
EXPLORE AND BUY NOW at Soundiron
Watch Craig’s Walkthrough on youtube
David Oliver’s Drum Kit
David Oliver's Drum Kit is a deeply sampled vintage Pearl DLX drumset, with a large cymbal collection and masses of drumming expressions with 5 microphone positions for a real live sound.
Featuring Soundiron’s unique remapper controls for a distinctively easy and customisable user friendly interface.
The Vintage Pearl DLX drum kit was originally played and endorsed by the legendary Jazz drummer Art Blakey although it has a very versatile sound suitable for multiple genres of music. “We put it through it’s paces sampling it with a number of different stick types for maximum scope of expressive drumming techniques from ultra loud to ultra soft.” The compact 18 inch kick is super punchy with a 12 inch rack tom and 14 inch floor tom.
Product Specs
- Deeply sampled drumset with five microphone positions
- 8 Crash Cymbals, 4 Hi-hats, 2 Ride, 7 Splash, 1 Kick, 2 Snare, and 2 Toms
- 10 Powerful Kontakt Player .nki instrument presets
- 81,163 stereo samples in locked .ncw format
- 24-bit, 48 kHz Stereo Lossless NCW Format for Kontakt presets.
- 26.7 GB Installed (50 GB Uncompressed)
- Made for the free Kontakt Player (version 6.2.2+), Komplete Kontrol, all S-Series Keyboards and NKS software and hardware by Native Instruments
- Works with the Kontakt "Libraries" browser and Native Access.
EXPLORE AND BUY NOW at Soundiron
Film, TV, Game & Library projects
DAVID’s Percussion features on the following projects
Music by Barnaby Taylor - Featuring drum kit, calabash dry and water drums, wood blocks, various seed pods, kayamba flat shaker.
Score composed by Ian Livingston. - Featuring GIANT 54 and 60 INCH TAIKO DRUMS, Sound Iron David Oliver's Rhythmic Odyssey, African Dun Duns, Tambora, Doumbek, layers of percussion including chekere.
From Rhythmic Oddysey, Music comp by Dan Pollard.
JAMIE COOKS ITALY - CH4
Jamie Oliver
Meditteraneo album - Featuring drum kit
Music by Al Lethbridge.
WILD KOREA (BBC2)
Score composed by William Goodchild.
LIFE AT THE LIMITS (TERRA MATER - AUSTRIA).
Score composed by Barnaby Taylor.
OTTERS (BBC2)
Score composed by William Goodchild.
Featuring Water Drums, drum kit and shakers.
MEDITERRANEO (UNIVERSAL PUBLISHING)
Library album of 10 acoustic drum tracks.
Music composed by Al Lethbridge.
Featuring Kit Drums, shakers, hand claps.
WOLFBLOOD Episode 6 (CBBC)
Score composed by Nick Holywell-Walker.
Featuring Taiko Drum Programming and live frame drums.
WARHAMMER - GAME
Score composed by Ian Livingston.
Featuring frame drums, wicker bundle, rusty jerry cans, velcro (close mic'd), springs, scrapers, shakers, deep hits and textures.
GHOST OF THE MOUNTAINS - DISNEY NATURE, NETFLIX. Score composed by Barnaby Taylor. Featuring Taiko drums, gongs, frame drums, shakers, deep hits and textures.
WILD CORNWALL.
Score composed by Barnaby Taylor.
Featuring Cajonico, bass Bodrhan and frame drums, textures and Hang programming.
ELEPHANT FAMILY AND ME (BBC2).
Presented by Gordon Buchanan
Score composed by Barnaby Taylor. Listen to Tsavo Intro:
Featuring a number of dramatic expressive African combo cues with inventive melodic and intense kalimbas and unusual found objects (bought in this case) including 2 weathered army jerry cans. WATCH BOTH EPISODES
JAGO: A LIFE UNDERWATER - UNDERDOG FILMS Produced, Directed and Written by James Reed.
JAGO A Life Underwater follows the life of 80-year-old Rohani, a Bajau diver from the Togean Islands of Sulawesi, Indonesia.
WINNER OF GRAND TETON AWARD, Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Awards 2015. Runner up for best score Wildscreen Panda Awards 2016 and Winner for best Cinematography.
Score composed by William Goodchild. Featuring various home made bamboo instruments (rainsticks, slit drums, claves...) expressive Udus, bamboo marimba, textures and full non dampened drum kit played by fingers with wicker laundry lid for hi hat. One cue is natural percussion lead which I created for the Boys running on Jetty sequence.
David co wrote the rhythmic blueprint for the Warrior Sequence I was Strong noted for a memorable underwater camera array scene including dramatic Taiko Style drumming.
INDIA NATURE'S WONDERLAND - (BBC2) - Opening titles by William Goodchild produced by Dan Brown. Featuring a combo of Indian style drumming, rainstick, bells and chimes.
GORILLA FAMILY AND ME - (BBC2). Presented by Gordon Buchannon
Score composed by William Goodchild. Featuring some deep heart stirring hits and and expressive, talking drums and cymbals in odd time signatures.
THAILAND - Earth's Tropical Paradise - (BBC2).
Score composed by William Goodchild.
Featuring a number of inventive cues in particular Hermit Crabs which features a recycled Koto I found on a wood pile and brought back to life with tlc and strimmer cables for strings.
GORONGOSA - Rebirth of Paradise*. (PBS). A wildlife series about a game reserve in Mozambique that has rejuvenated and extensively repopulated it's civil war decimated wildlife over the past 20 years. Score by William Goodchild.
Dramatic drumming featuring full tribal combos and powerful hits.
AFRICA'S GIANT KILLERS - BBC2 (Icon Films, Bristol) Winner, Best Natural History Programme, RTS Awards 2014). Score by William Goodchild. Featuring dramatic drumming ensembles, shakers and scraped djembe.
ULTIMATE HONEY BADGER (Nat Geo) (now available on DVD). Music composed by William Goodchild. Highest Rated Documentary in Nat Geo History (2013). Score by William Goodchild.
Featuring quirky cowbells, kalimbas, scraped and rubbed drums heads, close mic'ed cajon taps and full combo tribal creations.
INDIA NATURE'S WONDERLAND - (BBC2) - Opening titles by William Goodchild produced by Dan Brown. Featuring a combo of Indian style drumming, rainstick, bells and chimes.
MY GORILLA FAMILY AND ME - (BBC2) - Presented by Gordon Buchannon
Score composed by William Goodchild. Featuring some deep heart stirring hits and and expressive, talking drums and cymbals in odd time signatures.
need live percussion?
Percussion examples and setup
PERCUSSION EXAMPLES
SHOWREEL AUGUST 2016
Listen on soundcloud
SHOWREEL JANUARY 2016
Percussion recording for TV and Film
David plays creative percussion and records sessions from his home studio and on site. Here are a few film commissions with composer William Goodchild. David played talking drum, djembes, dun duns, congas, cajon, claves, bells, thumb pianos, udu's, bits 'n' bobs and shakers of all kinds.
Ultimate Honey Badger clip
Listen to the percussion David recorded to Will's string compositions before it was mixed and cued into the Honey Badger documentary >>>
Africa's Giant Killers clip - AWARD WINNING
Listen to the percussion David recorded to Will's string compositions before it was mixed and cued into the Africa's Giant Killers documentary >>>
SETUP AND EQUIPMENT
PERCUSSION
BATA LYA - CAJON - CAJONICO - DJEMBE - DARBUKA - CLAY UDU DRUMS - TOMS - BASS DRUMS - SNARE DRUMS - DUN DUNS - CONGAS - BONGOS - TAMBORA - TALKING DRUM - DHOLAK - NAAL - RUMWONG - SURDO - BERIMBAU - GUACHARACA - FRAME DRUMS MASSIVE SELECTION OF SHAKERS, RATTLES and TAMBOURINES - AFRICAN CAXIXI - SHEKERES - SEED PODS - SCRAPERS - CABASSA - GUIROS - GOURD CALABASH BASS DRUM - TAMBOURINES - CYMBALS AND BELLS - BELL TREE - WOOD BLOCKS AND COWBELLS - BAMBOO SLIT DRUMS AND MARIMBA - THUMB PIANO - SANSULA - KALIMBAS (TRADITIONAL AND RAY TRACEY TUNED) - RAINSTICKS - VIBRASLAP - JERRY CANS - SPINNING SPARK SHAKERS X 3 STREET FX CRASH AND VARIOUS EFFECTS...
ROLAND V DIGITAL DRUM KIT, BOPAD USB DRUM TRIGGER PAD
PLEASE NOTE: This list is often changing as new projects require new sounds so if there's an instrument you don't see on the list please contact David.
RECORDING EQUIPMENT
IMAC - FOCUSRITE SCARLETT 18i20 (8 CHANNELS) - FOCUSRITE OCTOPRE MK2 PRE AMP - MICS: NEUMANN TLM 103 STEREO PAIR - AUDIO TECHNICA AE2500 - ASTON ORIGIN STEREO PAIR - AKG C1000S - SHURE PG 81 - SHURE SM58s - SONTRONICS STC1 STEREO PAIR - RODE NT1A - SENNHEISER EVOLUTION E604 - AKG D112.
RATES
For competitive rates and quotes please contact David to discuss your needs.
Rates inclusive of draft mixes, multiple individual un-effected stems and grouped stems by type with online dropbox or delivery of your choice.
Hire David
Give what you got - Written and produced by David Oliver
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