Beach Boys Hairpin Piano Sample Pack

When the Beach Boys recorded Pet Sounds in 1966, the effects at their disposal were limited. So, Brian Wilson and company had to get creative. In the tune "You Still Believe In Me", Brian Wilson and lyricist Tony Asher employed an unconventional tool to create the iconic opening piano melody: a hairpin. Instead of playing the piano as normal (you know, with the keys), they opened up the back and struck the strings with a common hairpin. 

While that may sound like a simple enough idea, you'll see in our video that it's much more complicated in practice. Turns out, hitting sets of strings simultaneously without the familiar reference of the keyboard is quite difficult. So we've also made it easy, creating a free sample pack of individual hairpin-plucked notes across three octaves. Go ahead and download it for free.

When the Beach Boys recorded Pet Sounds in 1966, the effects at their disposal were limited. So, Brian Wilson and company had to get creative. In the tune "You Still Believe In Me", Brian Wilson and lyricist Tony Asher employed an unconventional tool to create the iconic opening piano melody: a hairpin. Instead of playing the piano as normal (you know, with the keys), they opened up the back and struck the strings with a common hairpin.

While that may sound like a simple enough idea, you'll see in our video that it's much more complicated in practice. Turns out, hitting sets of strings simultaneously without the familiar reference of the keyboard is quite difficult. So we've also made it easy, creating a free sample pack of individual hairpin-plucked notes across three octaves. Go ahead and download it for free.

Compatibility
Release notes: This download is a zip file containing 24-bit audio wav files at a 44.1kHz sample rate. You may have to convert them to 16-bit and/or a lower sample rate to work in your preferred DAW or sampler

Installation Instructions

Download the file

Find the file in your Downloads folder

Load WAV files into your sampler device

What's new?
Release notes: This download is a zip file containing 24-bit audio wav files at a 44.1kHz sample rate. You may have to convert them to 16-bit and/or a lower sample rate to work in your preferred DAW or sampler