What is VST?
VST ( Virtual Studio Technology ) was created by Steinberg ( https://www.steinberg.net/en/home.html ) to help music producers to create their own music from their home. VST is a software or a plugin that recreates or emulates an instrument – it could be a synthisizer , guitar amplifier , full orchestra and much more. It is used mostly throught DAWs ( Digital Audio Workstation) like Ableton Live , Logic Pro , FL Studio , REAPER , Reason and Cubase , but some of this plugins could be use standalone too. This format helped many composers and producers to enchance their music , as well as producing full tracks for a huge variety of music styles . Along the years it was used with more frequency by professional producers untill it became a standart for anyone producing music digitaly . Here are some of the features:
Features :
Virtual Instrument Emulation and modulation
Analog like Interface
Full MIDI control and automatization
VST effects and MIDI effects
Compatible with almost all DAWs
Chain connection between plugins
There are more plugin formats rivaling with VST – like AU , RTAS , AAX . If you want to know more about different plugins formats here you could learn more in an article i wrote this year.
Today the quality of the VST became so good – it is hard to distinquish between real recorded instruments and virtual and you can hear many VST plugins in famous songs now. Here are some examples :
The Salmon Song – Chemical Brothers – VST used : Native Instruments Massive .Preset : Big Deeper
Adele – Hometown Glory (Axwell Remode).VST used : Cakewalk Rapture . Preset : Classic Chicago Stack