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Slate + Ash, Bristol-based sound design studio – has announced the release of a new Kontakt instrument. Primaries / Woods is the next edition in the company’s Primaries series, inaugurated in 2024 with the release of Primaries / Strings.

Primaries / Woods uses woodwind instruments as the raw materials for expressive sound design.

Where that instrument focused on solo string performances across bass, cello, viola and violin, Primaries / Woods is based on the sounds of the woodwind family, packing more than a hundred recordings of bassoon, clarinet, flute, oboe and saxophone into an instrument that the company says is designed to “capture the physical exchange between player and instrument”, exploring solo woodwinds as “a fundamental colour in the orchestral spectrum. From guttural vibrations to fragile overtones, every texture is distilled into tactile breathing matter”.

Primaries / Woods’ library of multisampled articulations is accessible via the same sophisticated sound engine found in Primaries / Strings, which is capable of layering two sound sources together with independent controls for tuning, envelopes, filtering, and key-zone.

Each layer can be processed with a selection of fifteen macro effects, with delay, reverb, compression, tremolo, bitcrusher, pitch-shifter and more on offer, along with a master effects section on the output that features EQ, compression and a lo-fi processor. Effects can be modulated via the onboard LFOs or MIDI CC.

Primaries / Woods’ spatial mixer allows you to blend multiple reamped versions of its sample library together across an XY pad; recordings have been reamped in the Funkhaus echo chamber in Berlin and Real World Studios’ Wood Room, and processed via an EMT 140 plate reverb and Bricasti M7.

Primaries / Woods is equipped with four input modules, spanning a multi-mode arpeggiator, scale-aware harmony generator, and a randomizer that introduces octave shifts, tuning variations and panning into the mix. There’s also a tape simulator onboard that can be used to time-stretch and pitch-shift sound sources.

Though Primaries / Woods uses woodwind instruments as a sound source, Slate + Ash has creatively processed its source material to create a broad range of synthetic textures that sound worlds away from the original recordings, and the instruments’ 200 sound-designed presets offer everything from “warm pads and subtle underscore layers” to “arpeggiated sequences, synthetic pulses and granular textures”.

As was the case with Primaries / Strings, you’re able to drop your own samples into the instrument’s sound engine, effectively giving you a versatile and powerful sampler with which to manipulate and rework your own sounds.

Here’s the Preset Demo:

Primaries / Woods is currently priced at £149 and can be purchased with Primaries / Strings for a discounted price of £349. The instrument runs in Native Instruments Kontakt 7.10.7 or higher, or in the free Kontakt Player.

Find out more on Slate + Ash website.

The news that Native Instruments has filed for Preliminary Insolvency shook the music industry, because the company’s tools have been used by so many, for so long.

Many have speculated about what led to the company’s decline, but the best take we’ve seen comes from Music Trades Editor Brian T. Majeski, who calls Native Instruments as “the industry’s latest private equity casualty”.

In his newsletter, he shared his analysis of the company’s decline after it was acquired by private equity firm Francisco Partners:

“After five years under the stewardship of Francisco Partners, the company that pioneered computer-centric music systems filed for bankruptcy protection in the Berlin courts on January 27.

The catalyst for the filing was a steep decline in sales, cumulative losses of €288 million ($339 million) accrued in 2023 and 2024, and looming maturities on approximately €262 million ($309 million) in debt.

The bankruptcy court has a mandate to keep Native Instrument intact as a viable business and they are likely to succeed. The company retains a valuable product portfolio that is used on 80% of the Top Ten Billboard tracks and has over 1.5 million registered users. However, there will be serious post-bankruptcy challenges.

Despite assurances from management that “business will carry on as usual,” consumers are understandably wary. Many are deferring or cancelling planned purchases out concern that the restructured company many not honor existing software licenses or provide product support.”

Recent moves left many Native Instruments customers puzzled:

• In 2022, Native Instruments and iZotope announced ‘Soundwide’ as the new name of their parent company, and welcomed several new members to the Soundwide group of brands, including audio plugin platform Plugin Alliance and audio software company Brainworx. The goal was to provide end-to-end solutions, but the companies seem to have struggled to find synergy.
• Just a year later, they announced dumping the Soundwide brand, and that iZotope, Brainworx, and Plugin Alliance would become part of Native Instruments.
• The company also frustrated long-time customers by neglecting or retiring loved products. In 2022, the company retired Absynth – one of its oldest and most powerful software synths. In late 2025, though, the company introduced Absynth 6. It was a welcome return, but also left many questioning Native’s strategy for its software synths and virtual instruments.

“The failure of Native Instruments is a complicated story, worthy of a full-length case study,” notes Majeski, adding that “Misplaced growth expectations, poor product development, and a healthy dose of hubris surely contributed.

You can read more analysis and editorials by Majeski at the Music Trades site.

Have your own take on what created Native Instruments’ predicament? Share your thoughts in the comments!

Today, Native Instruments CEO Nick Williams shared a statement on the future of the company, which earlier in the week went into Preliminary Insolvency.

Preliminary Insolvency is a court-orded phase where an administrator steps in to protect debtors’ assets, and to see if changes can be made to enable a company to stabilize its financial situation.

While his statement is short on the type of details that customers may be hoping for, Williams says that it’s business as usual for the company:

“Please rest assured that business continues as usual at Native Instruments, iZotope, Plugin Alliance and Brainworx. Our hardware and software products remain on sale and available for download and activation. Our passionate and dedicated teams are here and supporting customers as normal. In product and engineering, we are continuing to develop and launch new products and features. Our NKS Partnerships team continues to process Kontakt Player licences and NKS Partner submissions.

We are working diligently and responsibly to secure a healthy, financially sustainable future for Native Instruments. As you may have seen, Native Instruments GmbH has entered a restructuring process in Germany, as have 3 of our German non-operating holding companies. In legal terms, we have filed applications to open pre-insolvency proceedings for those companies.

We are focused on providing continuity for creators, customers, and partners. We’ll continue to share updates as we have them.

I’m a lifelong musician myself, and have been a passionate fan of Native Instruments for 25 years. Our mission to inspire and enable creators to express themselves through sound continues.”

Are you worried about the future of NI, and about applications that may need depend on ‘cloud’ resources for installation? Share your thoughts in the comments!