Pulse Developer Spotlight Interview
Pulse Audio recently asked us to talk about our approach to sampling and what makes us Triumph Audio. Here is that conversation!
A conversation with Kevin Manthei - Founder & Creative Director of Triumph Audio
Can you tell us about how your journey into virtual instrument development began?
I’ve been scoring film, TV, animation, and games for over 20 years including Invader Zim, Marvel’s Spider-Man, Villainous, and Star Trek Online. I’ve always created custom sounds for every project, and other composers kept asking what I was using. That’s when I realized there was a real need for instruments that felt more personal and emotional.
Triumph Audio started as tools I originally built for my own scores. I saw a need for smaller developers creating the same forward thinking libraries as the big guys, but at a more accessible price point, and with the added benefit of giving composers sounds that not everyone else had.
What inspired your first virtual instrument and what did it teach you as a developer?
Ghost Cello. I wanted an emotional, imperfect solo cello library that felt alive, like something I’d build for a moody Spider-Man cue or a psychological moment in a dramatic score. It taught me that vulnerability and raw character connect far more deeply than clean orchestral perfection. I set out to explore experimental articulations, phrases, and playing techniques without worrying about perfecting yet another legato library. I wanted to see how far the manipulation of organic sounds could go; turns out it can go pretty far. Ghost Cello became the blueprint and DNA for Triumph Audio.
What tools, frameworks, or programming languages do you rely on most in your development process?
Kontakt and KSP are the core. Most of the editing and performance shaping happens inside the DAW. A big part of our sound identity comes from our unique signal chains, combining software and hardware processing to push the limits of what an instrument can sound like. We love to explore the raw, gritty and real sound of the organic instrument, but we also love twisting it into something new with additional FX and sonic mangling. We don’t just stop after recording, chopping and programming; that’s usually just the beginning.
Do you approach instrument design more as a sound designer, a programmer, or a musician?
Always as a composer first, thinking in narrative, tension, and emotional function. Then my team and I refine it like sound designers. Programming is just the delivery system that makes it playable and invisible. Recording is always the foundation, but the additional programming and manipulation come a close second. When we bring it all into Kontakt, we spend a lot of time making sure the instrument feels musical and inspiring for composers.
When designing your products, how do you decide which features and controls to give users?
If I wouldn’t touch it in the middle of a scoring deadline, it doesn’t need to be there. Every control has to earn its spot and directly serve storytelling or playability. The sounds we create and drop into Kontakt stand on their own two feet, but there’s a whole world to explore through our Kontakt engine for those who want to dive deeper.
When our collaborators help us finalize a library, we like to create an entire folder of Engine Processed sounds. These patches are a further exploration of the original and main patches, giving users more ways to experiment and expand on the core material.
How do you make your instruments approachable for beginners while still deep enough for pros?
The first layer of use is always instant emotion with no menu diving. But if you open it up, there is depth for power users: mod-wheel, filter, effects, the pulse engine, and more. The instruments are designed to reward curiosity.
All of our libraries rely on a feature we call TRP, which stands for Transposition. It’s simple but incredibly handy for composers. We all love having many single samples available at our fingertips, but what happens when you want to transpose them or use them in various keys all in one cue? I can’t tell you how many times I wanted to use some samples, but they weren’t easily or quickly accessible. TRP gives that flexibility back to composers, and we love it for that reason.
Have you ever had a “happy accident” in development that turned into a core feature or sound?
Almost every library has one. The Ghost series in particular was born from processing accidents that felt too magical to delete. I often end up with leftover bits from sessions, and a big part of my sound design process is revisiting those fragments to create new and interesting sounds inside the DAW, even long after the recording sessions are over.
If you had unlimited resources, what dream instrument would you create?
A large 100-piece orchestral session at Abbey Road with no agenda. Just walking in and experimenting with the orchestra as a fellow collaborator. What ideas would they have? What would become of a week's worth of recording? What would the musicians come up with in this collaborative environment?
If you could collaborate with any artist to design an instrument, who would it be?
I love artists like Hildur Guðnadóttir. They have a healthy respect for their main instrument as it was traditionally designed for, but also explore their creative and lesser known paths. There are so many cool Instagram artists that have this aesthetic. I could definitely see a Triumph Audio Artist Series in the future.
Where do you see the future of virtual instrument development heading in the next 5–10 years?
Many sample library companies are starting to build their own custom non Kontkakt engines, which is exciting, but I’m not personally thrilled about having to download and learn a brand-new VST format every time I buy a library. I really appreciate Kontakt as an industry standard, and I’d love to see more shared frameworks emerge across the sampling world.
AI will definitely play a role in music creation, DAWs, and sampling, but I’m much more inspired by working with real musicians and discovering sounds organically, rather than prompting them into existence. At Triumph Audio, we will not be using AI to generate our sounds. Creating them ourselves is the whole point, and that will never change.
