Custom Sounds — Bring Your Own

Signals & Sorcery ships with curated sample packs and Surge XT as the default synth, but you are never limited to what comes in the box. You can bring your own sounds in two ways:

1. Import your own sample libraries — drop your commercial or homemade drum kits and instrument samples (Splice / Loopmasters-style WAV folders) into the drum and instrument generators, so generation and shuffle draw from your sounds.
2. Load your own instrument plugins — put any VST3 or AudioUnit instrument on a synth track in place of Surge XT.

Which one do I want?

• Have a folder of WAV samples (one-shots or single hits)? → Import a sample library.
• Have a synth or sampler plugin installed on your Mac (Diva, Serum, Kontakt, an AU instrument, …)? → Load it as an instrument plugin.

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Import your own sample libraries

The drum and instrument generators play sample-based kits. By default they use the packs S&S provides, but you can import your own WAV libraries and they will sit alongside the factory sounds (or replace them, for drums). Your imported sounds are then picked up automatically by generation, shuffle, and the sound browser — no per-track wiring needed.

Your imports are kept completely separate from the packs S&S ships: they live in their own folder, are never overwritten by app updates or pack re-installs, and can be backed up as a single archive.

What you can import today

	Drums	Instruments (pitched)
Sound type	One-shot hits (kick, snare, hat, …)	Single samples mapped across the keyboard
Mapped to	24 drum roles	32 instrument categories
File format	WAV only	WAV only
Per sample	One file = one hit	One file is repitched across all keys from a detected root note

WAV only (for now)

Only .wav files are imported. Other audio (mp3, aiff, flac, ogg, m4a…) is detected and skipped — the import screen tells you exactly how many files were skipped. Convert them to WAV first if you want them included. Multi-zone / velocity-layered formats (SFZ, DecentSampler) and looped instruments are not supported yet — pitched imports are single-sample.

Before you start

• Organize your samples into sub-folders by type. The importer maps one folder to one role/category. A layout like My Kit/Kicks/…, My Kit/Snares/…, My Kit/Hats/… imports cleanly, because each sub-folder becomes a role.
• Make sure the files are WAV. Anything else is skipped.
• Your original files are copied on import, so you can move or delete the originals afterward without breaking anything.

Step-by-step: import a drum kit

1. Open the import wizard from any of these places:
   • Settings → Sample Library → "Import Drums…", or
   • the "Import Samples" button in the Drum generator panel header, or
   • the "…or import your own drum samples" link shown when no drum pack is installed.
2. A folder picker opens — select the folder that contains your kit and click "Scan".
3. On the review screen:
   • Give the import a Pack name (a suggestion is pre-filled).
   • Leave "Skip duplicates" on to avoid re-importing files you already have.
   • In the "Their folder → Import as" table, check the role the wizard guessed for each of your folders. Each row has a dropdown — correct any wrong guesses, or choose "— skip —" to leave a folder out. (The wizard learns your corrections and reuses them next time.)
   • A yellow banner lists any non-WAV files that can't be imported.
4. Click "Import N" (N = the number of files that will be imported).
5. When it finishes, choose how the kit should be used:
   • "Alongside the factory pack" (default) — your sounds are added to the existing pool.
   • "Use only my imported samples" — disables the built-in drum pack so only your kit is used. This requires an app restart ("Restart now").

Step-by-step: import an instrument library

The flow is identical, started from Settings → Sample Library → "Import Instruments…" or the "Import Samples" button in the Instrument generator panel. Two differences:

• You map your folders onto instrument categories (pianos, pads, strings, brass, …) instead of drum roles.
• An optional "Analyze pitch" checkbox (off by default) detects each sample's root note when the filename and embedded metadata don't already specify one. S&S reads the root note from the WAV's metadata or a note in the filename (e.g. Grand_C3.wav) first; turn this on for samples that have neither.

Each imported instrument is a single sample stretched across the whole keyboard from its root note — great for one-shot textures, pads, and simple keys.

How your imported sounds get used

Once imported, your samples become additional options in the same role/category pools the generators already use. You don't pick them by hand:

• Generate and the 🎲 shuffle button draw from the combined pool (factory + yours).
• The more samples you have in a role, the more variety shuffle gives you.

Managing your imported packs

Everything lives under Settings → Sample Library:

• Imported Packs lists each pack with its kind, file count, and size.
• "Remove" deletes a pack. Before it does, S&S runs a usage check and warns you if any tracks depend on it — e.g. "3 tracks across 2 projects use this pack — 3 will fall silent." — and asks you to confirm with "Remove anyway". (Removal is whole-pack.)
• "Back Up My Samples…" zips your entire imported library into one archive, and "Restore…" merges a backup back in (skipping packs you already have). This is the easy way to move a painstaking import to another machine.

Where your files live

Imported samples are copied into:

~/Library/Application Support/signals-and-sorcery/user-samples/

This folder is yours alone — app updates, pack downloads, and library scans never touch it. Because everything is copied here, deleting your original sample files is safe; the app keeps its own copy. (A track whose sample later goes missing simply falls silent — it never crashes the app.)

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Load your own instrument plugins (VST3/AU)

On a synth track, the default instrument is Surge XT, but you can swap in any VST3 or AudioUnit (AU) instrument plugin installed on your Mac — a soft synth, a sampler like Kontakt, a Rompler, anything that makes sound from MIDI. Gemini still generates the MIDI; your plugin makes the sound.

1. Install the plugin (once)

Install your plugin the normal way for macOS so it lands in a standard location:

• VST3 → ~/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST3 (or /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST3)
• AudioUnit → ~/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/Components (or /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/Components)

S&S scans these standard system folders automatically — it does not read from custom plugin directories.

After installing a new plugin, restart Signals & Sorcery

S&S scans for plugins when it starts up and caches the results. A plugin you install while the app is already running may not appear in the list right away — restart the app to pick it up reliably.

2. Pick it on a synth track

1. On a synth track row, click the ▾ "Sound" button (the chevron at the right of the row's button strip).
2. In the drawer, open the "Pick" tab.
3. You'll see a searchable grid of instruments. The first cell is always "Surge XT / Default"; every other cell is one of your installed VST3/AU instruments, labeled with its name, maker, and format (VST3 or AU).
   • Use the "Search instruments…" box to filter.
   • The "Refresh" button re-reads the scanned list. (If a freshly installed plugin still doesn't show, restart the app — see the tip above.)
4. Click an instrument to load it onto the track. Your generated MIDI is preserved — only the sound changes.

3. Choose presets in the plugin's own UI

After you pick a custom instrument, the drawer offers "Open Plugin Editor" — this opens the plugin's native window, where you can browse its presets/patches exactly as you would in any DAW. Use "← Back" to return.

Your choice sticks

The instrument you pick and the preset/patch you dial in are saved with the track. They are restored when you reopen the scene, save and reload the project, or import a .sasproj file — per track. You don't have to set it up again each session.

Notes & troubleshooting

• macOS: AU instruments are macOS-only; VST3 works the same on any supported platform. VST2 is not supported.
• A plugin ships both VST3 and AU? It appears as two separate entries. Prefer the VST3 entry — preset save/restore is most reliable with VST3.
• A new plugin doesn't appear? Restart the app so it re-scans. The first scan after launch can take 20+ seconds for large plugin collections.
• Track shows "MISSING" / an amber warning? The project references an instrument that isn't installed on this Mac. Install that plugin (then restart), or pick a different instrument for the track.
• The "Shuffle" button is greyed out on a custom-instrument track — that's expected. Sound shuffle ("re-roll the sound") only works with the default Surge XT. To change a custom instrument's sound, open its plugin editor and choose a different preset.

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Next steps

• Getting Started — install S&S and learn the core workflow.
• Features — the full capability overview.
• Tutorials — video walkthroughs, including a samples demo.
• Plugin SDK — build your own generator plugins (a different kind of "custom" — extending the app itself rather than its sounds).