Orchestra hit

An orchestra hit, also known as an orchestral hit, orchestra stab, or orchestral stab, is a sound effect created through the layering of the sounds of a number of different synthesized orchestral instruments playing a single staccato note or chord. The orchestra hit sound was propagated by the use of early samplers, particularly the Fairlight CMI where it was known as the ORCH5 sample. The sound is used in pop, hip hop and techno genres to accentuate passages of music.

The orchestra hit has been identified as a "hip hop cliché". In 1990, Musician magazine stated that Fairlight's ORCH5 sample was "the orchestral hit that was heard on every rap and techno-pop record of the early 1980s". The orchestra hit has been described as popular music's equivalent to the Wilhelm scream.

Use of short samples (such as the orchestra hit) became popular in the early 1980s with the advent of digital samplers. These devices allowed sounds to be replayed at specific times and at regular intervals by sequencing, which was extremely difficult through previous methods of tape splicing. Samplers also began to allow sections of audio to be edited and played by a keyboard controller.

The orchestra hit was popularised in Afrika Bambaataa's "Planet Rock" (1982) and used soon after in Kate Bush's "The Dreaming". Other examples of use in popular music include En Vogue's "Hold On" (1990) and Duran Duran's "A View to a Kill" (1985).Yes's "Owner of a Lonely Heart" (1983) used an orchestra hit which was possibly sampled from Kool and the Gang's "Celebration". By the mid 1980s, the orchestra hit had become commonplace in hip hop music, and its ubiquitous use became a cliché. Use in other genres extends to jazz funk, where it was used on the title track of Miles Davis's 1986 album Tutu. By the mid 1990s the sound had begun to be used in caribbean music.