The Orchestra Crew

Our Odyssey Orchestra team is a group of well-rehearsed friends; everone involved with a musical background and years of experience in the business. Never change a winning team - that's why we work together as often as possible.

Matthys Maree

Close friend, great musician, arranger and director of the Odyssey Orchestra, Matthys is in charge of the musical side when it comes to orchestral recordings with the Odyssey players. His talent and great musicality is well-known and heard on many albums around the world. Hundrets of songs of experience. We've never disliked one of his arrangements. In other words: Bolletproof.

Evert van Niekerk

Evert is the heart of the Odyssey ensemble. He calls the players and always brings the right bunch of people together, depending on the customer's request. His friendship and outstanding skills as first violin player make him a key person in every single project we've done with him and his flocks.

Fuzz

The man with the beard (or the beard with the man). The man behind the desk, on stage, under the rack, in the car - getting some more mics and cables. Da maan! Every single Odyssey recording session deeply depends on his outstandingly serving character. Can't beat this man. Great engineer (and musician as well).

Daniel Mhlanga

Daniel is the running man. He's always on duty before, during and after the sessions. He transcribes Matthys' handwritten orchestral charts into proper Sibelius files and is in charge for all the many things around the obvous things. Oh, and he serves great coffee. What a great man!

Matthias Heimlicher

Responsible for the whole production, Matthias organizes the sessions and is the key person between the artist and the orchestra. Sometimes, he draws some rough arrangement ideas and is in charge of all the files, financial issues and travels forth and back with the precious recordings. Your data is in good hands here. Promise!

THERE'S NOTHING LIKE A REAL ORCHESTRA

Imagine having a real orchestra on your next album. Nothing artificial, just real strings played by real musicians. The real deal. We have great experience in doing this - so let us know if we can help you out tracking a real orchestra for you. We love networking with people, that's why we work closely with some of the best in the business to make this possible.
The Odyssey Orchestra from Pretoria, South Africa is our first call address if it comes to strings recording. Working closely together for many years now, we offer a full service from string arrangements to orchestra recording and the whole organization around your project. Please contact us and give us some details on your project for a quote. Using the magic yellow button above, you can discover some info about this incredible team.

A REAL ORCHESTRA?

Sure! We generally use 15-18 players in the lineup. Each song is typically recorded 2-3 times, giving you the feel of 30 to 54 players. Pretty big, huh? Compared to synth strings, a real orchestra behaves different - humans listen to the music while they read their notes and play along the track - it's not a static thing, it's pure interaction. And each time, the players act slightly different. The result is just phenomenal…

NOT TOO EXPENSIVE?

Nope. Of course it would be cheaper to add some sample strings that just come out of your box. But hey, once you've received our quote for a complete song package, you won't ask this question again. And you'll save a lot of time by letting the real pros doing the proper work for you. The quality difference is huge. Forget about the synth and enjoy a real orchestra, worth every single penny.