IK MULTIMEDIA Hammond B-3X €359.99

There's something glorious about the sound of a Hammond underneath your fingers, especially if you’re lucky enough to play a genuine C3 or B3 coupled with a Leslie speaker. It’s a tremendously versatile instrument – from the soft, almost angelic sound of a few drawbars, to the ‘all-stops-out’ sound where the Hammond roars into action. Then you have a series of quirks – like the inertia of the Leslie speaker as you move between fast and slow setting, or the percussive key clicks so evident on the bass notes – that makes it a truly organic musical beast.

In virtual form, though, the Hammond can be a somewhat mixed bag. Native Instruments set an early gold standard with its B4 II organ, but that was sadly discontinued some years ago. Other solutions, like