FM Strings Synth Voice

17%20PM

FM Strings Synth Voice

This is an adaptation of a DX-7 patch that Brian Eno made in the 1980’s. It’s a somewhat cheesy sound, but I still really enjoy it, especially with reverb.


I/O

Input Signal Range Notes
112x74 -4 to 4 1/oct Signal input
103x74 0 to 1 Velocity sensitive gate input

Output Signal Range Notes
73x85 -1 to 1 It may be a good idea to attenuate polyphonic signals as individual voices are summed and summed signals may exceed the indicated range.

Controls

Knob Function Notes
142x137 Decay
137x132 Tremelo


Version History

Revision File Date Notes
V1.0 FM Strings V1.0.audulus (198.2 KB) 11/06/2018 Reuploaded from old forum

Demos

Revision File Date Notes
V1 Reverbed Strings Demo V1.audulus (745.3 KB) 11/06/2018 Demonstrates how to bring out the stringiness of the patch with reverb as well as how to tame a polyphonic patch.
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Wow this sounds FANTASTIC and it has a great demo!

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Poly strings.audulus (424.7 KB)
I think it really shines when you rig up two of these in stereo and feed it a polyphonic chord.

Once I sent the string oscillator out of the ES-8, I put it though the LXD and cv’d that gate with the Cyclic Skew envelope. It has some nice instabilities this way. Can really hear some perceived reverb and the release phase trails off naturally like a string being muted against a hard surface.

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Yeah, in general FM patches sound great in stereo. I gotta work out some auto-panned stereo FM patches.

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@futureaztec just fyi - you might be getting some distortion on the outputs in that example you posted there since you’re sending polyphonic outputs directly to the ES-8. When your polyphonic signal is exiting Audulus you always want to collapse it to mono at some point - usually after VCF and VCA, but before effects like delay and reverb.

Usually what you have to do is use a PolyToMono node to collapse the polyphonic signal, then use a level node after to adjust the level down so that it’s between -1 and 1.

Also, the way you have the gates wired up there to the ES-8 - I don’t know if you meant to do this, but it’s two of the same signal, which will just be a sum of all the gates, acting like a 4+ input OR logical operator.

If you want to have two separate gates for two different notes being held, you need to extract which gates you want by attaching the polyphonic gate signal to the QuadToMono node, then wire up the appropriate gates from there. You can have access to up to 4 at the moment since you’re limited by Quad(4)ToMono node.

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I had two of the same gates because I was out of multiples on my rack and needed to trigger two aspects of the voice I was shaping.

Is there any chance you could just show what you mean. I imagine I need to interject the PolyToMono node somewhere in @robertsyrett’ module?

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Yep, just plop it on the output. A dc blocker helps as well, since the ES-8 won’t have the AC-coupling of a typical output.

13%20PM

The diode distortion is just there for a little compression as well, but that’s not really there for practical reason like the other two.

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Okay. Sounds good to me.

Poly strings amended.audulus (669.2 KB)
I have them going through the lxd

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Seems like that’d be a good combo! Sound/video?

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Maybe someone else. I have no setup for that. I can’t really record right now. It’s like I am starting from scratch by getting out of the box.

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Okay. A couple of things. There is an ethos about doing things yourself, finding deals, making great art with humble tools. I get it. But the flipside is, there has to be an original designer, an initial run of the design that needs to be marketed and scaled in quantity to bring production costs down. So in adopting a design or finding a deal, quite often this approach is on the back of the proper, actual full process of initially releasing the product.

Brands. So it is cool to not be caught up in brands. Right. However, the other day I found a hooded sweatshirt on the dock, soaking wet in a heap by a trash can. Before I threw it away, I glanced at the label. Turns out it was a really nice sweater. So I washed it and offered it to a friend who loves it. Great find. Two things. 1. Someone had to pay for that sweater in the first place. 2. It was the brand name that kept me from just throwing it away.

If you are in a store and you are feeling open minded, you might see a cardigan that you wouldn’t normally give a second look, but suppose you notice it is a brand you wear and like. You might think, “well it is not quite my style, but maybe I just don’t know that I will like yet, because it is unfamiliar.” You go try it on and then think, “I normally don’t wear cardigans but this one is different. I like it.”

What does this have to do with music production? I just realized that because the elektron Analog Four mk1 I just acquired has overbridge, I can record all of my gear through the A4.

Now, I didn’t know this when I was researching the unit. But I figured that the elektron gear would have some really nice surprises – things I need but don’t yet know I need, which is a big reason I bought it.

Bottom line. It turns out I can record my gear without having to buy a new audio interface and worry about the quality of the converters. So maybe I could have found cheaper gear than elektron. But I bet it wouldn’t have so many happy surprises waiting to be discovered. I think that if one is attracted to ‘design’, there is an extra value when you own something that has be thought out well.

One of the reasons I checked that sweater twice was be cause I bought one just like it 6 months ago. It was maybe 15% off, but still expensive. Mind you, it is a local company who sponsors local surfers and organizes environmental projects. You could go on to say that the person who pays more for this type of product is less of a materialist than someone who buys a cheap verson and 3 other cheap items with the money they saved – made, most likely in China (or Indonesia), under nasty working conditions, bought from a retail store no one actually ever wants to have to work at. They will probably also throw this sweater away instead of passing it on, and no individuals will receive the benefit of sponsorship (a big deal in the Skateboard/Snowboard/Surf culture).

Thankyou elektron, for your pioneering work in performace synthesis/sampling! I love my new/used A4!

Check out the synthtopia overbridge 2.0 thread for some interesting criticism.

*feel free to move this post

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