Sound programming question

[stevewahl]

As background, my first two synths were an Ensoniq VFX and a Roland JV-1080. Both sample based, pretty similar to HD-1. But the Ensoniq architecture gave you up to six vioces per program, and the Roland had up to 4 tones per patch.

HD-1, however, only gives you two oscs per program. This seems quite limiting to me, and I'm here to ask if there are general tips and techniques used to get around this.

Take, for instance, a VFX sound I was trying to imitate on my Kronos. On the vfx, there were three voices used. Two of them were sawtooth waves slightly detuned from each other, and panned apart just a bit to give the sound some width. A third voice was used with a sample to give an interesting edge to the attack.

Sort of a sampled attack + synth body approach, like I understand was the Roland D50's claim to fame.

Complicating this, the attack sound had two components, both a "CH" and a buzz, that I could have got by using one sample for each on the Kronos, but I couldn't find both in a single sample on the K.

Is there a way to do things like this with HD-1? If I try and make one OSC for the body and the other for the attack, I can layer two samples together, but I can't detune them or pan them apart. Layering two samples in the other OSC for my two attack pieces may have worked well, but I didn't try that because I couldn't figure out how to do the body.

If I were to layer one sawtooth with one attack wave in each oscillator, that might work, but I don't get to shape the attack portion independently from the saw portion (envelopes, filters, etc).

I went over to EXi, used MS20 to get the detuned body (but no panning), and used MOD7 to play one of the samples - but it doesn't look lilke MOD7 lets me layer two samples like HD-1 does. I'm not very familiar with MOD7 or FM of any kind, is this the only EXi capable of playing samples? I tried STR-1, which I'm also not very familiar with, either, but although it had a sample playing spot, it seemed only useful as a body to be "tortured" by the rest of STR-1.

I could, of course, just sample the original and be done with it, but my aim is only partially to have some of my favorite old sounds; I want to use this to learn better how to program the Kronos as well.

I feel like there could easily be a technique or two I'm totally unaware of that would help me here, so I thought I'd ask all of you.

[burningbusch]

You can get the panning of the two VA oscillators in AL-1. but you're correct in that MOD-7 does not allow layering of the multisamples. If you need to stay in Program mode, then your best option might be to sample the original or resample the two Korg sounds into a single sound.

Don't overlook Combi mode. That's why it's there. A program will only take you so far.

Also, while HD-1 might seems limiting, remember that each osc. supports up to eight stereo multisamples. 16 stereo velocity layers is something the older synths simply cannot do.

Busch.

[stevewahl]

Thanks for the input! I did think of the workarounds I could get to by samplng or going to a combi. But I wanna learn "the korg way" first, you know?

I probably need to go at this from the other direction, once again: go through the existing programs, listening for sounds that make me ask "how'd they do that", and figure them out. Then I'd know "I can't do that, but I can do this and it may be close enough for my purpose."

Has anyone ever made a list of what engines the factory programs use? I probably want to do this one engine at a time.

[KEYponderer]

Has anyone ever made a list of what engines the factory programs use? I probably want to do this one engine at a time.

Have a look at the Programs section of the Voice Name List coming as part of the documentation set.
The synth engines are listed in the second column.

Hope this helps.