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I've done a little research and created a Combi that emulates drawbars, harmonics, vibrato and Leslie effects of an Organ using the sliders and SW1+2.

I've been considering doing a tutorial on this setup, would anyone be interested in this? I know there have been a number of requests for good Organ sounds for the M3, I'm not claiming this is the best example but it's very enjoyable to play with the 'drawbars'.

The concept:
I used to own a Kurzweil 2500s and a 2600R and was very fond of the KB3 models used on those instruments and wanted to create something for the M3 with a similar level of control.

The tutorial will show you how to use some of the great features on the M3 to allow this to happen.

If there's any interest in this I will happily start writing the tutorial tonight (week off work and need a little project!).

James

--Edit--
This tutorial won't use any extra samples or the Radias board, so it would also work for the M50 as well.

I do not think I care too much for drawbars per se, but I would LOVE to see how you do it, or at least an outline of the procedure. The way I see it, every tutorial is an oportunity to learn the machine a little more, regardless of the topic being discussed. The techniques always have broader applications...

So I say go for it! I am sure most will agree...


Cheers!

that 's a real good idea, if not a tutorial, a description of your approach to programming will be very appreciated and usefull!

Creating an Organ Combi For The Korg M3

Concept:
To create a Combi that offers the same level of control and ‘tweakability’ as offered by the Kurzweil KB3 Organ Model.

Step One: Creating the Program

This is the easy bit. Go to an initialized program, we’re only after a single oscillator patch here so nothing to change really just the sample thats driving it all. Go to the Osc page, change the sample to a the basic Sine wave. In the Pitch screen get rid of any pitch bend control (this is going to be an organ patch, we won’t need pitch bend). There thats it. Nothing more to do here, just save the program and move to Combi mode.

Step Two: Populating the Combi

First, copy the program over to the first 8 Timbre slots in the Combi. Go into Timbre Parameter page and set the 8 slots to receive note data on the same channel as being transmitted by your keyboard. What you should have now is one, very loud, Sine sound all over the keyboard. Not a life-like Organ sound by any means, but this is a very good start.

Step Three: Creating the Drawbar Harmonics

OK, this is where it gets a little more interesting. We currently have a Combi made up of 8 Sine wave programs but what we want is something resembling the registers of a Tonewheel Organ. This is where the wonderful Tone Adjust comes in very handy, this allows parameters to be tweaked inside the Combi Timbres without having to create and save (using up valuable space) separate programs. The idea here is to use the per-Timbre pitch settings in the Tone Adjust window to setup the Harmonics for each of the Drawbars.

These are the pitch settings:

Timbre 1: Timbre 2: Timbre 3: Timbre 3: Timbre 4: Timbre 5: Timbre 6:
-12 +7 +0 +12 +19 +24 +28

Timbre 7: Timbre 8:
+31 +36

Note: Make sure to turn the Pitch setting on, either via the Touch Screen or the first Switch above Slider 1.

These settings will be saved when you save the Combi. Speaking of which, it might be a good idea to save the Combi now.

Step Four: ...Combi Saved? On with Creating a Percussion Setting

So if you play the Combi now (assuming you haven’t moved any sliders in Mixer Mode) it should sound like a very full Organ. Mixer mode will now act as your Drawbars (although in the opposite direction an Organ player would expect, so watch out for that if you’re used to pulling Drawbars towards you). This is all well and good, but we need to add a Percussion element to this sound. Being the lucky owner of an M3 you still have a further 8 Timbres to play with. We’re only going to use one, and then I’m going to show you a neat trick for turning that Timbre on and off without having to switch to the second mixer screen.

Back in Program Mode we’ll need to create another program for this sound. Luckily the good people at Korg have provided us with some great base ROM sounds for this. Look out for one of the Organ samples with Percussion settings on (there are a few), and also a Click sample. Layer these two sounds in a singular Oscillator program. Next visit the Amp EG page turn the sustain right down to zero, then turn the decay down to a point where you no longer hear the Organ when you hold a note down, what we’re trying to do here is cut off the sample after the percussive hit is heard no matter how long we hold the note. Save the Program and load it into Timbre 9.

Now we’re going to use the Karma button to turn off the percussive Timbre (this frees up SW1 and SW2 to turn IFX like Chorus and Distortion on and off).

Go to the Timbre Parameters page and then to the very end Tab labeled ‘Other 9-16’ change Timbre 9’s Karma Timbre Off Control so that when the Karma button is on the Percussion timbre is turned off.

Step 5: Adding Effects

Finally you can add the various effects to the organ to colour it to taste. This is very subjective and personal to the individual to the particular programmer/player, but I thought I would show you how I have this setup on my M3. In this setup I have all Timbres running through IFX1.

IFX Setup:

Harmonic Chorus
Guitar Amp
EQ + Distortion

MFX Setup:

Rotary Speaker
Room Reverb

Total Effect:

Limiter

There we go, I have the SW1 and SW2 set to turn the Wet/Dry mix on the the Chorus and Distortion effects from 100% Dry to varying degrees of Wet

Very cool!
Thanks.

Awsome tips!!! i must try this first...thank you!
The one i know is church organ drawbar like which use 8 slider for controlling the drawbar. I forget what is the combi number i will tell you later if i find it...

Thank you for this!!

You say this:

EVPS wrote:These are the pitch settings:

Timbre 1: Timbre 2: Timbre 3: Timbre 3: Timbre 4: Timbre 5: Timbre 6:
-12 +7 +0 +12 +19 +24 +28

Althought there are 6 Timbre settings, the list of values are 7 numbers.

There are 7 timbre settings in that list; he wrote Timbre 3 twice. An actual hammond organ has 9 drawbars.

kanthos wrote:There are 7 timbre settings in that list; he wrote Timbre 3 twice. An actual hammond organ has 9 drawbars.

How could I be so blind jejeje. Thanks Kanthos

I think this corrects some errors in the pitch values ...

T1: T2: T3: T4: T5: T6: T7: T8:
-12 -6 +0 +6 +12 +18 +24 +30

Good article

This looks incredible, and I'm anxious to try it out. I'm confused by the discussion on pitch values. Which ones ARE the correct numbers for pitch values? The "corrections" above sound right except for maybe the -6 for T2. Is that in line with the original Hammond pitches? Thank you!

Actually, I have an M50. Will this work for the M50, maybe with only being able to use 4 "drawbars" (knobs)?

bump for boogieman's question...

boogieman wrote:This looks incredible, and I'm anxious to try it out. I'm confused by the discussion on pitch values. Which ones ARE the correct numbers for pitch values? The "corrections" above sound right except for maybe the -6 for T2. Is that in line with the original Hammond pitches? Thank you!

Actually, I have an M50. Will this work for the M50, maybe with only being able to use 4 "drawbars" (knobs)?

I don't have a Hammond so can't say. It's a question of listening to it and adjusting to taste. Try T1 = -24 and T2 = -12. Also listen to the factory Drawbar Pipe Organ combis, see what pitch adjustments were used there, try them?

I think ideally that the pitch adjustments for each drawbar should be related by a common divisor to generate the right harmonic mix. I used a divisor of 6 (ie 6/100 of a tone per adjustment). The total range of the tone adjust parameter is +-1200 cents, so there's scope for a lot of experimenting.

Regards,
Rob