Chords in Presets

[Grimes]

A lot of my favorite patches/presets use chords to get a sound. For example, in Absynth many of the patches get their nice sound by tuning each of the 3 oscillators differently (e.g. to get an Am chord) and then having slightly different envelopes / modulations / whatever for each.

Now my question is: how do you deal with this when using these types of patches (e.g. playing live)? The only things I've thought of to deal with this are

1. Create 3 different instruments, each one containing a different oscillator's settings. The problem with this is that it can be a bit of a pain to setup all the routing, and I don't think this can be done for playing an instrument live.

2. Play chords with different velocities on each finger and then use the velocity to change modulations / envelopes. The problem here is that it's quite difficult for to play my cheap MIDI keyboard in this way.


Any suggestions?

[Sascha Franck]

Instead of doing it inside the patch itself, you may want to try a MIDI plugin.
Cubase SX for instance comes with "Chorder".

With those, you could set up a different chord for any key you like.

Alternatively, you could of course also learn how to play some chords...

[advaya]

Instead of doing it inside the patch itself, you may want to try a MIDI plugin.
Cubase SX for instance comes with "Chorder".

With those, you could set up a different chord for any key you like.

Alternatively, you could of course also learn how to play some chords...

Ouch! That last one stings a little!

[CypherOne]

I would usually try the same chord with some pads or retune the oscillators on the synth so that they play the same chord as my pads. Not that I use chords much.

[Dr.Wu]

in the case of presets that are already configured as chords you could do the following:
modulate the pitch of the oscillator that plays the third in the chord with the pitchbender and assign a pitchbend range of a halfstep.
then disconnect the two other oscillators from the pitchbender so they do not respond to it.
make sure that the oscillator is tuned to a major third.
now if you bend to the left you get a minor chord and when you bend to the right you get a suspended fourth chord.
even if you know how to play proper chords i found this approach to be a fresh inspiration because by wiggling the pitchbend and playing one finger lines with my right hand i can come up with chord progressions that i would have never thought of while playing in the traditional way.

Of course this approach only works with synthesizers that have a very flexible
modulation routing for the pitchbend.
I used it a lot with my XV5080 but maybe some softsynth can do a similiar thing

best
Dr.Wu

[Sascha Franck]

Ouch! That last one stings a little!

Does it?

[Grimes]

Instead of doing it inside the patch itself, you may want to try a MIDI plugin.
Cubase SX for instance comes with "Chorder".

With those, you could set up a different chord for any key you like.

Alternatively, you could of course also learn how to play some chords...

Perhaps I wasn't clear. If I disable all the oscillators except one and then play chords, it won't sound nearly as good because each of the notes in the chord will have the same envelope and modulations. I do know how to play chords - in fact what I'm trying to do is have more control over what chords are being played without sacrificing some of the qualities of the patch.

For example, suppose I make a patch using two oscillators: a saw at the root note and a square at the 5th. I'd like to be able to play this patch live and not always be stuck with this chord, yet always have a saw on one note and a square on another. Ideally I'd have some magic way of telling the synth which oscillator to use for each finger.

modulate the pitch of the oscillator that plays the third in the chord with the pitchbender and assign a pitchbend range of a halfstep.

This is an interesting idea. It still doesn't totally solve my problem, but it does give me a bit more control. Thanks for the tip!

[Sascha Franck]

For example, suppose I make a patch using two oscillators: a saw at the root note and a square at the 5th. I'd like to be able to play this patch live and not always be stuck with this chord, yet always have a saw on one note and a square on another. Ideally I'd have some magic way of telling the synth which oscillator to use for each finger.

OK, use a "chorder" or "chord memorizer" (which is what it's called in Logic) and send the output to different instances of the same (or similar) plugins.
Further MIDI messages can then be used to change the scale.

Not sure whether SX's Chorder is capable of such a thing (never tried), Logic's chord memorizers defenitely are.