What is all that "warm" "Analog" - "cold" "digital" sound thing about?

[fluffy_little_something]

Today most people use synths for making sounds that can't be made using conventional acoustic or electric instruments.

Yet another 'most people do what I say they do' from fluffy. Where's your evidence for that?

Just listen to EDM, Pop, Hip-Hop, etc.

[fmr]

But OK, lets make it more interesting - which is warmer, a french horn or a trombone? A flute or a recorder?

A bongo is also an acoustic instrument. Yet does it have nothing in common with a piano. Synthesizers to 95% sound the same. And the rest 5% is distinguished and described by, for you, non-telling terms.

Bullshit. Are you saying that a Prophet-5, a Kawai K5000, a Yamaha FS1R and a Synergy sound 95% the same?

And you didn't answer my question: I didn't ask about a bongo and a piano. I asked about a french horn and a trombone, and a flute and a recorder. Actually, you have more points in common between a flute and a recorder, or a french horn and a trombone than you have between a Prophet-5 and a Synergy.

featuring more or less the same technology, even the same waveforms.

Are you sure? If you mean that Serum can use saw waves and square waves, sure.

Yes, that is the point. Of course, you wouldn't compare things which are present on the one synth, and not the other. At least, if you want to judge that the one synth sounds different to the other.

The sound is a result of ALL the components of the instrument. Again, you have more points in common between a flute and a recorder, or a french horn and a trombone than you have between DIVA and Serum. If you want to reduce BOTH to just a saw and a low-pass filter, be my guest. Following that method, I guess that I can have a piano and a bongo sound the same too (if you knock in the wood on both, I think you can have pretty similar sounds - I guess I have to try that )

[fluffy_little_something]

I don't think so. Synths (and I mean synths, not romplers) are not compared to acoustic or electric instruments anymore like about half a century ago. Unlike musicians back then we are all used to synths sounds.

Being used to something doesnt stop people from making comparisons between that thing and other things.

Sure, Lounge Lizard does the modeling thing, but there are not many who do that. The vast majority of synth developers don't.

So when you claim something is in 'vast majority', you get to speak for 'we', do you?

And few people compare Sylenth1 brass to real brass, for instance. Or a Diva electric bass to a real electric bass. Or a Legend string to a real violin.

How exactly would you know how many people do or dont make those comparisons? Speaking for everyone again?

In reality, when people sense something that resembles something else, comparing it to the thing it resembles is pretty much part and parcel of what our brain does; people make comparisons against familiar reference points for everything. That's why a synth brass sound is still called 'brass' even though there's no actual brass involved, the reference point is that ingrained in what it is.
If people werent intrinsically comparing a synth brass patch to the reference point of real brass sounds it wouldnt be getting called 'brass' in the first place.

Yeah, you always want to be the exception, we know, but don't expect me to waste my time trying to convince you. I don't care whether you believe me or not.

With many synth brass sounds the usage of the term is indeed dubious as they might as well be leads, strings, pads, or whatever. Most people no longer care whether what we call synth brass sounds authentic and close to an orchestra's brass section.

[whyterabbyt]

In my view sample-based synthesis (which might also include wavetable I suppose) is not what a mere rompler/sampler does. The former is for creating new sounds, whereas the latter is for reproducing real instruments as authentically as possible.

Funny how many of the commercial romplers specifically include synthetic sounds, and synthesiser features like filters, then.
The 'vast majority' of them, I would have thought.

Maybe you should list which ones only reproduce real instruments.

[whyterabbyt]

Today most people use synths for making sounds that can't be made using conventional acoustic or electric instruments.

Yet another 'most people do what I say they do' from fluffy. Where's your evidence for that?

Just listen to EDM, Pop, Hip-Hop, etc.

Have done, no evidence of your assertion to be found there.

[whyterabbyt]

Yeah, you always want to be the exception[/.quote]

Exception to what, accepting something just because you say it? Dont think I am, really.

but don't expect me to waste my time trying to convince you.

What a convenient excuse for making claims with no evidence.

[fmr]

In my view sample-based synthesis (which might also include wavetable I suppose) is not what a mere rompler/sampler does.

yet, it's not "your view" that defines things. Thigs are what they are, no matter what your view of them is. And what do you mean by "mere rompler/sampler"? What does "mere" means in that sentence?

The former is for creating new sounds, whereas the latter is for reproducing real instruments as authentically as possible. There are people who do entire classical works using romplers. For a layman it is hard to notice that it was not a live orchestra but a sound module playing.

ANYTHING can be used for creating new sounds. You can create new sounds with acoustic instruments - just use them in unusual ways, and you create new sounds with them (actually, this has been done since like 100 years now). And the fact that there are people "who do entire classical works using romplers" doesn't invalidate anything. Do you have any idea of how much work is necessary to "fake" an orchestra, with what you call "a rompler"?

Not only does the library have to be SUPERBLY WELL programmed, using ALL the vast resources of synthesis engine of modern samplers, as also the performance has to be carefully programmed to take advantage of all that power, and the player has to be familiar with all the phrasing and playing techniques of EACH of the orchestra instruments - very much like a composer/orchestrator. Devaluing it is nonsense, and it just means you have no idea of what is involved.

Anyway, a sampler can be used to create "new sounds" MUCH MORE than a "mere" subtractive synth, which sound palette is WAY more limited.

[foosnark]

I honestly believe that if you gave people two versions of the same synth, analogue or digital, and one was all kitted out with blue LEDs and chrome knobs, and the other was kitted out with amber LEDs and bakelite, the former would be identified as 'colder'.

I expect you're right A Sub37 looks a lot warmer than a Roland System 1...

[annode]

When synths first started appearing in popular music etc, one the most common pejorative descriptions of them (often from musicians with a more luddite bent) was that they were thin, cold and sterile(*).

That exact same generations of analog synths is now revered, not just for their nostalgic/vintage associations, but for their warmth, thickness, and richness.

Funny that, innit.


* That notion even made them more popular with some musicians who used that to leverage a sense of alienation and dystopia (cf certain British post-punk Ballard-worshipping outfits, just before everything turned into bland plinky Synthpap.)

Well, initially they could only compare them to acoustic and electric instruments that dominated up until when synths came along, not to the DX7 or whatever. So naturally synths must have sounded a bit thin to them. Especially in the case of monophonic synths because the warmth often results from the voices of chords interacting. A violin alone can also sound rather cold and boring, but a string section is a different story.

And maybe those Brits wanted synths to sound that way, and programmed them accordingly.

Today, however, we don't compare synths to more traditional instruments, but to each other. We no longer consider synths to be instruments for emulating real instruments, but a class of instruments of their own. And since attributes such as warm or cold are based on different sound characters, and synths are all different (be it hardware or software), it is only natural that some synths sound warmer than others.

Still, I don't know which objective properties determines that warmth. Maybe the focus on certain frequency bands.

What I remember from that time specifically were comparisons to the Freeman String Symphonizer (Jan Hammer)and Oberheim strings(Lyle Mays). Not Moog or other monophonic types. Analog string emulations often received comments concerning warm and thin. Comparing them to real orchestra.

[chk071]

But OK, lets make it more interesting - which is warmer, a french horn or a trombone? A flute or a recorder?

A bongo is also an acoustic instrument. Yet does it have nothing in common with a piano. Synthesizers to 95% sound the same. And the rest 5% is distinguished and described by, for you, non-telling terms.

Bullshit. Are you saying that a Prophet-5, a Kawai K5000, a Yamaha FS1R and a Synergy sound 95% the same?

If they had the same features, they would. I think you're massively missing the point. Again, read the first post, instead of posting offtopic nonsense. That's much better than doing multiple quotes to allegedly prove someone wrong, and still miss the point. Seriously.

[yellowmix]

There's no unified 'we' for whom that applies. Lizard Lounge has been a stape emulation of real instruments for years, as has Pianoteq etc etc. More broadly, synthetic strings, brass, and organ sounds are still used all over the place, made by synths. To many people its a thing synths are 'for.'

Like cellos are for "string sounds" in a particular frequency range? Every instrument plays a role. Outside of modular synths, synths are generally architected with a particular approach and workflow, like all instruments. People don't expect a flute to be able to also produce a tuba sound, so why expect any one synth to have an unlimited palette?

Granted, a single synth generally does have a much wider variety of distinct sounds than any one acoustic instrument so people have a hard time identifying and categorizing it, so we have terms like "pads" or "synth string". It's a classification issue at this point.

The names for synth tropes/clichés is interesting; in EDM we have the dubstep "Wub Wub", and yesteryear's "Hoover". Contrast with synth patches in pop/rock that are named after the song, "Lucky Man lead", "Jump synth". People are all about likening things to what we know; it's not a deficiency in whatever it is we are describing.

[fmr]

But OK, lets make it more interesting - which is warmer, a french horn or a trombone? A flute or a recorder?

A bongo is also an acoustic instrument. Yet does it have nothing in common with a piano. Synthesizers to 95% sound the same. And the rest 5% is distinguished and described by, for you, non-telling terms.

Bullshit. Are you saying that a Prophet-5, a Kawai K5000, a Yamaha FS1R and a Synergy sound 95% the same?

If they had the same features, they would. I think you're massively missing the point. Again, read the first post, instead of posting offtopic nonsense. That's much better than doing multiple quotes to allegedly prove someone wrong, and still miss the point. Seriously.

So, if all the synths were the same, they would sound the same Brilliant (it wasn't what you wrote, BTW).

Reading the first post - I did, and I answered that with my first post in this thread (sarcastically). To be clear, all this "analog= warm" vs "digital=cold" talk is just another urban myth.

All software is digital, BTW - so, DIVA is not more "analog" than Serum. What else can be more objective than that?

Besides that, the qualities that one "sees" (or listens") in one synth vs another synth vary from person to person. So the sooner the OP realizes that there isn't any intrinsic "warmness" quality in analog as there isn't any intrinsic "coldness" quality in digital (whatever these mean), the better. IMNSHO, of course.

[fluffy_little_something]

Just a few remarks to the posts directed at me:

So what? Who compares sampled Fairlight or Minimoog sounds to acoustic or electric instruments?
Obviously I am talking about sampled real instruments, not sampled synth sounds (like UVI stuff).

If you think the sounds used in current EDM, Pop, and Hip-Hop can be made without synths, you are mistaken. Most of them just can't, or they sound very different. Even with simple sounds such as drums and percussion, let alone supersaw sounds etc.
No idea what you have listened to, those genres are full of synth sounds that can't be done using conventional instruments while achieving the same sound.

I didn't say the vast majority of samplers don't have synth functionality. I had used 'vast majority' regarding the developers making plugins based on modeling real instruments, AAS being among just a few.

When I look at Air's Xpand for instance, it is also a hybrid, which includes sampled real instruments, but also comprises synth engines for making normal synth sounds. I wish it only had the sampler part as the synth sounds suck and the parameters are very incomplete for a synth.
A good example of basic samplers in my view were Roland's sound canvases, which were also aptly called sound modules.

Sure, it is a lot of work, but still, I can get much closer to a real orchestra when using Roland's sound canvas rather than Dune or Sylenth1, which will always sound artificial, lacking the typical aspects of real instrument sounds, like characteristic attack etc.

I can play a sampled, say, piano patch very expressively, but it is still the piano patch. It doesn't become a new sound. Unless, again, I apply synth features such as filters.

String machines didn't really sound like real strings, albeit interesting.

[Sampleconstruct]

Page 4 and no lock yet, so sad!

[fluffy_little_something]

So, if all the synths were the same, they would sound the same Brilliant (it wasn't what you wrote, BTW).

Reading the first post - I did, and I answered that with my first post in this thread (sarcastically). To be clear, all this "analog= warm" vs "digital=cold" talk is just another urban myth.

All software is digital, BTW - so, DIVA is not more "analog" than Serum. What else can be more objective than that?

Besides that, the qualities that one "sees" (or listens") in one synth vs another synth vary from person to person. So the sooner the OP realizes that there isn't any intrinsic "warmness" quality in analog as there isn't any intrinsic "coldness" quality in digital (whatever these mean), the better. IMNSHO, of course.

I disagree. It is not about whether it IS analog or not, but about whether it SOUNDS analog or not. And I do think Diva sounds more typical of an analog hardware synth than Serum does. And it makes sense, as Diva has been developed with that goal in mind, Serum not.