List(!!!!) of synths with per-voice (polyphonic) distortion

[e-crooner]

What's the point of polyphonic distortion? When you play more than one note at a time anyway, can you tell which note is the distorted one?

Yes

Having multiple signals (like chord voices) summed and then distorted is completely different than having them individually distorted then summed.

With an MPE controller you can have a chord (like 1-3-5-7) and with per-voice saturation/distortion on "aftertouch" you can definitely tell which voice is getting more or less saturation, which is added harmonic content tied to the fundamental of each voice.

Same way with multiple guitar tracking, you (usually) don't sum them before going into the amp/distortion, but you distort them individually, then sum them together in the mixing stage.

More on the subject
https://www.tokyodawn.net/meaning-of-sy ... roduction/

Does it prevent the ugly mess distortion tends to cause when playing chords?

Well, with too much distortion you could mess up literally anything, but surely it's a completely different effect, and it sounds a lot less messy.
Assuming "less messy" is what's needed on the moment, which isn't necessarily the case.
Like distortion on an electric piano/organ, you wouldn't want it to be "per-voice" if you're after the iconic sound.

What's the difference between saturation and distortion? Just a matter of degree?

[Niowiad]

What's the point of polyphonic distortion? When you play more than one note at a time anyway, can you tell which note is the distorted one?

Yes

Having multiple signals (like chord voices) summed and then distorted is completely different than having them individually distorted then summed.

With an MPE controller you can have a chord (like 1-3-5-7) and with per-voice saturation/distortion on "aftertouch" you can definitely tell which voice is getting more or less saturation, which is added harmonic content tied to the fundamental of each voice.

Same way with multiple guitar tracking, you (usually) don't sum them before going into the amp/distortion, but you distort them individually, then sum them together in the mixing stage.

More on the subject
https://www.tokyodawn.net/meaning-of-sy ... roduction/

Does it prevent the ugly mess distortion tends to cause when playing chords?

Well, with too much distortion you could mess up literally anything, but surely it's a completely different effect, and it sounds a lot less messy.
Assuming "less messy" is what's needed on the moment, which isn't necessarily the case.
Like distortion on an electric piano/organ, you wouldn't want it to be "per-voice" if you're after the iconic sound.

What's the difference between saturation and distortion? Just a matter of degree?

Yes, in some way.
https://www.waves.com/how-to-mix-with-d ... saturation

[sinemotor]

Does it prevent the ugly mess distortion tends to cause when playing chords?

Basically yes. I make lots of patches using poly distortion in repro-5 or MX and when I play chords it's like day and night, the results are always so much more satisfying. Very effective when each voice is also panned differently. On a monophonic sound it's pointless obviously.

[Gone soft]

u-he Zebra 2 offers polyphonic distortion as modules and built into the XMF filters. Surge has a polyphonic waveshaper with presets like Soft, Hard, Asymetric, Sine and Digital - all have drive modulatable with velocity, polyphonic LFOs/envelopes and MPE,

[adamszabo]

Viper has per voice distortion in the filter section, and a summed ones as effects.

[imrae]

Absynth

Strictly-speaking, "distortion" on oscillators is very common in analog synths. Most oscillators generate a saw-wave or triangle-wave "core" and obtain other waveforms by passing this through waveshapers. PWM pulse waves can be achieved by adding DC bias before a comparator. Sine waves are achieved by carefully-calibrated soft-clipping.

[discoDSP]

Discovery and Discovery Pro have polyphonic distortion.

[Cinebient]

P900 (best in class for me here too)
And yes, it makes a really HUGE difference if you have saturation/distortion per voice.

[Urs]

The point of Repro-5 per voice distortion is that it is inserted after the VCA of the voice, before the voices get mixed. This gives it a very dynamic behaviour. I'm sure one can emulate this in many synths, but it takes extra steps to get there.

[mystran]

The most obvious difference between per-voice and global distortion is that distortion applied to (mostly) harmonic signals tends to produce (mostly) harmonics results, while distortion applied to a mix of notes creates intermodulation products at all the sums and differences of all the partials (well, in a slightly simplified sense at least; there are almost always higher order terms as well).

This is why playing a monophonic lead on a guitar with lots of distortion still sounds like a monophonic lead. It is also why playing two notes on the same guitar at the same time through the same distortion can give you "power chords" where the IMD products essentially provide the missing notes in the chord when the original notes are chosen from a simple ratio (eg. 4th or 5th typically). It is also why you get a huge mess if the two notes are not in a simple ratio to each other.

If you want to play chords, where the individual notes are distorted, but the whole thing doesn't become one big noisy mess (of IMD products), then per-voice polyphonic distortion is the answer.

[crickey13]

I believe Rob Papen's Predator 2 has polyphonic distortion.

[Dencheg]

The It is also why you get a huge mess if the two notes are not in a simple ratio to each other.

Strangely enough, major 2nd sounds beautiful when distorted non-polyphonically (perhaps as a part of a powerchord)

[mystran]

The It is also why you get a huge mess if the two notes are not in a simple ratio to each other.

Strangely enough, major 2nd sounds beautiful when distorted non-polyphonically (perhaps as a part of a powerchord)

Sure, but if you put something like a complex chord through a non-poly distortion it usually comes out as pretty much just noise.

[DGillespie]

Not to toot my own horn, but Newfangled Audio Generate has polyphonic distortion.

(Whoops, just noticed it was already mentioned)

[pdxindy]

Tip:
If you use MPE, you can have distortion per voice (and other effects per voice) on any instrument that uses copies of the instrument. For example Omnisphere has an easy function to copy the first part across to the other 7. All effects on the part will then be per voice if they are on separate midi channels and you use an MPE controller (or can draw in an MPE sequencer).

It's huge, but not often talked about, benefit of an MPE set up.

That's pretty cool. Though I don't have an MPE controller (and don't plan yet on getting one).
Will it work with a good old MIDI keyboard?

Bitwig has the instrument selector device... you can create multiple instances of a synth and it has a round robin mode where each note goes to the next layer/instance. That works with a regular keyboard