Musical Practice and Performance Stack Exchange
Musical Practice and Performance Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [synthesis]

For questions related to sound synthesis and sound designing.

Synthesis concerns the different ways to design a sound wave and are performed by synthesizers. A lot of different methods are possible - additive, substractive, frequency modulation - and can be combined to reach a particular timbre of effect.

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Why doesn't my synthesized note sound natural?

I'm currently developping a game, and I'm trying to synthesize a music note from various instruments in C++. For now, I'm only trying to replicate an A4 440Hz with the help of an existing audio file as a reference. I've tried my best to make my…
Nereid Regulus
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Are there any music programming languages from after the SuperCollider era?

The history of music and sound synthesis languages can be traced back to the Music N languages starting in the 1950s. You can trace the threads from there to a variety of languages that were developed in the 90s, including CSound, ChucK and…
N. Virgo
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Do different synthesizers have different timbres and/or produce different harmonics for the same given waveform?

All basic synthesizers can produce the basic waveforms: sawtooth, square, triangle, and sometimes sine. Does each synthesizer "injects" its own character to the waveform? Are all sawtooths the same, or can there be differences? For example: Can an…
Lolo
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Synthesizer: why playing a second time the same note shut down the first one?

When playing on synthesizers, usually when playing a second time the same note, even if the release phase is very long or the sustain pedal is pressed, the first note is shut down. Put in another way,…
Tom
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Learning to Patch Synthesizers - "Synth Theory"

I'm currently in the process of learning to produce music, and one thing I'm finding absent in any of the resources I come across is what I guess I'd call "synth theory". For someone who's very experienced with synths, they can pick up a subtractive…
user1002617
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What exactly is the "cross modulation" on Roland Jupiter and JX analog synthesizers?

Roland's later analog synthesizers have a setting for cross-modulation between the two oscillators. I'm trying to find out what the exact technical nature of this effect is. Is it phase modulation, linear frequency modulation, exponential frequency…
Your Uncle Bob
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Why do some synthesizers have two or more oscillators?

Many synthesizers (like the Elektron Analog Four) have two oscillators. The Novation Peak has even three oscillators. This seems to be common in subtractive synthesis: Source: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subtraktive_Synthese For what practical…
Simon
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Possible Harmonium/Reed Organ Synthesizing Techniques

I am working on a project to make a synthesizer for RaspberryPi capable of playing Harmonium/Reed Organ using external MIDI keyboard. I am making it in Python 2.7 using Numpy. Till now I have completed first phase of my project which includes…
DCP
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Creating a Risset glissando with Chuck - How do I get rid of the "click"

I'm trying to create a Risset glissando (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shepard_tone) with chuck (http://chuck.cs.princeton.edu/). The problem is, I keep hearing a very annoying click when the sounds start a new cycle. I tried to get rid of it by not…
Roland Bouman
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Vibration Modes of Drums

I just learned in the context of a PDE course how the various modes of vibration arise as solutions to the 2D Wave Equation. I am curious as to how many of these describe the motion of actual drums. Clearly the size and shape of the drum matter as…
user82425
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How do you simplify a guitar note signal so that it's a simple sine wave and sounds "synthy"?

I'm looking at using a modular synth to convert a single note guitar melody into basic sine waves at pitch. I don't care about chords so that should simplify things quite a bit. Problem is, I don't know what steps to use to simplify the signal. …
empty
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Portamento only when gate already opened

In the factory synth, Oki Computer, there is a portamento/glide knob. I would like to alter the instrument so that a new note (ie. the gate has closed) begins on it's default pitch rather than pulling the pitch from the previous note. It looks like…
MikeiLL
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How to make a Shepard tone, shape frequency amplitude response in Reaktor

Here's a video demonstrating combining a Pitch LFO and an Amplitude LFO in Reaktor's Form ensemble to create "infinitely upward" glissando in Reaktor. I'd like to be able to play a scale or melodic passage of Shepard tones that does this and am…
MikeiLL
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How do I figure out the fundamental frequency of a sound from its frequency spectrum?

I really want to know the fundamental frequency (hertz) of every sound I play in my DAW. All I have is an oscilloscope. I can see the waveform of a sound, I can see all the frequencies the sound is at on the spectrum analyzer, but I can't get the…
SillyQuestionMale
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What are the typical value ranges and units for ADSR parameters?

I'm building my first electronic instrument. With a piano keyboard (made of plywood), 61 keys, 12 tone polyphony (even number bigger than the number of fingers). The controlling electronic is done, now will be time for the user interface. The device…
bicyclesonthemoon
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