Charlatan – free polyphonic, subtractive virtual analog soft synth
BlauKraut Engineering has released Charlatan – a free polyphonic, subtractive virtual analog software synthesizer for Windows.
Charlatan is a polyphonic, subtractive virtual analog software synthesizer plugin whose design focuses on sound quality and easy usability. The design philosophy was to provide a feature set just large enough to cover a wide range of sounds rather than an infinite number of parameters and modulation options cluttering the user interface and distracting from the creative process. That said, Charlatan’s synthesis architecture is flexible enough to create all kinds of sounds, from conventional classic leads, basses and pads to weird blips and noises.
While making no compromises about sound quality, the algorithms have been optimized for efficient CPU usage making Charlatan well suited as a ”bread and butter” synth even in projects with a large number of plugin instances.
Charlatan is available for free download via BlauKraut Engineering.
Features
Main features of Charlatan:
- 2 oscillators with triangle, sawtooth, rectangle and noise waveforms
- oscillator pulse-width modulation (PWM) and slew rate modulation (morphing between triangle and sawtooth)
- oscillator hard synchronization and ring modulation
- 2 ADSR envelope generators
- 1 LFO
- 3 filter types emulating nonlinear characteristics of classic hardware: 4-pole (24 db/oct) and 2-pole (12 db/oct) lowpass, bandpass
- 3 voice modes: Monophonic with retriggering, Monophonic Legato and 8-voice Polyphonic
- low CPU usage
- 100% coded in C++
- native 64-bit support
Vintage demo: Roland Alpha Juno 2 Analog Synthesizer (1986)
Roland Alpha Juno 2 Analog Synthesizer from the year 1986. The direct successor of the Juno-106 but with more possibilites.
The first demo shows the different sound possibilities.
“This is an upgraded version of the Alpha Juno 1. It adds an extended 61 note keyboard with velocity and aftertouch and an external memory cartridge slot. Other than that it has the same great sound and features as the Juno 1. Sliders and buttons were replaced by membrane buttons and the Alpha Dial which is used to edit and browse through the extensive selection of parameters: DCO digitally controlled oscillators, LFO, bend, ENV, pulse, waveforms, noise, PW/PWM, high pass filter, VCF filter with freq/env/res/lfo/kybd, VCA envelope, chorus, and more.
Adequate in the studio or on the stage, the Juno 2 has 64 presets and 64 user memory patches, a nice LCD display, an LFO capable of a very slow rate for some cool sweeping effects, and a great bass sound (especially nice for acid basslines) and noise effects! It also has chord memory which is perfect for rave & techno, portamento and keyboard transposing. The PG-300 Synthesizer Programmer gives you traditional slider control of each parameter for much easier and faster editing. “
Deep Street has released Sunrizer XS synthesizer
Sunrizer XS synth is a virtual analog synthesizer that takes the definition of iOs synthesizer to the next level.
Thanks to carefully designed architecture and heavy usage of coprocessor it blurs the boundaries between iOs and hardware synthesizers.
Sunrizer XS was built to perform and works perfectly with any MIDI keyboard or sequencer. A lot of research has been done in order to achieve unheard warmth and clarity.
*** The app requires at least iPhone 3GS or iPod Touch 3rd gen. iPhone4 or iPod Touch 4rd gen. recommended for full polyphony ***
*** Introductory price -50% off. ***
HIGHLIGHTS
· True SuperSaw sound emulation, first found in the legendary Roland JP-8000 synthesizer. SuperSaw is a layered waveform consisting of multiple saw waves which are detuned to create an extremely full and epic sound. It’s possible to use 2 supersaw oscillators per voice · Polyphony: 7 voices on iPhone 4, 3 voices on iPhone 3GS
· Two independent filters per voice with configurable routing. You can select between various filter types including classic resonant LP,HP,BP,Notch and less common like Comb and Formant.
· The Morph Group function lets you continuously morph of up to 30 parameters in a sound (including effects), using only the modulation wheel.
· Full support for CoreMidi, MIDI mapping with learn function
OSCILLATORS
· 2 warm-sounding analog modelled oscillators per voice + 2 sub-oscillators (except SuperSaw). Available waveforms: Saw, PWM pulse,Triangle, SuperSaw.
· Oscillator 2 hard-sync and configurable routing
· Osc-mix, ring modulator
· White noise oscillator
FLEXIBLE MULTI FILTERS
· Two independent filters per voice with configurable routing. You can select between various filter types including: resonant LP,HP,BP,Notch, Comb and Formant.
· Configurable routing: serial or parallel with bypass option.
· ADSR envelope, keyboard tracking and full LFO control
MODULATION
· Two LFOs per voice. It’s possible to assign each LFO to almost any parameter. 3 LFO running modes: trigger, 1 shot, global. 6 waveforms, phase and fade-in knobs
· The Morph Group function lets you continuously morph of up to 30 parameters in a sound (including effects), using only the modulation wheel.
· Two Modulation ADSR Envelopes for amplitude and filters cutoff
· Pitch and modulation wheels
EFFECTS
· A number of effects are built in: distortion, chorus, equalizer, stereo delay. All parameters can be modulated using mod-wheel.
ARPEGGIATOR
· Sunrizer XS incorporates very powerful programmable arpeggiator. You should think of it more like a small step sequencer.
OTHER FEATURES
· Over 200 presets, ability to share cutom banks via email
· 7 voices polyphony
· Playback modes: poly, solo, arp
· Built-in recorder supporting AudioCopy and iTunes file sharing.
· Supports CoreMidi. MIDI key velocity can affect up to 3 parameters.
· Configurable piano keyboard size
· Hold button allows you to to keep notes sustaining until you play new notes.
· With Chord Memory function you can play the chord by only pressing single keys.
· Tube soft saturation on output
How to get started with analogue synthesizers, modular systems, stepsequencers and more
“The Testsalon inside Rough Trade East in London is the showroom installed by Schneidersladen, Berlin with the latest news in electronic hardware devices. The Video gives you an overview on how to get started with analogue synthesizers, modular systems, stepsequencers, drummachines, or filters from independent manufacturers like Doepfer, Sherman, MFB, TomOberheim, Makenoise, Cwejman, SND, Vermona and many others. All is connected with each other via Midi or cv gate and you can make some music easily .. if you are around. “
Geist Expander: Analogue Mayhem
Here’s a new expander we discovered yesterday, promises to give you a lot of organic electro sounds:
FXpansion is proud to present Analogue Mayhem, a Geist Expander featuring edgy, organic electronic sounds generated almost exclusively with a large analogue modular synthesizer. Its unique character and texture is ready to deploy in Geist’s fast and intuitive sample-sequencing environment – insane sequences, deranged SFX bursts, deep basses, lush chord stabs and multi-sampled synthetic drums which use Geist’s round-robin, velocity layering and FX treatments for expressive depth and sonic variation.
Geist Expander for electronic music
Over 800 WAV samples
Over 180 RX2 loops
5 Full song presets
6 Engine presets
30 Kit presets
71 Pad presets
Anything but vanilla, Analogue Mayhem defies genre categorization and is infused with a refreshing energy and attitude. Its versatile, tasteful material is universally relevant in any music requiring powerful, forward-looking sounds, and begs to be mangled further through Geist’s FX and filters or any device capable of loading 24-bit 44.1khz WAV and RX2 files. Producers of dubstep, techno, electro, hip-hop, ambient, drum & bass and other creative modern styles will find Analogue Mayhem a trip to use.
New VST recreation of the famous Oberheim™ SEM module
WOK has announced SAM, a VST recreation of the famous Oberheim™ SEM module.
While the soundwise construction is similar to the hardware unit, some limitations have been eliminated in the software version; so there is polyphony, a second LFO, a noise source and PWM for the saw waveform.
Special attention was given to recreate the analog variably of seperate hardware circuits for the audio paths in polyphonic mode.
SAM will be available end of August as a VST plugin for Windows with an introductory offer.
More information: WOK
Background info:
The SEM was Oberheim’s first official analog synthesizer. SEM stands for Synthesizer Expander Module. It was conceived with the notion of being used as a backup synth connected to a sequencer for layering or beefing up your existing monophonic analog synths. The SEM itself was a keyboard-less module with two analog oscillators, a 2-pole multimode filter, ADR envelopes, and an LFO. Each of the two oscillators offer triangle or rectangular waveforms. But unlike the Moog and ARP counterparts of the time, the SEM’s 2-pole (12dB/oct) filter was a little thin. The others used a 4-pole (24dB/oct) filter which has a steeper roll-off and so it sounds much better. But the SEM’s filter offered many modes in addition to low-pass, including high-pass, band-pass and band-reject.
Corona – new 32 and 64-bit, virtual analog and wave synthesizer
discoDSP has released Corona, a new software synthesizer for Mac & Windows.
Here’s what the developer has to say about Corona:
32 and 64-bit, virtual analog and wave synthesizer for Audio Units, VST hosts featuring 3 VA + WAVE oscillators, up to 14 combine modes between oscillators resulting in extensive timbres, 8 destination matrix modulations, 3 LFOs, 3 ADSR envelopes, unison, chorus, delay and limiter effects with high-quality sound and analog modeled filters using a straightforward and easy to use interface.
Corona is available now for EUR 149.00. A demo version is available.
Features:
- Full 64 bit compatibility:
- 64-bit Audio Units and VST for Mac.
- 64-bit VST for Windows.
- 32-bit also available.
- Unique oscillator modes – oscillators can be combined using operators. There are 10 for Phase mode or 14 for Detune mode (DT):
- Add.
- Sub.
- Mul.
- And.
- Or.
- Xor.
- Abs And.
- Abs Or.
- Abd Xor.
- Pythag.
- Sync.
- Ringmod.
- Pm/Broken Pm.
- Hundreds of waveforms – From classic VA saw, triangle, square, sine, parabola and noise to the included waveforms in two extra DWB banks with 300+ timbres from:
- Aeterphon.
- ARP 2600.
- Buchla Modular.
- Crumar Performer Elka Synthex.
- Eminent 310.
- EMS VCS-3.
- Fairlight CMI.
- Farfisa organ.
- Fender Rhodes.
- Hohner.
- Jen Bass Pedal.
- Korg Lambda.
- Korg MS-20.
- Korg Polysix.
- Mellotron.
- Memorymoog.
- Micromoog.
- Minikorg.
- Minimoog.
- Modulus Monowave.
- Moog MG-1.
- Moog Prodigy.
- Moog Rogue.
- Moog Taurus.
- Oberheim Matrix.
- Oberheim OB8.
- Oberheim Xpander.
- Odissey.
- Paia Fatman.
- Polymoog.
- Prophet 5.
- Prophet 600.
- Rhodes Chroma.
- Rhodes Polaris.
- Roland Alpha Juno.
- Roland Juno 60.
- Roland Juno 106.
- Roland Jupiter 4.
- Roland JX.
- Roland SH-101.
- Roland System 100.
- Theremin.
- Vox Jaguar.
- Waldorf Pulse.
- Yamaha CS80.
- Filters – 7 different filter types, 2-pole and 4-pole each with selectable tahn, poly, asym1, asym2, hardlimit, polywrap and asymwrap shapes. Includes filter posotive and negative drive, keytracking and selectable pre-post volume envelope stage.
- Fat, easy, mix-standing unison – Dedicated Unison unit to make sounds spread across the stereo mix with selectable octave spread, voices, detune knob and panning spread controls.
- Flexible ADR curves – Up to 5 different envelope curves for extended shaping.
- Easy to use modulation matrix – Select the most relevant synth destinations to be modulated by:
- MIDI Note.
- MIDI Velocity.
- Pitch Wheel.
- MIDI CC#1 Modulation Wheel.
- MIDI Aftertouch.
- MIDI CC#4 Foot Controller.
- MIDI CC#11 Expression.
- MIDI CC#2 Breathe.
- Several random values.
- Modulation LFO.
- Modulation Envelope.
- Filter LFO.
- Filter Envelope.
- Vibrato LFO.
- Vibrato Envelope.
Analogue Solutions Leipzig
Two nice videos prepared by a german synth mag
Home made – Digi synth with analog filter and LFO
Here’s some background info on the project:
Further progress on a digital synth project that I plan to start producing very soon. The synth will be reprogrammable from any computer and the code can be easily bent or created from scratch. It also has an LFO controlled analog resonant lowpass filter to fatten up the sound (also circuit bendable) . This project will be COMPLETELY open source (schematics, code, everything) once I get everything organized.
Vintage exploration – Maplin 3800
A small test on this incredible synth…
This is the original model of the Maplin 3800, no midi, no other effect.The Maplin 3800 has a very distinctive analog sound. The audiopath is totally analog, from the oscillators all the way to the build in spring reverb! It’s very good for Moog-like basses and leads, total weirdness and drones.
Trevor G Marshall started building synthesiser kits in Australia in 1973, the first models being the 3600 and 4600 which were hybrid digital and analogue synthesisers. The original company was bought by the UK based Maplin Electronics and these models were marketed as the Maplin 3800 and 5600.
DATAMASKIN
