All right, I’m probably not the first to figure this out, but I’ve seen a lot of posts on here by folks wondering about their sound or versatility, or ones that decry their limitations as a polysynth. True, the 1 osc per voice makes for a pretty thin sound, and the brass preset is pretty much useless. UNLESS…
…you pump it through a flanger! Slow speed, narrow sweep, low resonance. Just enough to replicate the dissonance of several slightly detuned oscillators. A chorus would probably work too.
Damn thing’ll sound like an OBXa. Swear to God. Just try playing the riff to Rush’s “Subdivisions” or Van Halen’s “Jump.” Does wonders for the organ voice, too. Sure, it still sucks having a single envelope and no filter tracking, but this almost overcome by the sheer brassy fatness. It’ll open up a whole new realm for any leads or pads you wanna play with your Opus.
Again, this might not be news to some, but I was so excited at this I had to share it.
I like the opus.
It has lots of tonal variations and sounds great in stereo.
Just to avoid confusion though, it doesn’t have one oscillator per voice.
It’s not a voice assigned synth. It has one tone per key.
A bit different, but important to distinguish because of the large amount of disinformation and rumor out there.
My bad. I meant to convey that one clean tone (a “one-oscillator sound”) sounds with each key depressed. I shouldn’t use “oscillator” and “tone” interchangeably.
Maybe you can answer me this: I understand that the Opus is a divide-down synth, not a voice-assigned or “true” polysynth. Does it have 12 oscillators, one for each top-octave pitch? Is there one waveform produced that’s converted for each of the 3 sections (to square for organ, sawtooth for brass, etc.)? For such a seemingly simple instrument, its architecture still boggles me.
There is a lot of contention about this, but the Opus, while one of the few divide-down synths I truly do not like, IS a “true” polysynth. There is no such thing as a true or untrue polysynth… there are merely a couple of different ways that synthesizer polyphony has been achieved.
Divide-down is often decried as not “true polyphony” because of an issue unrelated to polyphony but actually related to synthesizer designers cutting corners. A lot of divide-down synthesizers have but one filter and one envelope that all of the 12 notes and subsequent divisions are put through. This is not a weakness of the concept of divide-down, but rather a money-saving plan on the part of the companies that designed them. Your Opus is one of these. While you can still happily achieve nice polyphonic synthesizer playing, once the trigger for the envelope and/or filter has happened, the subsequent notes played after the chord is held are bland un-filter/enveloped notes. However, this is not a divide-down problem, it is a paraphonic problem… the designers chose to make it inexpensive instead of effective.
The only real difference between a fully-implemented divide-down synthesizer and a microprocessor synthesizer with limited polyphony (and let’s face it… if “true polyphony” is being able to play all notes like a piano, limited-oscillator synths are not “true polysynths” either) is that portamento as we have known it from monosynths is not really possible as it depends on voltage changes to attain different notes, and divide-down synths oscillators do not need to change pitch of the individual oscillators/dividers. Some of them allow pitch changes and can simulate portamento with an envelope controlling the pitch of the individual oscillator/divider.
The other polysynths require a microprocessor so that notes depressed can be directed to various oscillators.
Kevin will have to answer the question about the architecture… but the way to tell if there are multiple oscillators is usually if you can detune… if you could detune the organ against the strings, then it would mean there were multiple sets of the divide down architecture. I can’t remember specifically if the Opus is capable of this, my memory tells me it isn’t… so it is likely one set of 12 oscillators being divided and waveshaped for the various sections. The Korg ES-50, my favourite string synth, had three layers of the 12 osc divide-down scheme, allowing a great deal more diversity. It also had a VCA and ENV per note. However, it was VERY lacking in a number of other ways. Still a true polysynth, though!
Good points, museslave. It’s interesting, although I’ve never considered the Opus to not be a “true” poly. That’s why “true” is in quotes. Nothing more “poly” than being able to mash all 49 keys down and to hear every damned one of 'em. I only tossed that in to, somewhat sarcastically, show the distinction that some – many, in fact – make between these and microprocessor synths that can only play 4, 5, 6 notes at a time, BUT have envs for each one. I don’t quite understand it either.
That begs an interesting question… how does a Polymoog figure into all of this? It’s a divide-down too, but I don’t know much about its filter and vca, or its env and tone capabilities.
But yes… cutting corners. The unfortunate truth about the Opus is that, from what I understand, it was designed primarily not by an engineer, but by a music professor (Bob Moog’s partner from the breadboard days, Herbert Deutsch) who was aiming at making a keyboard that made ensemble sounds easily but was maybe more capable than a preset synth, so they tossed in a Moog filter (an incredibly fat one, unlike the Rogue/Realistic one – one of its strong points!). This resulted in what I at first saw as “oversights” but, as you said, were probably just complexity- and cost-saving measures, as I imagine it was probably marketed with music students in mind. It does seem that they could’ve done a little more with it.
And you are correct, museslave… you can’t detune the 3 sections on the Opus. So it probably is just one set of oscs, which would explain the painful lack of that fat, “dissonant” sound of other polysynths. Nothin’ a little signal processing can’t fix.
Even still, I thoroughly enjoy the Opus; it seems that, at least for my purposes, for each of its shortcomings, it’s got something else about it that redeems it, and seems to me to have a lot of potential. Among the most underrated Moogs, I think!
Yeah, it’s strange. There are some very cool articles about polyphony in synths on the SOS website. Gordon Reid is really a great synth writer… but he makes some assertions, as I recall, about what defines true polyphony. It’s the only place I’ve ever seen anyone assert something like that, and I see it quoted a lot. But, as I always counter-assert, divide-down came first and is not, in itself, responsible for the under-implementation of it that came later.
A lot of the notion of what defines polyphony in synthesizers comes from pianos… which I find totally bizarre. Apart from the keyboard (which is also shared by organs and also implemented in a manner different from pianos), there is virtually no similarity between synthesizers and pianos, in design, implementation, or history. It is baffling as to why anyone would insist that polyphony in synthesizers match the polyphony in pianos. The whole notion that it should was driven by the poor ignorant people who, when first met with an synthesizer in the 60s and 70s asked, “Why can’t I play more than one note at a time?” Well, why do you WANT to play more than one note at a time? Simply because the two devices feature a similar means of activation (in appearance, anyway), it was assumed that it should operate in a manner similar to a piano. From that point on, there was this ridiculous expectation that continues even today… as people not only want piano-like polyphony (where each note follows its own independent course of amplitude and timbre, etc.) but also piano-like velocity and weight.
To me, it’s like complaining that your banjo only has four strings and lacks a sound-hole. ; ) “Why is this so twangy?”
Granted, we have a mindset that tells us that individual notes in a chord, or harmony should have their own attack, decay, and timbre… just like that of multiple instruments playing in an ensemble, even if we’re not expecting a synthesizer to sound like a piano. Frankly, I would prefer it, too… it’s just the way that Western music has trained us. It is an odd aural experience to hear a chord on a paraphonic synth followed my notes which do not have the ENV/VCF experience the notes preceding it. However, every danged THING about synthesizers sound odd (or at least did originally)… the whole concept is quite foreign to everything that came before it. While it is reasonable to expect it to follow aural tradition, it should not be NECESSARY that it do so.
The Hammond Novachord was the first divide-down device. It was intended to be an instrument that used electronic technology to generate new, as-yet-unheard sounds. While I abhor applying modern specific terms to devices that existed before those terms were coined, it is plain that the philosophy behind the creation of the Novachord was the same as that which drove Bob Moog and those composers who badgered him about making the devices that became the modular. The Novachord is a bit too primitive to have a voltage controlled filter, but it does have a VCA per note… making it at least on the right track. ; ) Basically, it was the first polyphonic synthesizer device. While it is nothing like a modular, it is a primitive version of the divide-down polyphonic synths that came after it.
Well, I’ve never had a Polymoog, but I’ve always wanted one. As Kevin has explained on this forum before at some point, the Polymoog ends up being another example of a not-fully-implemented divide-down polyphonic synth. I can’t remember specifically how it works, but it is not, according to Kevin, VCA/VCF/ENV per note.
Still, though… as in the case of the Opus, that doesn’t make it a FALSE polyphonic!
I had not heard that Herb Deutsch was involved with the Opus 3! I won’t hold it against him, though… as he was a great adviser to Moog in a number of other ways. ; )
Yes… the one saving grace for me with the Opus was that awesome filter. I was really pleased with that aspect of it.
I would have absolutely loved the Opus 3 if:
It would have, at least, had a VCA/ENV per note
It would have had a more intuitive layout
It would have been built with with a higher grade of components.
Still, even with its limitations, some cool and unique sounds can be made with it and I would never say otherwise. I bash it a lot on this forum… which is sad, as I am such an ardent defender of divide-down!
I’m glad that you like it, because that means you’ve found a way to use it and be expressive with it, and in the end, that’s all that matters.
The Opus 3’s status has increased considerably in the last 5 years. It wasn’t that long ago that I used to rant about how amazing it was that there was a Moog synthesizer with a delicious filter that went for $250. ; ) You won’t see them for THAT price anymore.
I only tossed that in to, somewhat sarcastically, show the distinction that some – many, in fact – make between these and microprocessor synths that can only play 4, 5, 6 notes at a time, BUT have envs for each one. I don’t quite understand it either.