Voyager Oscilator Chord Tuning Questions

Tips and techniques for Minimoog Analog Synthesizers
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infinitepest
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Voyager Oscilator Chord Tuning Questions

Post by infinitepest » Sun Jun 19, 2016 9:34 am

hi guys, new to the forum and a new voyager owner. tried searching but couldn't seem to find what i was after.

pent about a week messing with my voyager and now have been messing with midi control and trying to get my head around tunning the oscilators to make different chords or weird note combinations.

i'm a bit confused on the oscilator section, in terms of the freq and octave settings. specifically how do people know what note to dial in with OSC 2 & 3 in terms of the value? my music theory and maths isn't that great. is this possible to do on the fly? is there a chart or something to understand what values dial in what notes?

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GregAE
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Re: Voyager Oscilator Chord Tuning Questions

Post by GregAE » Sun Jun 19, 2016 1:57 pm

Here's a chart from the KnobTweak web site that might help:
Tuning Ref.png
You could dial in the notes from the chart on your Voyager and derive the MIDI CC equivalent value on your PC.

- Greg

infinitepest
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Re: Voyager Oscilator Chord Tuning Questions

Post by infinitepest » Sun Jun 19, 2016 7:34 pm

perfect. just what i was after, thanks man!

Sweep
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Re: Voyager Oscilator Chord Tuning Questions

Post by Sweep » Mon Jun 20, 2016 6:25 am

I'd strongly advise using a tuner. Oscillators can drift (and my Voyager ones have). I always keep a tuner by my synths.
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NickGrooves
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Re: Voyager Oscilator Chord Tuning Questions

Post by NickGrooves » Fri Aug 05, 2016 5:19 am

infinitepest wrote:... how do people know what note to dial in with OSC 2 & 3 in terms of the value? ... is this possible to do on the fly?
At the risk of sounding like a jerk ... I just use my ears (dialing on the fly). Each oscillator 2 + 3 has a big tuning wheel at the top. When I hold a note of osc.1, I turn the large dials for 2 and/or 3 (usually 2) until I hear the chord I want. Very easy to do on the fly.

Where you talking about something different? What am I missing here?

FWIW, maybe related or unrelated but interesting, I have noticed that the perfect 5th intervals below/above the pitch center tend to fall directly over the same left/right hash marks, respectively (the panel artwork around the knobs). I suppose if my oscillators were fundamentally "out of tune" then the hash marks would not align with those perfect intervals?
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MC
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Re: Voyager Oscilator Chord Tuning Questions

Post by MC » Fri Aug 05, 2016 10:34 am

I tune by ear too. Due to slight calibration differences between units, panel hash marks or patch values don't always get the same results.
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GregAE
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Re: Voyager Oscilator Chord Tuning Questions

Post by GregAE » Sat Aug 06, 2016 7:33 am

MC wrote:Due to slight calibration differences between units, panel hash marks or patch values don't always get the same results.
Agreed! That's why I wrote:
"Due to its analog nature, the tuning values for any given Voyager will probably be different from those shown", and included space to write in new values.

While fourths and fifths are easy, other intervals can be harder to discern by ear. The reference sheet can get you there very quickly. :D

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NickGrooves
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Re: Voyager Oscilator Chord Tuning Questions

Post by NickGrooves » Sat Aug 06, 2016 3:29 pm

So I was correct in thinking we are discussing the adjustable pitch knobs?

or are we tuning the fundamental "center" pitch of each osc somehow? or both?

I'm just not sure what we are "tuning" as there is also the global pitch tuning.
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