PolyVoyager wanted!

Portamental · Post by **Portamental** » Fri Oct 30, 2009 4:25 pm

psicolor wrote:Some girls told me that keyboarders are the least desirable band members, because they always appear like computer nerds. So trying to look more "human" should be importand for all synthesizer players.

That's pretty much the tone you can ear throughout, when reading Keith Emerson's autobiography : 'Pictures of an Exhibitionist'

spittingoutteeth · Post by **spittingoutteeth** » Fri Oct 30, 2009 4:26 pm

psicolor wrote: Some girls told me that keyboarders are the least desirable band members, because they always appear like computer nerds. So trying to look more "human" should be importand for all synthesizer players.

Don't tell that to these guys...

ozy · Post by **ozy** » Sat Oct 31, 2009 5:31 am

psicolor wrote:The tetr4 doesn't look as sexy. Some girls told me that keyboarders are the least desirable band members, because they always appear like computer nerds. So trying to look more "human" should be importand for all synthesizer players.

oh, come on...

let's stop immediately this unrelevant discussion...

You won't really start a debate about "keyboards vs guitar", won't you?

what's next: "analog or digital"? "pc or mac" ? "beatles or stones"? "yamaha or korg"? THAT's nerdish!

SCIENTIFIC STUDIES

have made it clear once and forever that:

guitar players a

re concave-chested, pale, and have funny facial hair. They usually die young in stupid accidents. Or, if alive, in their 50s are already pathetic relics whose face components fall all over the place,

[and let's not mention bass players and their "lonely and melancholic albeit dispotic" attitude, their propensity to suicide and to pump up the volume for attention]

while keyboard players

(especially analog synthesists, and above all jazz synthesists) kick ass, play one mean ball, tennis, boxe or whatever, eat well, drink better, and live long lives, siring cute children with young women well into their 70s.

That's a fact (I read it in The American Journal of Artistic Medicine), the rest is vacuous chatter.

As for "nerdish look", I play in my baseball jersey, proud of my strong and tanned forearms and ...er... "coach belly". My blond wife adoringly watches me from behind the mixer, and condescendigly tolerates the teenagers throwing me bras.

Discussion closed

ozy · Post by **ozy** » Sat Oct 31, 2009 5:43 am

oh, by the way:

psicolor wrote:The tetr4 doesn't look as sexy as a sh101! How do you want to rock your ass off with a tetr4?

Tetr4 is small enough to be used (two of them) as a sofisticated nipple cap,

when dancing naked while playing.

If you can't consider THAT kinky, i dunno what.

teamore · Post by **teamore** » Tue Nov 10, 2009 12:49 pm

ozy wrote: SCIENTIFIC STUDIES have made it clear once and forever that:

guitar players a re concave-chested, pale, and have funny facial hair. They usually die young in stupid accidents. Or, if alive, in their 50s are already pathetic relics whose face components fall all over the place,

[and let's not mention bass players and their "lonely and melancholic albeit dispotic" attitude, their propensity to suicide and to pump up the volume for attention]

while keyboard players (especially analog synthesists, and above all jazz synthesists) kick ass, play one mean ball, tennis, boxe or whatever, eat well, drink better, and live long lives, siring cute children with young women well into their 70s.

That's a fact (I read it in The American Journal of Artistic Medicine), the rest is vacuous chatter.

As for "nerdish look", I play in my baseball jersey, proud of my strong and tanned forearms and ...er... "coach belly". My blond wife adoringly watches me from behind the mixer, and condescendigly tolerates the teenagers throwing me bras.

Discussion closed

haha. you made my day

EricK · Post by **EricK** » Tue Nov 10, 2009 2:57 pm

Welcome to the forum Teamore.

Eric

Electrong · Post by **Electrong** » Tue Nov 10, 2009 9:19 pm

What would be involved in making a Voyager polyphonic? You would need the keyboard to be able to scan for more than one note, you would have to have more than the one voice with 3 oscillators, and you would need to have features regarding envelopes triggered with either each key depression or first-note priority. What else? Does the Voyager do splits? Is it multitimbral?

Oberheim's new SEM comes to mind. Can the Voyager send MIDI info in a manner to allow it to control a polyphonic synth or sound source?

EricK · Post by **EricK** » Tue Nov 10, 2009 10:03 pm

THe voyager won't do splits. Youd also need a VCO VCF ENVGEN and VCA for each voice.

ozy · Post by **ozy** » Wed Nov 11, 2009 9:26 am

Electrong wrote:Oberheim's new SEM comes to mind. Can the Voyager send MIDI info in a manner to allow it to control a polyphonic synth or sound source?

Voyager doesn't send enough information to drive SEVERAL SEMs in polyphonic mode.

It can drive a polyphonic synth (midi out from the keyboard is polyphonic, velocity included - albeit aftertouch isn't),

but can't do voice allocation.

There lies the problem with the SEM (it doesn't manage voice allocation or "poly chain" in any way).

I asked Tom Oberheim and he recommended the Expressionist interface from Encore Electronics in order to play several SEMs from a single source.

I am thinking about it, and still the setup doesn't convince me (remember that "US$ per quality ton" considerations are always on my mind):

+a master keyboard (the voyager)
+a midi filter/router (or the Voyager will find a way of messing up with your SEMs. It did with my prophet)
+a polyphonic interface
+ 4 or 6 SEMs (Tom refuses to give them away for free...

)
= megabucks.

I'll wait for TO to try releasing a polyphonic synth (he owes his life-long clients, if only for insulting us with the Ob-12).

Electrong · Post by **Electrong** » Wed Nov 11, 2009 10:23 pm

Agreed. What was that OB-12 about, except the relinquishing of any control he had over his name. Hopefully he made some money from it.

ozy · Post by **ozy** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 3:07 pm

dada wrote:nobody has pointed out the most significant shortcoming of the mono though a harmoniser idea .. your chord voicing is fixed unless you twiddle the knobs, you couldn't for example play a major then a minor chord

Nobody did, because that shortcoming doesn't exist.

If the harmonizer plays harmonies based on midi notes, playing the Voyager keyboard will determine the chords. That's what happens when you sing and play a chord using the so-called [wrongly named] "vocoder" setting on a live harmonizer.

The real issue is that this is a digital process: all the harmonies are NOT analog-quality, they are digital-quality, being sampled then processed then reverted to analog.

If the question is "polyphonic analog" that solution is wrong because it's not "analog".

But it is feasible.

I tried it with a digitech harmonizer: can be used, but it's not an analog polyphony.

[Disclaimer, just in case somebody of the anal-completist persuasion feels the need of starting a quarrel: I said "so-called vocoder" because most harmonizers call "vocoder mode" the setting which makes harmony notes to be controlled in pitch and gated by a midi note on message. It's not a vocoder. That's stipulated]

CZ Rider · Post by **CZ Rider** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 2:07 am

Electrong wrote:What would be involved in making a Voyager polyphonic? You would need the keyboard to be able to scan for more than one note, you would have to have more than the one voice with 3 oscillators, and you would need to have features regarding envelopes triggered with either each key depression or first-note priority. What else? Does the Voyager do splits? Is it multitimbral?

Oberheim's new SEM comes to mind. Can the Voyager send MIDI info in a manner to allow it to control a polyphonic synth or sound source?

Simply add as many RME's as you need for voices. The fixed voice allocation of the polyphonic Voyager is for keys held down only. It does not cycle through the voices. So first note down = Voyager 1, second note held = Voyager 2, and so on. The only way to trigger X amount of voices is to have X amount of keys held down. I have a three voice, and decided adding a fourth voice, would be wasteful as it would only sound with a 4 note chord, and the Voyager keyboard is only 3 1/2 octaves. My setup includes a small 2 octave keyboard triggering a Moog modular for bass. So 1 Moog bass note and three note Voyager makes for an interesting polyphonic synthesizer system.

It should be noted the MIDI out on the Voyager is like any MIDI controller and is polyphonic, probably up to 16 notes, but I havent tested to see if it craps out after 16. So you can control any polyphonic MIDI synthesizer from your Voyager. The polyphonic voice allocation system for the Voyager and RME's is set by the recieving Voyager, and requires local off if using a Voyager as the master. It's the polyphonic MIDI data that each Voyager receives and the individual voice settings that assign each voice.

Photo of the three voice Voyager and small bass keyboard on top of Hammond = 4 voice Moog!

I have no reason to believe I could not trigger three SEM's from this Voyager setup. Would only require the gate and pitch CV from each Voyager. I have not tried this yet, since I only have 1 vx-351 output expander. Must try!

ozy · Post by **ozy** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 8:47 am

CZ Rider: "I have no reason to believe I could not trigger three SEM's from this Voyager setup"

Of course you could. Should you? That's another story.

Of course, having a complete modular synth for each note is the finest solution

If your purpose is driving 4 SEMs, you built the most expensive MDI-to-CV polyphonic interface I've ever seen.

You should rename yourself "Ruby Goldberg"

In fact,

the difference between your multi-voyager setup is that the Voyager RMEs manage "chain link" via MIDI, while the SEMs don't, even if they are MIDIfied.

Post scriptum:

Do you gig often? Do your tours include air travels?

REAL POST SCRIPTUM:

Forgive my bitter humour: it's born from sheer envy

It's a very nice studio. Congratulations.

monokit · Post by **monokit** » Fri Dec 11, 2009 8:36 pm

r05c03 wrote:Wow, 5 grand. Anything cheaper that can do something similar?

A Polyvoyager won´t be cheaper. The best next thing would be to get an Alesis Andromeda for half the price. Or spend 8k Euro for a refurbished MemoryMoog from EMC. And yes...P08 or Tetr4.

nick braithwaite · Post by **nick braithwaite** » Tue Dec 15, 2009 1:43 pm

Carey M wrote:
psicolor wrote:Some girls told me that keyboarders are the least desirable band members, because they always appear like computer nerds. So trying to look more "human" should be importand for all synthesizer players.
Whaaat?

- CM

......You should hear what they say about drummers, mate! On the subject of poly, I seem to remember reading somewhere (Wendy Carlos' site?) that Moog used to make a chord generator for the big modular systems - I don't know anything about it, but maybe given modern technology, those guys could come up with something. On the other hand, what's wrong with using a sampler & a controller keyboard to poly-ise your Moog patches......or am I barking?