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Any synth is fine it's the method that you should focus on. learningsynths.ableton.com this is an interactive tutorial on how to use synths. Every synth has these basic modules and you should go through this with whatever synth you choose. But tons of free synths like https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ are super powerful
Download the demo versions of synths you want to try. Most synths have demo (except Falcon and Omnisphere?).
Imo, Serum is a very good synth, if you are looking for a simple interface. It's far away from a "da bestezt sint in da gaem"...
It has a lot of third party content for it, but it's mostly harsh dubstep, psytrance, dnb, metallic sfx type sounds; it's extremely easy to create such "unmusical" sounds in Serum. (The lack of filters and oscillators prevent it from becoming a good soundscapes synth for example.) I've seen people selling "semi-realistic" banks for Serum, but these are just resynthesized samples and Serum is not good at this compared to other synths (and the typical synth paradigm oscillator->amp with envelope is not good for creating intricate playable sounds, you need semi-modular or modular with plenty of envelopes and many oscillators to control the timbre in a realistic manner, depending on the register and volume).
Dimensions expander and Multiband compressor in it are a big part of Serum's final sound and these are a free download; and it's not hard to be replaced by similar effects.
Using KVR's search for for powerful synths within your budget we find: Synthmaster, Zebra2, Spire, Dune3, Blue2, Harmor, Razor, Thorn, Diversion, Pigments, Icarus, Electra2, Biotek2, Cypher2, Nemesis, Sytrus. The main difference between some of these and Serum is the lack of that many third party presets and that they will sound weaker, because of lack of effects sections or worse effects, but you can always create a preset chain in your mixer to mimic Serum's fx. Out of all these I think Dune3 and Cypher2 sound the best atm.
Oh, and Surge is basically a free Serum, but you need a third party program to create additional wavetables.
https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
Learn to play a KEYBOARD not PIANO. I know there there are fundamental similarities but they are not the same. The scales are the same, the fingerings are the same, but when it comes to playing there are major differences.
For example playing "pads" or long drawn out evolving notes will be completely different from playing "leads" or sharp quick arpegios. Drums is a whole different ball game.
A fundamental familiarity with the keyboard layout and some skills with playing/fingering will absolutely help, just remember that if you want to learn to play synths, don't learn keys on an actual piano, start using a controller right away.
And speaking of controllers, I would HIGHLY recommend a "Semi weighted" midi controller and preferably one with aftertouch.
For your first synth i would suggest using software but look for something that emulates hardware like maybe this one or even better the best COMPLETELY FREE and OPEN SOURCE synth out there SURGE
This community is full of people with way too much knowledge and they are all willing to help.
There are many great free plugins, like Surge (check out the skins!). Make sure you don't download too many plugins at once, try to focus on learning one at the time.
This list has a lot of stuff, havent even checked them all https://bedroomproducersblog.com/free-vst-plugins/
Surge is apparently a very powerful free synthetizer https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
Helm by Matt Tytel, Synth1 and Dexed are some other free synthetizers.
Spitfire LABS is a great collection of free virtual instruments.
Steven Slate Drums 5 Free version if it's not listed in the first link
You need a good piano library, preferably from an imperfectly tuned piano. Your options for this are Pianoteq or Kontakt. https://www.modartt.com/u4 has a nice "weathered" preset - if you can reduce the detuning a bit more, you're probably halfway there.
The synth part sounds wavetable-ish, but not horribly complex. You could already get close with oscillator sync on a square wave. I'd wager you can make these sounds easily with Surge. Switch on portamento and add a nice reverb and some delay. That also goes for the piano btw.
You can use an autopanner/tremolo to get the left-to-right effect. One sound is as u/IrishFiddle11 suggests an electric piano - search for "Rhodes VST" and you're bound to find something, even though it might not be an exact match. The other sound is a bit reminiscent of an electronic organ. The approach you could use here is to use two square waves and detune one of them just a tiny bit, then (additionally) apply a tremolo effect. By applying a highpass filter with the keytracking enabled, you make the sound more "hollow".
You can make this sound with https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ in case you didn't have any plugins yet.
so you're looking for a vst that you can load per midi channel?
I'd go with https://vital.audio/ - that thing is amazing, to me. You can also go with https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ which uses a bit less DSP.
>FluidSynth didn't recognize the MIDI-Input at all.
hmm. I would suspect there's some problem that switching to a different softsynth won't fix.
Any synth with FM controls so surge-synthesizer.github.io is a good option and you can automate the FM controls so you don't need a midi controller. Skrillex and Deadmau5 wrote most of their songs all in the box with no midi controllers at all
Reaper is very stable and performant, runs excellently and lot of engineers like it. However, there's almost no instruments included and it's not the most composer-first designed program.
However, I've used Reaper for some music and I would say if you get some community plugins (pretty good community might I add) you can make Reaper a really excellent DAW for music.
I'd say just download the free trial and try some stuff, but you're gonna need your own VST's. I can recommend Surge, it's gonna give you pretty much anything you need and it's 100% free.
What you're hearing is a single oscillator sinewave. Portamento is enabled - and after playing a high note, the lowest note on the keyboard is played so it quickly dips down in pitch again.
Alternatively, it can be achieved by using a pitch envelope, but portamento is by far easier - and if you combine it with velocity routed to the volume, you play the lowest note as softly as possible; you generally don't want a low drone in your mix. Alternatively alternatively, you can still use the portamento approach without velocity and just aggressively EQ everything below 200 Hz or so. A single sinewave will just disappear :)
There's also an LFO routed to the oscillator pitch.
All of this should be possible with the stock plugins. If Retro Synth isn't up to the task, use ES2. Alternatively, consider Surge - https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ - it's free, works in Logic and it's easier for anyone without Logic to build a patch for you (there's a Discord with lots of helpful people).
There are VSTs for Linux. Surge, Vital, and ZynAddSubFx are three prominent examples, as well as OxeFM, Dexed, and plenty I'm forgetting. Surge and Zyn also come LV2 and DSSI, which are native Linux formats. For those who don't know, the VST3 SDK supports Linux, and is released under GPLv3 by Steinberg.
I use Renoise, which supports Linux (but only VST2/3 and LADSPA) and is reasonably cheap ($65 US for "one full version" I bought 2.8 and it's only at 3.3 eight years later, and upgrades are like $40). Reaper also has a Linux-native beta that supports VST plugins, at the very least. For VSTs I use Surge/Vital for most things, and have no problems getting them running in Debian-based distros, currently Kubuntu. I use Surge and Vital in Windows, I just think they're that great, even having some paid VSTs. You can also use KXStudio, which provides a bunch of available Linux-native VSTs across formats (LADSPA, DSSI, LV2, VST) for Linux applications, as well as software to get your Windows DAW running properly with WINE and WINEASIO.
One way to create them is to start with the reversed sound; then it becomes a short pluck. You record that as audio, then reverse it. Then you apply delay as needed.
The short sound in the intro is probably two saw waves with a tiny hint of detune. To achieve the sound as-is, you need a volume envelope with a short attack time, a decay time of zero and importantly, a sustain value of zero and a release of zero.
The sustain of zero causes the volume of the sound to immediately stop. You use the attack to control how long the note is supposed to last.
By increasing the release a little bit, the sound will fade out gently.
With a synth like https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ you can switch between linear and exponential envelopes ("analog" and "digital" modes) to figure out what sounds the best.
It can also make all the other sounds you're hearing. The bass sound would require two oscillators - one detuned a fifth.
In all cases, starting with a saw wave is not a bad idea :)
Well, there are 3 or 4 synth sounds in this track at the point you linked to.
They might not all have come from the same synth in when they recorded it.
Surge would be my first recommendation:
https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
There are tracks on that page made with it, but you can also find plenty of stuff on YT:
I'd say stick with what you have for now because the producer edition stock plugins are way more than enough. Sytrus I've found to be incredibly powerful and versatile so I'd give that a shot.
If you're looking for some good 3rd party plugins I recommend Helm for starting out and Surge for some more advanced things like wavetables, FM etc. (both plugins are free btw.)
Hope I could help!
Heyo, maybe you want to go in a sequencing DAW and place midi notes instead of trying to arp it. That way you´ll have way more controll over each note, and can adjust on the fly....
That being said that synth is propably more complex than it sounds, eskmo is a beast when it comes to sounddesign. Id try not only modulating the pitch but also filter cutoff and resonance. The base sounds fairly sine-ish for the most part but in the lower there are some strange pulselike harmonics so it might be the work of a wavetable synth, maybe its automated to be a sine at the higher notes and pulse in the low, maybe its pulse all the way and filters shape it to make it sound more round, its hard to tell....
If you need a free sequencing DAW try LMMS or the Ableton or FL demo.
If you need a wavetable synth try surge https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ very powerful but you´ll propably need to watch some tutorials.
Im not a hardware guy so if you were hoping to recreate this on hardware synths, I dont have any advice sorry ;P Good luck!
Check out Surge which is open-source, very powerful and comes with hundreds of presets. You won't have the sample-based side of Omnisphere but it's a big synth.
Are you using the VST2 or VST3 version of the plugin? FL has an issue with VST3 sometimes, and VST2 sidechain inputs, while they may work, are technically a work around. Try each individually and report back.
I've found the VST3 Version of Voxengo SPAN doesn't expose side chain inputs to FL, and the VST2 versions of Surge don't allow Audio input. (I think, it's been a while since I've tested.)
Hope this helps.
Single-oscillator (saw wave) soft synth brass with a little bit of vibrato. Here's a patch for Surge: https://www.mediafire.com/file/x3f47mztllqd8cf/ClaireLaffutVeriteBrass.fxp/file
This is a wonderful song though, so thanks for introducing me to it :)
The "Analog" instrument is only in Live Suite, not Live Lite or even Live Standard. There are plenty of free synth VST instruments you can find that will yield similar sounds with a slightly different interface. I like Surge https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
surge synthesizer is free and open source. They have a great group on discord that can help you create these sounds in the surge synth software
See new shiny, want new shiny, wallet makes death threats and attempts murder, you keep eyeballing new shinnies that you may or may not afford, the shinnies make you think they are the snake oil which will just make you magically create stuff that slaps. In reality, the only thing that makes music is you.
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Get free soft synths and get paid ones for cheap when they go on sale. Check out Pluggin Boutique, great deals if you wait around and I scored lots just by waiting for sales and limited time deals. Especially since I have absolutely nowhere to stow a new synth in my room, space is beyond ultra premium and I have to rely on soft synths and my midi controller.
ok so... i'm a poor producer so this is very nice but i'm trying to use https://surge-synthesizer.github.io that plugin and for any reason doesn't work... please help me ;;
I guess my question is this: What are we looking for with a software synth? What are the requirements here?
I’m trying to save some money here; I believe Surge meets most needs for most people, so I think we should only consider a for-pay VST if there’s a compelling reason.
With the current version of Surge, there are 11 different types of oscillators: https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/manual/#oscillators
Now, hopefully someone with first hand experience with Generate, Aalto, or even Arturia Pigments (which is $100 for a limited time right now) will chime in with some good reasons how this works better in some contexts than Surge.
But considering no one else has chimed in yet in the last half day indicates that the free stuff — Surge, Dragonfly Reverb, Valhalla Supermassive, Limiter No6, etc. — is good enough for most people posting here.
Surge used to be a commercial synth but it was abandoned by the creator and open sourced in 2018 and is now maintained by a community of volunteers.
Helm is a nice open source synth from Matt tytel.
Vital is Matt Tytel's new synth that's one of the most popular synth plugins at the moment and just went open source a few weeks ago.
Probably not much help to you but it's working perfectly for me in Cubase 11.
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Have you got the most recent version ?
VST3 is only supported by Ableton 10.1 and newer. The website for Surge says only older versions come in VST2 format. These are still available it seems:
The really quick arpeggio is standard Prophet-5 style synth brass - and as the comment suggest, an arpeggiator is involved. In Ableton Live, I set the arpeggiator to downwards, 2 octave range, at 1/48 notes (triplet pattern) for the tempo of the song itself (80 bpm).
If you play A-Db-Fb-Gb you should have the first chord. You can figure out the others by slowing down the song.
The background chords seem to be played with a variation on that sound. You can still use this preset for it - just set the Sustain slider (marked "S") in the filter EG section to 40%. Since it differs so little from this one, I didn't upload it separately.
Here's the preset for Surge called "AllMyLoveliesBrass" - https://github.com/instatetragrammaton/Patches/tree/master/Vember%20Audio%20Surge/v1.7.1/Polysynth
It's not cringe if you ask about free alternatives rather than free stuff just like you did. :)
Check out Vital, it's pay what you want, yes you can get it for free. It's incredible and provide pretty deep customization. Also Surge it's a really deep and complex synth and also free. Helm on the other hand pretty user friendly and a good starting point for synth VSTs. Cheers!
Surge. https://surge-synthesizer.github.io//
It’s free, ridiculously capable and powerful, and it isn’t restricted to a single type of synthesis. It does basic FM really well so you can dip your toes into it before diving into Dexed.
There is usually not much softsynth content here, but I thought this one might be interesting.
I used the free open source synth Surge as the only sound source in this track, including the "drums" and everything. I also used Valhalla Delay, VintageVerb and Ableton's stock EQ and compressor plugins.
Surge is maintained by a small and very passionate dev team that puts a lot of work into it and is definitely worth checking out, if you are looking for a very flexible and great sounding synth!
The Echo device that comes with ableton is actually really good, however, I would try out some free reverb plugins, because imo the ableton reverb is stinky garbage. Download a bunch of freebies and see which one you like. If you are unhappy with the instruments that come with ableton, get Surge. It's really good.
There's a lot to do with dub techno as a genre, I think people have taken it to a lot of different places in the past few years. I think it's easy to assume that the only elements to dub techno are tape noise, echo, and chord stabs, but there is so much more you can do. It doesn't need to sound like it came out of germany in 1993... unless you want it to, of course.
https://www.ableton.com/en/trial/
https://surge-synthesizer.github.io
figure out the basics before paying any money for anything since this is a long road you are about to take on.
good luck with your music dream
Since people didn't mention them: U-He Zebra 2, Cakewalk Zeta+ 2, Dune 3.
Try this free synth if you can't afford one of the big name synths, it's got everything. https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
All of these things sound like a wavetable synth with a nice analog-style chorus and perhaps some tape simulation. However, since there is (seemingly) no modulation of the wavetable's position (this would cause the timbre to change) anything with a single cycle should do the job as well, and I'm fairly sure I'm only hearing a single oscillator, too.
Of course, just saying "wavetable" doesn't help much - you need to figure out which waveform we're dealing with. It sounds rather glassy, as if it originated from an FM synth. Start with two operators and set these to 1:3 or 1:5, then add a third operator at 1:2 or so. You'll have to tune the ratios by ear. If you're using Surge, you can try both approaches. If you look at the waveform's shape, it should not have any hard edges - just squiggles.
Otherwise I'd get myself Waldorf PPG Wave 3.V and try them one by one until I found it. That approach can work for Surge, too.
The way to learn FM synthesis is to start with 2 operators. Having 6 operators means that you can view it as a "3 oscillator" synth (with a pair of operators acting as an oscillator) - or as a "2 oscillator" synth (with a trio of operators acting as a more complex oscillator).
Compared to subtractive, the thing is that those oscillators also are responsible for filtering - that is, controlling the frequency response over time.
With just 2 operators, there's already a large variety of timbres to discover - every tuning results in a different character but gradually things get more "glassy", so most of the interesting parts are (IMO) going to be found between 1:1 and 1:8 (1:8 is that the frequency of the modulator - the operator on top - is 8 times that of the carrier - the operator on the bottom).
One thing that FM does that subtractive doesn't is that it's suited much more towards this kind of "component" building. Just like a kick can be seen as consisting of 3 parts - the sub, the oomph and the click - you can treat other sounds in the same way, with a transient and a body.
A harpsichord has a pretty bright attack. That's the transient. It can be made by one pair of operators with pretty high tuning and a short pluck envelope. It also has the "body" - which is the part that takes longer to decay, so you can use lower tuned operators for that, but with longer envelopes.
That's how you can approach things. For brass, you also have a body and a transient, but the transient is basically the moment just before a clear tone occurs since there's no standing wave in in the instrument yet. It's also not as bright.
If you have Ableton Live, Operator is a really great FM synth. Dexed is great as well, but the envelopes are anything but intuitive. For simpler 2-op and 3-op patches, https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ is really great as well.
Nice!
Looks perfect for running Surge:
https://surge-synthesizer.github.io
(I have one of those with a dead GPU. May try reflowing... but am still using a 2013 iMac as my main music + everything computer and it's going strong, even with i5; compare with 1993-5 when the fact that I still used a Lisa for wordprocessing/text editors was seriously anachronistic and it's amazing how much value there is in old computers now)
if the interface looks too small click the 'menu' button on bottom right for options to zoom it and that makes it so much easier to learn. I'm not aware of many resources besides the manual: https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/manual/
All these threat analyzers count the number of downloads. Surge just got a new version. If you downloaded it from the official website ( https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ ) there is no issue. Try the older 1.6 release - you will not get a warning, most likely.
FWIW I heard that this happened with the latest release of Serum as well. You have a new executable with a new signature and the threat analyzer considers it suspect until enough people have installed it and didn’t report issues.
kenny is using a soundcard audio output/input and because the synth has probably no midi over usb he is using midi out/in cables but it depends on the sounds of your keyboard if its worth the effort and if you use it a lot,because with many free vst synths you can make the same sounds like https://veg.by/en/projects/syxg50/ or drop some samples from your keyboard as mono 16 bit into https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
The trick with software is to map that shit. Map it to knobs, sliders, don't mouse. Seriously. There is no joy in mousing when you're trying to play a software synth. I learned that back in the 90s using Rebirth. Added a controller and it was like magic.
But yeah, the Monologue multitracked will get you a really long way.
Also, seen this? Open source and Roger Linn approved... https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
- Get https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ (or tell us which synth you'd like to use for this). If it doesn't matter, you might as well pick Surge :)
- You start with an initialized patch. This is a saw wave. You need a sinewave.
- Click on the dropdown that says "CLASSIC". It allows you to choose between oscillator models. One of these is Sine. Pick that one. You can also choose "Wavetable", because some of these start out as sinewaves.
- Set the Attack and Release sliders in the AMP EG section to something that is not entirely 0. Start with 10% or so.
- Add a short reverb effect. In Surge, in the top right of the plugin window, you see several boxes; a group of 6 and a group of 2. From the group of 2, pick the top one. Then, in the dropdown below, choose a reverb to taste, and set the mix amount (bottom right of the plugin window) to about 10% at most.
Done!
You should use https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ .
Of course this can be recreated! The good part is that you can pretty much copy the settings you see in the screen at 1:25.
To get the pitch rise, modulate the pitch of the oscillators with the envelope. It's best to use negative modulation for that - normally an envelope causes the pitch go up, then down. By setting attack to zero and decay to half a second or so, and using negative modulation, the sound gently rises from a low pitch to the actual pitch (and then it stays there). Since in this screenshot you can't see the modulation matrix, you'll have to take my word for it that that's what's being done here :)
For the waveforms, the video shows that oscillator sync is being used, and both oscillators are run through a lowpass filter. Surge has this sync slider as well, and of course a basic triangle waveform.
Add a bit of chorus to top it off, and you should get pretty close.
Those are both synth sounds. The first one is a pulse wave with I think a flanger on it very warm chiptuney sound. The second is a saw wave with some sync. You can get some really cool free synths if you wanna learn them It's not very begginer friendly but I like this one
Most plugins will have a so-called "init(ialized) preset". This sets all the knobs to a position that's kind of like a blank template. Any effects are disabled. The sound's parameters are set so that you should hear something when you press a key (and the sound stops when you release it). This also makes it suitable for testing whether anything works well, because you know you should hear a sound rightaway.
If a synthesizer has multiple oscillators, all of them except for the first will likely be muted/disabled. The waveform for that oscillator tends to be a saw wave (for FM synthesizers like Sytrus, it's a sinewave). This is a bright, somewhat nasal waveform that's used for a lot of sounds. Additionally, a good starting point would not be Sytrus but Surge - Synth1, which is a free synth that gets also a lot of recommendations has an init preset is not that suitable)
When you follow u/dagojay 's instructions, it's best to start with something like that.
As for the pulsating effect, I think it's a compressor. Sidechaining on a compressor can reduce the volume of a sound on the basis of an incoming sound; while it's more effort to set up, it's a technique worth learning. Not all synthesizers allow you to change the waveform of an LFO, and if you want to have a sound that drops in volume faster than that it recovers, sidechaining is your friend.
Additionally, since several other elements of a track tend to be sidechained (and most often to the kick drum), just not playing any kick drums will let each instrument sound at its full volume. This may be easier than switching off the LFO in some cases, because it only requires you to change a single thing (vs drawing automation lanes for all LFOs of all instruments).
That's because it's not a Serum preset :) The .fxp format is the generic "VST Preset" format that many software synths use - Sylenth uses it as well, for instance.
I can remake the preset so that it's for Serum, but for you, the following would be faster:
- Download and install Surge: https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ (it's free!)
- Open Surge in your DAW (or otherwise suitable plugin host)
- Navigate to "Menu"
- Choose "Data and Patches"
- Choose "Open User Data Folder"
Create a new folder (for instance "FamousSounds") and copy the preset into this folder. Surge *needs* a folder structure to find patches; putting them directly into the user folder means they can't be found.
Then:
- Restart Surge, or choose "Rescan all data folders".
Vember Audio Surge became free and open source in 2018. It is high quality and comes with 1010 factory patches.
TAL NoiseMaker is also a good free synth, and comes with 256 presets.
PG-8X is a great free software implementation of the Roland JX-8P and can use its sysex patch files.
So I decided to rebuild this sound in Surge: https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
As a basis, I'm using a single oscillator, triangle waveform - these are a bit softer and less "hollow" than a square wave. I'm using LFO1 as envelope to control the noise level (for the breathy "chiff" noise, which is caused by air pressure build up in the pipe before the air column starts to resonate) , and have added a little reverb to mask that the sound is synthetic. You might choose to add a chorus to simulate two pipes playing the same note, but slightly out of tune.
Here's the preset: https://www.mediafire.com/file/sqdjwdcvoucpqan/AmmoniaCalliope.fxp/file because it's a bit ridiculous to buy a Fairlight (plugin or real) for just this. Luckily, the sound is simple enough that it could be modeled.
Here's a Surge preset: https://www.mediafire.com/file/qvk5deh30ea3q1r/VocoderLikeLead.fxp/file (and since https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ is free, you don't have to buy stuff). Instead of using a vocoder, I used a filter with less than 100% keytracking, distortion and a flanger (Surge has no dedicated flanger effect, but it does have a comb filter, which is similar). It sounds a bit throaty if you set up the filter cutoff and resonance just right.
Redarding working at Ableton, he actually writes the Ableton manual, which is said to be excellent, a public opinion I personally share. But this books is not technical and, as you wrote, focuses more on the creative side. Its a great read and at 25€ [+ shipping] (flat, no .99, something that speaks for it as well) its very affordable compared to other books with similar content (Affinity Workbooks: 44,99€ {book about graphic design}, Electronic Music and sound Design: 57.84€ {guess what that is about}, also literally and programming book) .
So, why should people read it? To get away from their displays, take some time off and so something “offline“, while still reading something that will probably interest them and maybe spark a new idea, that brings them forward in their creative life.
Personally, I get sick of staring at a backlit display all day, especially inside. Cant get my piano outside and my screen is not bright enough to make music in the sun, so I usually read outside. Another excellent book to read is “how to“ by randall munoe, or for my german friends, “Herr Sonneborn geht nach Brüssel“ by Martin Sonneborn, however these are not associated with Ableton in any way and therefore do not belong here, however I would be down to include them in a future post if so desired.
Moving on, Im sorry if this feels like empty content to you. However, I think its still more than posting links to yt videos of synthesizer releases to r/synthesizers (something rather uncreative yet effective I did recently for Surge, which is a great noncommercial, free and open source synth). That's why I posted this little piece of OC, cause I just felt like it may help or inspire others.
Anyways, have a nice day and happy new year :)
You're hearing two distinct sounds on top of eachother. The first is a square wave pluck, with a very short pitch envelope that acts as a transient designer to give a sound a more pronounced attack. The second would probably be classified as a musicbox - a short, bell-like pluck. There's a bit of a delay on the musicbox - I guess that's done to make it more obvious that the sound is included.
Here's a Surge patch with both! Set the mode to "Dual" to hear both the music box and the pluck, and set the mode to "single" and select Scene A to only hear the pluck.
https://www.mediafire.com/file/ll4qqpsrw8irvke/EDMSquarePluckMusicBox.fxp/file
The latest one that I've truly loved is SURGE, I think it's a lot of fun and some good sounds.
While it's not free Xpand!2 is on sale right now for $4.99(I'm Canadian too so it came to like $7.50 with exchange), I think this ones great. I know a lot of people look down on presets but personally I think it's a great way to spark inspiration and this one has 500+ so that's a bonus.
Clearly synth preference comes down to taste so to make sure you find the right one I'm going to rattle off a bunch of other ones that you might like;
Crystal
Dexed
FB-3300
Free Alpha
Helm
Lokomotiv (like this one a lot as well)
ModulAir
Synister
TyrellN6
Triple Cheese
TAL Noisemaker
AAS Player
It's not a Rhodes :)
I've prepared a Surge preset for you. Here it is: https://www.mediafire.com/file/t3iwhbn4ptec7cm/MusicIsMathMelody.fxp/file . You can get Surge itself here: https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
The basis of the patch consists of two saw wave oscillators. The filter envelope has the sustain halfway, and a slightly higher decay; this causes a "bump" but it's far more gentle than a pluck (where the sustain level is generally zero and the decay is in full control of the timing). I'm using a 2-pole lowpass filter; it depends a bit on the character you want to achieve, but you want somethin gentle and subtle for this, so a Moog- or MS20-style is already too much.
To get that "recorded on a VHS tape which then spent 2 weeks in a car parked in Arizona in the summer" warble, no tape simulator needs to be used; an LFO on the pitch is enough. While I would've preferred a rounded squarewave, Surge allows for a somewhat deformed sinewave. With any kind of tape mechanism, the motor failling/slipping results in a periodical but not symmetrical waveform. There is some oscillator drift as well.
Besides some gentle pitch modulation, the levels of the oscillators are also modulated by the same.
The envelopes have a soft release, but most of the notes in the track are just held down for longer, instead of having a long release time.
To top things off, there's a bit of chorus followed by gentle compression/limiting to add a bit of stereo image.
You love great synths with tons of possibilities and presets? Well, enter Surge.
If you havent heared of it yet, Surge is a free, open source synth thats activly developed by a community.
Heres a link to the official Surge website: https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
Hi, if you havent heared of it yet, surge is a free, open source synth thats activly developed by a community (after it was open sourced a while ago by its developer Claes Johanson, who is now working on Bitwig). Roger Linn made some MPE presets for it, take a look at/listen to them.
Heres a link to the official Surge website: https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
Hi, if you havent heared of it yet, surge is a free, open source synth thats activly developed by a community. Roger Linn made some MPE presets for it, take a look at/listen to them.
Heres a link to the official Surge website: https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
Since you didn't specify what you have available in terms of synths and plugins, I've chosen a freeware option. To get more used to building sounds in this plugin (and because it's also quite powerful!), I've chosen Vember Audio Surge - https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
Here's the preset: https://www.mediafire.com/file/ujfmmtrmdgm6lqp/EndCreditsLFOBrass.fxp/file
The basis is a soft synth brass sound (I used the "Fast Poly" factory preset), using either gentle unison or two saw oscillators (alternatively, to give more motion you can route an LFO to the pulsewidth). The filter cutoff is controlled by a faster, different LFO that retriggers every time a key is pressed. The LFO's modulation intensity fades out gradually.
The reverb on this patch is quite special! I believe it cuts off when the next note is played; how that is achieved can be seen as an exercise for the reader.
Here are some options that take some effort, but are workable:
- play every note on its own track with its own reverb effect, and quickly fade away the track's volume when the next note is played. This way, only one note will be reverberated at a time.
- If your reverb supports a "freeze" option, switch it on after a note is played. Just before the next note should be played, switch it off, then re-enable it after the next note is played.
I made this track Z Cubed - The Surge Challenge as a submission for a competition on metapop.com. The goal was to use only one VST to create all the sounds on a track (but other plugins are allowed for FX etc.) We ended up using the free and open-source synth called Surge by Vember Audio and it was a ton of fun. The timeline was about a week so I couldn't overthink it too much with all the other projects I have going on, so I went with a synthwave-y type beat. Please let me know what you guys think and what things I should improve for a final release version.
Kontakt 6 is basically a synth, because it has a wavetable module. You have to load it and assign filters, envelopes etc.
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Here is free quality synth that can do EDM/trance/house sounds (Kontakt is an overkill for this stuff): https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ There were other good ones like Tyrell 6 and Mau5ynth, if you are on a budget.
In general, it's not worth it to buy multisampled synth sounds, because the good banks are in the range of getting a new softsynth (which would be more than capable making more diverse and higher quality output).
There are also samplers that can auto-sample all the presets of Sylenth's demo version or whatever synth you want. I think that the one in FL had this option, but there are others.
I think it's abandonware and the "demo" is (or was at least at some point in the past) fully functional.
It's not Serum alternative, it's waveshaping synth (like Z3ta and Sytrus - too bad that Sytrus' waveshaping options are not realtime).
Surge is a free Serum alternative (but you need external tool to create new wavetables).
https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/
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Give Surge a look. It's a synth that used to be $99 and became open-source a couple months ago. Izotope Trash2 is a great distortion unit that goes on sale a lot. Besides that, Youlean Loudness Meter and SPAN are great for analysis, OrilRiver is a good free reverb, and Native Instruments just put out a bunch of free shit today.
However, I think it's worth stopping plugin searching there and to learn that and the FL plugins you've got. You can fall down a rabbit hole of looking for new plugins rather than improving. Herzeloyde is a good example of someone that works with pretty basic FL stuff and still makes some fucking boppers. Have fun.