If Boss Roland can do it PropellerHeads can do it!

[calebbrennan]

Many of you know I am guitarist who loves synthesis

I have been an advocate for Props solving the polyphonic guitar from a single 1/4 jack equation
that electroharmonix pedals can do and now this Boss SY 300?

If Props can create an interface to allow guitarists to play poly synth it would result massive in sales.
Maybe an RE dedicated synth, or just an interface that translates audio data to oscillators


https://www.boss.info/us/products/sy-300/

[Jackjackdaw]

I am a guitarist and I have spent some time thinking about this. I was initially intrigued by the idea of guitar synths, where the notes played are translated to midi and then drive a synth engine. But in reality to my ears this always sounds terrible and on top of that there is always latency with makes the playing feel unnatural. I had a eureka moment when I started thinking about what a synth is, essentially an oscillator sending a sound through a signal path and getting shaped by lfos, filters, envelopes and fx. What makes the oscillator sound ‘synthy’ is the all the movement and modulation that goes on through the signal path.

In contrast what makes a guitar sound ‘guitary’ is the lack of movement in the signal chain. Guitar fx are traditionally very static, you set the overdrive to sound nice and leave it, the settings never evolve over time. Even phasers and choruses are very linear , operating on a basic lfo.

So my theory is that rather than pursuing synth triggers , you can get much more satisfying results building a synth where your guitar note is the oscillator and the sound moves through a synth signal path, maybe with a buffer in there for extra long sustain, fx modulated by long envelopes etc, filters sweeping and swelling...

This is all totally possible using Reason and one of the main reasons I bought it in the first place.

[zoidkirb]

Well there's Bitspeek :
https://www.propellerheads.com/shop/rac ... /bitspeek/
Certainly not perfect but it does allow you to take audio signal and convert to midi and send that on to synths. Accuracy isn't brilliant but some of the mistakes could lead to interesting results. Latency is pretty bad though.

[guitfnky]

you might want to check out MIDI Guitar 2 by JamOrigin. you need to run in standalone mode and use a MIDI loopback to use it in Reason, but it works incredibly well.

[two shoes]

If Props can create an interface to allow guitarists to play poly synth it would result massive in sales.

i like guitar synthesis too, but let's be honest it has always been and still is a niche thing. "massive sales" might be a bit optimistic...

[calebbrennan]

The new boss pedal sy-300 does not use MIDI and uses a standard quarter-inch Jack and no hexaphonic pickup. I own an old gr 50 and you're right they are clumsy and a lot of latency but this new boss sy-300 unit is completely different and can play polyphonic. That is completely new technology and if propellerhead could achieve this it would be revolutionary

[miscend]

Guitar midi instruments. Are like midi wind instruments.

[MannequinRaces]

Buy one of these and call it a day: https://www.meris.us/product/enzo/

[guitfnky]

that Boss thing sounded promising until I got to this: “you can’t use the SY-300 to control other hardware or software synths.”

the Enzo looks cool, but has the same limitation.

the MIDI Guitar 2 plugin I mentioned is likely the best option you’ll find right now, short of installing a hex pickup and going through a super expensive box. tracking is polyphonic, and is spot on (but you do have to play pretty cleanly, as with any proper MIDI guitar), with low latency at lower buffer settings. some of the sounds in this video sound dated to my ear, but I bought it to play the synths in Reason, so that’s a moot point for me.

once I had the free demo up and running, controlling Europa, Grain, etc., I knew within about five minutes I had to buy it.

[guitfnky]

oh, and the guy in the video is wrong on the last point—he says he doesn’t think you can use it to control other MIDI instruments, which is incorrect (also strange for him to think that since it’s called MIDI Guitar 2 ).

[123repeater]

I think what yall might be looking for is the FISHMAN TRIPLE PLAY

[AuralBee]

I think this looks interesting...