Glass Armonica, any idea how to reproduce its' sound?

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Trefor
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16 Aug 2015

I've just watched a youtube clip of someone playing a Glass Armonica and have tried to make a patch to sound like it in a Combinator containing a couple of PX7s and also in Malstrom. Don't think I'm quite there yet, but wondered if anyone might have some suggestions on how to get the patches to sound more like it. Here's the youtube clip. I can't seem to attach the patches but will figure out how to do it and put them up too. I plan to also try and emulate the sound using Thor.



Cheers Trefor

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Trefor
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17 Aug 2015

Here are the two patches that I have attempted so far. Not quite there yet.

Trefor

:reason: :record: :re: :PUF_figure: :PUF_balance: :ignition:
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Glass_Armonica.zip
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Benedict
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17 Aug 2015

What a fascinating and complex sound. A lot relies on performance as well.

I could't hear your PX-7 patch (don't have the RE) but your Malstrom patch was heading in the right direction. Just needed more detail and performance options.

I have made two versions that should get you bit closer

1) Parsec - This has Aftertouch for hand weighting
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/686 ... RM.repatch

2) Thor - sure to work for all. Swell knob will control hand weight.
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/686 ... 20BRM.thor

Both referenced against (using a MIDI File)



:)
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Trefor
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17 Aug 2015

Thanks Benedict, you're absolutely right about it needing more detail, particularly some subtle introduction of noise. I will try them out later and see if I can come up with any further tweaks.

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Benedict
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17 Aug 2015

No worries. Was fascinating to work on. I came back and realized that while the Thor sound is quite lovely it still lacks detail and little something of the real instrument. In fact I think much of the sound is a result of some or all of the glasses vibrating which is something you managed to almost emulate in your Mal patch. If you want more harmonics then add a line to the Mod Matrix: OSC 3 > 32 > OSC 1 FM > 100 > Rotary 2 (raise the FX Mix amounts)

You can also add a tiny bit of internal FM to OSCs. More than 1-4 will be too much. I also added a 6db Analog to Filter 2 and rolled of just a tiny bit of the highs.

Synths don't have any sympathetic vibration which brings in that mess of other-note harmonics that makes the Armonica sound so fascinating (and make you want to be depressed LOL).

:)
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selig
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17 Aug 2015

Here's the approach I took, which is to reverse engineer the sound from the ground up. First I grabbed a wine glass and recorded it. Then I played the recording while viewing the spectrum analyzer to see the basic harmonic structure. Then I loaded up a Thor and started to build the sound from the fundamental frequency on up. Now I realize that a wine glass isn't quite the same thing as the glass armonica, but it's the closest thing I had laying around! ;)

The ultimate sound IMO is layering my wine glass sample with my synth recreation…but I digress. ;)

Here's the results of my work, using two Thor's to get enough oscillators for a more "additive" approach, as the FM pair was aliasing too much to use it for this project.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/9xoingopun2hj ... b.zip?dl=0
Selig Audio, LLC

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Trefor
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17 Aug 2015

Benedict, I will try as you suggest and put the patch up for you to listen to. I will also try combining it with Polar to see if I can introduce some element of random harmonics.

:puf_smile:

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Trefor
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17 Aug 2015

:thumbs_up: Selig/Giles, thanks for that I've just downloaded the patch and will check it out today. I think that the idea of layering the wine glass sample with your synth patch is a great idea. I have seen sample libraries out there with layered multi samples of the Glass Armonica, but thought that it would be more interesting to try to sonically reproduce the sounds with Reason's amazing array of synths.

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Benedict
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18 Aug 2015

In case anyone is interested in how I made my patches - and more broadly how I approach synthesizing a sound I hear I wrote an article/tutorial

http://benedictroffmarsh.com/2015/08/19 ... n-patches/
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Trefor
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19 Aug 2015

:thumbs_up: Great tutorial Benedict. Thanks, I'm pleased that you found the time to do it.

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Benedict
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19 Aug 2015

Thanks

:)
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