[sdiy] Additive Synthesis - Wendy would say it works...

[Bill Felton]

On Mar 22, 2005, at 7:58 PM, Batz Goodfortune wrote:

> Y-ellow All.
>
> At 07:09 AM 3/22/05 -0600, Bill Felton wrote:
>> I'm a bit surprised no one has mentioned Kyma yet -- it can do live
>> analysis/resynthesis, with real-time spectral modification.  Pretty
>> rich set of additive and quasi-additive approaches and some 
>> interesting
>> presentations of controls.
>
> Actually I did in passing as it happens.

Sorry, must have missed it.
The discussion of the K5000 was interesting, but you have some of the 
details wrong (I have a K5000 as well as the Kyma system).  Biggest is 
that there are 64 osc, not 100, per voice.  But yes, it is 'harmonic' 
oriented, rather than 'partial' oriented, and this is a huge weakness, 
only partially ameliorated by 'stacking' voices with pitch offset to 
the second.  (Actually, I guess I'd say its more like "minimally 
ameliorated"...)

Kyma, however, is not particularly limited to how many sine waves are 
used, nor is it restricted to sine waves.  Group Additive is 
particularly interesting as it uses more complex waves to replace sets 
of sine waves, with the simplification being a corresponding reduction 
in amplitude and frequency envelopes required.
But Kyma will indeed to live, real-time analysis and resynthesis of 
pretty complex material, with a surprisingly high degree of realism 
attainable.  Worth a look, whether your interest is additive synthesis 
in general, or analysis/resynthesis in particular.  
(www.symbolicsound.com)

cheers,
Bill