[sdiy] Polysynth considerations

[Nicholas Gregorich]

I am interested in building a polysynth or two with my recently acquired 
CEM chips. I am having a really basic problem: deciding how many voices 
I need/want.

I've owned and played a fair number of synths, but I never stopped to 
think how much polyphony I use. I am not much of a player, more of a 
programmer, so my technique does not depend on the number of voices 
available.

I rarely grab two hands of chords, but I do like long-release pads. 
Voice stealing can actually be useful in these types of sounds, for 
example 16 voices of Andromeda with long release can turn very mushy.

I did not plan to include anything fancy like splits or multi-timber 
controls but I could be convinced otherwise. I guess I don't use these 
features enough to implement them.

There are a couple duophonic synths out there, but that would be too 
limiting. A few 4 voices too, this might be the lower limit of 
"acceptable" polyphony. There's a certain famous 5 voice (who's newest 
sibling has 8 voices) and a lot of 6 voice synthesizers. I don't know of 
any 7 voicers, but quite a few synths have 8 voices.

So I guess I'm looking for some insight. Do people find the Jupiter 4 to 
be short on voices? How about the Prophet 5? There are so many synths 
with 6 voices, but are they noticeably more useful than a 5 voice? Eight 
might be too much for me.

Nick.