[sdiy] Top Octave Generators, beehiving and leakage

[Mike I]

Don - thanks for pointing out the difference between leakage and beehiving.
Neat workaround by Hammond.

Saw an old torn-apart transistor organ yesterday - keycontacts galore, and
very fine wirewrap wire ( 38 gauge or smaller - looked like yellow thread )
all over the keyboard assembly contact blocks.  If there was any shielded
cable, I didn't see it.

Thought it funny that Korg included a "Key Click" tab on the then-new Korg
Lambda stringer (also with organ sounds)..
M.



----- Original Message -----
From: Donald Tillman <don at till.com>
To: Mike I <mirwin at marketbridge.ca>
Cc: <synth-diy at dropmix.xs4all.nl>
Sent: Sunday, May 04, 2008 12:11 PM
Subject: Re: [sdiy] Top Octave Generators, beehiving and leakage


>    > From: "Mike I" <mirwin at marketbridge.ca>
>    > Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 15:21:14 -0400
>    >
>    > That old  ETI- Powertran String-thing article by Tim Orr makes some
mention
>    > of the beehiving problem.
>    >
>    > Funny to see that   "Key Click" and "Leakage" have become virtues
:D
>
> Well, yeah!  Making a musical instrument is the art of turning
> imperfections into tools of personal expression.
>
> I believe there's a fundamental difference between "beehiving" and
> "leakage".
>
> Beehiving is when unplayed tone sources can be heard in the output;
> any tones you hear with all the keys up.
>
> Leakage is the sound of tonewheels seeping into the electromagnetic
> pickups of their physically adjacent neighbors.  Laurens Hammond was
> well aware of this effect, and addressed it by arranging the
> tonewheels in fifths so that the leakage effect would be most musical.
> Since fifths in the equal tempered scale are detuned from the 1.5
> harmonic frequency, a side effect of leakage is a subtle chourussy
> animation.
>
>   -- Don
>
> --
> Don Tillman
> Palo Alto, California
> don at till.com
> http://www.till.com