A
synthesizer (or
synthesiser) is
an
electronic instrument that
is capable of producing a variety of sounds by generating and
combining signals of different
frequencies. Synthesizers create
electrical signals, rather than direct
acoustic sounds, which are then played through a
loudspeaker or set of
headphones.
Synthesizers are typically, but not exclusively, controlled with a
piano-style
keyboard, leading the
instruments to occasionally be referred to simply as "keyboards".
Synthesizers can produce a wide range of sounds, which can either
imitate other instruments, such as flutes or guitars, or generate
unusual new timbres.
The first electric synthesizer was invented in 1876 by
Elisha Gray, who is best known for his
development of a telephone
prototype.
Robert Moog created a
revolutionary synthesizer which was used in 1968 by Wendy Carlos in
Switched-On Bach, a
popular recording which introduced many musicians to the sound of
synthesizers. In the 1970s, the development of miniaturized
solid-state components allowed synthesizers to become
self-contained, portable instruments, making them easier to use in
concerts. By the early 1980s, companies such as
Yamaha began selling compact, modestly-priced
synthesizers such as the
DX7, while the
development of
Musical Instrument Digital
Interface (MIDI) made it easier to integrate and synchronize
synthesizers with other electronic instruments. In the 1990s,
complex synthesizers no longer required specialist hardware and
began to appear as software for the
PC, often as hardware emulators with
on-screen knobs and panels.
Overview
Synthesizers generate different sounds through various
analog and
digital techniques. Early synthesizers
were analog hardware based, but almost all modern synthesizers use
a combination of
DSP
software and hardware, or are strictly software based (see
softsynth). These
digital synthesizers often emulate
analog hardware components. A common feature is that the sound is
very controllable by the operator, with many parameters which may
include:
- waveform generators (oscillators) - add
harmonic frequency components to the sound, modifying the timbre or colour of the sound
- ADSR envelopes - modify the amplitude
(volume) envelope of the produced note
- LFO - an oscillator
with adjustable frequency that can be used to modulate many
parameters of the sound. As an example, when applied to volume can
create a warbling or tremolo effect, and
vibrato when applied to the pitch.
- Filters - shape the sound generated
by the oscillators
Because the sound is so controllable, synthesizers are capable of
emulating other instruments with varying degrees of accuracy.
Control interface
Modern synthesizers typically look like piano keyboards with many
additional knob and button controls. These are integrated
controllers, where the sound synthesis electronics are integrated
into the same package as the controller. This has not always been
the norm: many early synthesizers were modular, and most modern
synthesizers may be controlled by
MIDI.
Another common form of synthesizer is as a
virtual instrument, and in this case the
controller is necessarily separate. Some commercial programs offer
quite lavish and complex models of classic synthesizers—everything
from the Yamaha
DX7 to the original Moog
modular.
Like conventional instruments, synthesizers are controlled in other
various ways.
- Fingerboards
- Wind control
- Midi controls, such as
- Body Movements
- Tangible interfaces[471066]
Fingerboard controllers
A fingerboard synth uses a
ribbon
controller or other fingerboard-like user interface used to
control parameters of the sound processing. A ribbon controller is
similar to a
touchpad. However, most ribbon
controllers only register linear motion. Although it could be used
to operate any sound parameter, a ribbon controller is most
commonly associated with
pitch control
or
pitch bending.
Older fingerboards used
resistors with a
long wire pressed to the resistive plate. Modern ribbon controllers
do not contain moving parts. Instead, a finger pressed down and
moved along it creates an electrical contact at some point along a
pair of thin, flexible longitudinal strips whose electric potential
varies from one end to the other. Different fingerboards
instruments were developed like the
Ondes
Martenot,
Hellertion,
Heliophon,
Trautonium,
Electro-Theremin,
Fingerboard-Theremin and the
The Persephone.
A ribbon controller is used as an additional controller in the
Yamaha CS-80 and CS-60, the
Korg Prophecy, the
Kurzweil synthesizers,
Moog synthesizers and many others. Ribbon
controllers can serve as a main MIDI controller instead of keyboard
(
Continuum).
Wind controllers
Wind controllers are convenient for
saxophone,
trumpet,
harmonica and
melodica players, being designed along the lines of
those instruments. These may be just analog or
MIDI controllers, or include built-in
synthesizers.
In addition to a keying arrangement, the controller have
breath-operated pressure transducers, and may have gate extractors,
velocity sensors and bite sensors.
Saxophone style controllers have included
the
Lyricon, and products by
Yamaha,
Akai and
Casio. The mouthpieces range from alto
clarinet to alto saxophone sizes.
Trumpet style controllers have included
products by Steiner, Yamaha, Morrison and Akai.
Melodica or
recorder style controllers have included the
Variophon,
Martinetta, Tubophon and Joseph Zawinul's custom Korg
Pepe.
A
Harmonica style interfaces was the
Millionizer.
Another controller option is for a breath controller being used as
an adjunct to a conventional synthesizer. The
Steiner Master's Touch and products which
interface to the Yamaha
Breath Controller are examples.
Several controllers exists which can also provide breath-like
articulation capabilities. The
Ondes
Martenot control
touche d’intensité is an example.
Theremin, footpedal and lightbeam
controllers are also examples. The envelope following systems, the
most sophisticated being the
vocoder,
follows the power or amplitude of an audio signial, rather than
pressure transducers. Various companies make
accordion controllers which use pressure
transducers on bellows for articulation. More direct articulation
using the vocal tract without breath is the
Talk box.
Impact on music and culture
The synthesizer has had a large impact on modern music over the
past forty years. The first significant influence of the instrument
came during the 1970s and 1980s. Wendy Carlos's
Switched-On Bach (1968), recorded
using
Moog synthesizers, influenced
numerous musicians of that era, and is one of the most popular
classical music recordings ever made. During the late 1960s,
hundreds of other popular recordings used Moog synthesizers. The
Moog synthesizer spawned a subculture of record producers who made
novelty "Moog" recordings, using synthesizers to create new sounds
to draw attention and sales. Musicians such as
Richard Wright of
Pink
Floyd and
Rick Wakeman of
Yes used the Moog and other synthesizers
extensively.
The synthesizer's notable influence during the late 1970s and 1980s
led to mainstream popularity among renowned music artists. The
first major artists to fully use the synthesizer included
Wendy Carlos,,
Emerson, Lake & Palmer,
Jean Michel Jarre,
Pete Townshend,
Arthur Brown,
Giorgio Moroder,
Vangelis,
Larry Fast,
Tangerine Dream,
Kitaro,
Stevie Wonder,
Peter Gabriel,
Kate Bush,
Kraftwerk,
Ultravox,
Frank
Zappa,
Yellow Magic
Orchestra and
Devo. English musician
Gary Numan was influenced by Kraftwerk,
Ultravox and
David Bowie. Numan's 1979
hit
Are 'Friends'
Electric? used synthesizers heavily. Numan continued to
use synthesizers throughout most of his career, including the 1980
hit
Cars.
The influence of synthesizers on the
Synthpop movement in the United Kingdom during the
1980s was evident from its usage by
Nick
Rhodes, keyboardist of
Duran Duran,
who used
Roland Jupiter-4 and
Jupiter-8 synthesizers. The
emergence of Synthpop, a subgenre of
New
Wave, can be largely credited to the synthesizer. It lasted
from the late 1970s to the mid 1980s. The influences of synthesizer
technology and Germanic ambience of Kraftwerk and of David Bowie
during his Berlin period (1976-77) were both crucial in the
development of the synthpop genre. By 1981, many artists had
adopted the synthpop sound and experienced chart success, such as
Depeche Mode,
Visage,
Japan,
OMD, and Ultravox. Duran
Duran and
Spandau Ballet were classed
as leaders of the genre in 1981. Many other acts followed,
including
Soft Cell,
Culture Club,
Eurythmics and
Blancmange, by which time synthesizers were one
of the most important instruments within the music industry.
The synthesizer introduced many recognizable sounds in the 1980s.
OMD's
Enola Gay (1980)
used a distinctive electronic percussion and synthesized melody.
Soft Cell used a synthesized melody in
their 1981 hit
Tainted Love. Other
chart hits include
Depeche Mode's
Just Can't Get Enough
(1981), and
The Human League's
Don't You Want Me. The
sounds varied between artists and songs, but all were distinctively
produced using synthesizers.
Types of synthesis
Additive synthesis
Additive synthesis builds sounds by adding harmonically related
waveforms. An early analog example of an additive synthesizer is
the
Hammond organ. Additive synthesis
is also the principle of
Wavetable
synthesis, which is used to implement real-time synthesis with
minimum hardware, commonly used in low-end
MIDI
instruments such as educational keyboards, and low-end
sound cards.
Subtractive synthesis
Subtractive synthesis is based on filtering harmonically rich
waveforms. Due to its simplicity, it is the basis of early
synthesizers such as the
Moog
synthesizer.
FM synthesis
Waveforms are frequency modulated with a carrier frequency. An
example is the
Yamaha DX7.
Phase distortion synthesis
This synthesis technique is used by the
Casio CZ synthesizers.
Granular synthesis
This type of synthesis is based on manipulating very small sample
slices.
Physical modeling
Physical modeling synthesis is the
synthesis of sound by using a set of equations and algorithms to
simulate a real instrument, or some other physical source of sound.
When an initial set of parameters is run through the physical
simulation, the simulated sound is generated. Although physical
modeling was not a new concept in acoustics and synthesis, it
wasn't until the development of the
Karplus-Strong algorithm and the
increase in
DSP power in
the late 1980s that commercial implementations became
feasible.
Other sound shaping
Other sound processing effects such as filters,
low-frequency oscillation, and
ring modulators.
History
Analog
The first electric synthesizer was invented in 1876 by
Elisha Gray , who is best known for his
development of a telephone
prototype. The "Musical Telegraph" was a chance by-product of
his telephone technology. Gray accidentally discovered that he
could control sound from a self vibrating electromagnetic circuit
and in doing so invented a basic single note oscillator. The
Musical Telegraph used steel reeds whose oscillations were created
and transmitted, over a telephone line, by electromagnets. Gray
also built a simple loudspeaker device in later models consisting
of a vibrating diaphragm in a magnetic field to make the oscillator
audible.
Other early synthesizers used technology derived from electronic
analog computers, laboratory test
equipment, and early
electronic musical
instruments.
Ivor Darreg created his
microtonal 'Electronic Keyboard
Oboe' in 1937. Another early synthesizer was the
ANS synthesizer, constructed by the Russian
scientist
Evgeny Murzin from 1937 to
1958.
Only
two models were built, and the only surviving example is currently
stored at the Lomonosov University in Moscow
. It
has been used in many Russian movies - like
Solaris - to produce unusual, "cosmic"
sounds.
The first commercially manufactured analogue polyphonic synthesizer
was the
Novachord, built by the
Hammond Organ Company from 1938 to 1942. This
groundbreaking instrument offered full 72 note polyphony, basic
envelope control and low pass resonant filters. Full polyphony was
implemented using 12 oscillators driving monostable based divide
down circuits. The instrument featured 163 vacuum tubes and weighed
500 pounds.
RCA produced experimental devices to synthesize
voice and music in the 1950s.
The Mark II Music Synthesizer,
housed at the Columbia-Princeton
Electronic Music Center in New York City
in 1958, was only capable of producing music once
it had been completely programmed. The
vacuum tube system had to be manually patched to
create each type of sound. It used a
paper
tape sequencer punched with
holes to control pitch sources and filters, similar to a mechanical
player piano, but capable of generating
a wide variety of sounds. In 1959,
Daphne
Oram at the
BBC Radiophonic
Workshop produced a novel synthesizer using her "
Oramics" technique, driven by drawings on a
35 mm film strip; it was used for a number of years at the
BBC.
Hugh Le Caine, John Hanert,
Raymond Scott, composer
Percy Grainger (with Burnett Cross), and
others built a variety of automated electronic-music controllers
during the late 1940s and 1950s.
Although synthesizers had many examples in the early 20th century,
other electrical instruments such as
electric guitar and
Theremin had much less complex designs than
synthesizers. Those instruments were taken up by musicians during
the 1930s and 1940s, while it wasn't until decades later that
synthesizers could be profitably manufactured.
By the 1960s, synthesizers were developed which could be played in
real time, but were usually confined to studios due to their size.
These synthesizers were usually configured using a modular design,
with standalone signal sources and processors being connected with
patch cords or by other means, and all controlled by a common
controlling device.
Many early analog synthesizers were monophonic, producing only one
tone at a time. Popular monophonic synthesizers include the Moog
Minimoog, and
Roland SH-101. A few, such as the Moog Sonic
Six,
ARP Odyssey and EML 101, were
capable of producing two different pitches at a time when two keys
were pressed.
Polyphony
(multiple simultaneous tones, which enables
chords) was only obtainable with electronic
organ designs at first. Popular electronic keyboards combining
organ circuits with synthesizer processing included the ARP Omni
and Moog's Polymoog and Opus 3. During the late 1970s and early
1980s,
DIY (Do it yourself) designs were
published in hobby electronics magazines (notably the Formant
modular synth, a DIY clone of the Moog system, published by
Elektor) and kits were supplied by companies
such as Paia in the US, and Maplin Electronics in the UK.
Modular
Buchla Music Easel
Most early synthesizers were experimental modular designs.
Don Buchla,
Hugh Le
Caine,
Raymond Scott and
Paul Ketoff were among the first to build such
instruments, in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Buchla later
produced a commercial modular synthesizer, the
Buchla Music Easel.
Robert
Moog, who had been a student of
Peter
Mauzey and one of the RCA Mark II engineers, created a
revolutionary synthesizer that could be used by musicians. Moog
designed the circuits used in his synthesizer while he was at
Columbia-Princeton. The
Moog
synthesizer was first displayed at the
Audio Engineering Society
convention in 1964. Like the RCA Mark II, it required more
experience to set up new sounds, but it was smaller and more
intuitive than what had come before. Less like a machine and more
like a musical instrument, the Moog synthesizer was at first a
curiosity, but by 1968 had caused a sensation.
Moog also established standards for control interfacing, with a
logarithmic 1-volt-per-octave pitch control and a separate pulse
triggering signal. This standardization allowed synthesizers from
different manufacturers to operate simultaneously. Pitch control is
usually performed either with an organ-style keyboard or a
music sequencer, which produces a series of
control voltages over a fixed time period and allows some
automation of music production. Other early commercial synthesizer
manufacturers included
ARP,
who also started with modular synthesizers before producing
all-in-one instruments, and British firm
EMS.
Micky Dolenz of
The Monkees bought the third Moog synthesizer in
existence. They were the first band to release an album featuring
music from a Moog with
Pisces, Aquarius,
Capricorn & Jones Ltd. in 1967. It also became the
first album featuring a synthesizer to hit #1 on the charts. During
the late 1960s, hundreds of other popular recordings used Moog
synthesizer sounds. The Moog synthesizer even spawned a subculture
of record producers who made novelty "Moog" recordings, depending
on the odd new sounds made by their synthesizers (which were not
always Moog units) to draw attention and sales.
Popular
In 1970, Moog designed an innovative synthesizer with a built-in
keyboard and without modular design - the analog circuits were
retained, but made interconnectable with switches in a simplified
arrangement called "normalization". Though less flexible than a
modular design, normalization made the instrument more portable and
easier to use. This first pre-patched synthesizer, the
Minimoog, became highly popular, with over 12,000
units sold. The
Minimoog also standardized
the design of nearly all subsequent synthesizers, with integrated
keyboard, pitch wheel and modulation wheel, and a
VCO->VCF->VCA signal flow.
In the 1970s miniaturized solid-state components allowed
synthesizers to become self-contained, portable instruments, which
soon began to be used in live performances. Electronic synthesizers
had quickly become a standard part of the popular-music repertoire.
The first movie to make use of synthesized music was the
James Bond film
On Her Majesty's
Secret Service in 1969. After the release of the film, a
large number of movies were made with synthesized music. A few of
them, such as 1982's
John
Carpenter's "The Thing", used only synthesized music in their
scores.
Modern
By 1976, the first true music synthesizers to offer polyphony had
begun to appear, most notably in the form of the
Yamaha GX1, CS-50, CS-60 and
Yamaha CS-80 and the Oberheim Four-Voice. These
early instruments were very complex, heavy, and costly. Another
feature that began to appear was the recording of knob settings in
a digital memory, allowing the changing of sounds quickly. When
microprocessors first appeared on the scene in the early 1970s,
they were expensive and difficult to apply.
The first practical polyphonic synth, and the first to use a
microprocessor as a controller, was the
Sequential Circuits Prophet-5 introduced in late 1977. For the first
time, musicians had a practical polyphonic synthesizer that allowed
all knob settings to be saved in computer memory and recalled by
pushing a button. The Prophet-5 was also physically compact and
lightweight, unlike its predecessors. This basic design paradigm
became a standard among synthesizer manufacturers, slowly pushing
out the more complex and recondite modular design. One of the first
real-time polyphonic digital music synthesizers was the
Coupland Digital Music
Synthesizer. It was much more portable than a piano but never
reached commercial production.
A Fairlight CMI keyboard, featuring
signatures from 43 celebrity musicians, composers and
producers.
The
Fairlight CMI (Computer Musical
Instrument) was the first polyphonic digital
sampling synthesizer. It was
designed in 1978 by the founders of
Fairlight, Peter Vogel and Kim Ryrie, and based on
a dual
microprocessor computer
designed by Tony Furse in Sydney, Australia. The Fairlight CMI gave
musicians the ability to modify volume, attack, decay, and special
effects like vibrato.
Waveforms could also
be modified on a
computer monitor
using a
light pen. It rose to prominence
in the early 1980s and competed in the market with the
Synclavier from
New England Digital. The first buyers of
the new system were
Herbie Hancock,
Peter Gabriel,
Richard James Burgess,
Todd Rundgren,
Nick
Rhodes of
Duran Duran, producer
Rhett Lawrence,
Stevie Wonder and Ned "EBN" Liben of
Ebn Ozn, who acted as Fairlight's New York expert
liaison to the American musician community.
The
Kurzweil K250, first produced in
1983, was also a successful polyphonic digital music synthesizer.
It was noted for its ability to reproduce several instruments
synchronously; the Kurzweil K250 also had a velocity-sensitive
keyboard. It was priced at
US$
10,000.
Most new synthesizers since the mid to late 1980s have been
digital. Japanese manufacturers
Yamaha and
Casio both influenced digital synthesizers
during the 1980s and 1990s.
John Chowning, a
professor at Stanford
University
, exclusively licensed his FM synthesis patent to Yamaha in 1975.
Yamaha subsequently released their first FM synthesizers, the
GS-1 and
GS-2, which were costly and heavy. The GS series
followed, which used a pair of smaller, preset versions—the CE20
and CE25 Combo Ensembles. These models were targeted primarily at
the home organ market and featured four-octave keyboards. Yamaha's
third generation of digital synthesizers was a commercial success;
it consisted of the
DX7 and
DX9 (1983). Both models were compact, reasonably
priced, and dependent on custom digital integrated circuits to
produce FM tonalities. The DX7 was the first mass market
all-digital synthesizer. It became indispensable to many music
artists of the 1980s, and demand soon exceeded supply. The DX7 sold
over 200,000 units within three years.
After the introduction of the DX series, Bo Tomlyn, original DX7
project manager Mike Malizola, and Chuck Monte founded Key Clique,
Inc, which sold thousands of
ROM
cartridges with new FM/DX7 sounds to DX7 owners. This led to
the demise of the heavy, electro-mechanical
Rhodes piano during the 1980s, until its
comeback in the 1990s. Yamaha later licensed its FM technology to
other manufacturers. When the Stanford patent expired, many
personal computers already
contained an audio input-output system with a built-in 4-operator
FM digital synthesizer. Following the success of Yamaha's licensing
of Stanford's FM synthesis patent, Yamaha signed a contract with
Stanford University in 1989 to develop jointly
digital waveguide synthesis. As
such, most patents related to the technology are owned by Stanford
or Yamaha. The first commercial
physical modeling synthesizer
was
Yamaha's VL-1 in 1994..
Analog synthesizers have also revived in popularity since the
1980s. In recent years, the two trends have sometimes been combined
as
analog modeling
synthesizers, or digital synthesizers that model analog
synthesis using digital signal processing techniques. New
analog synthesizers now once more
accompany the large number from the
digital world, including its many
Software synthesizers.
MIDI control
Synthesizers became easier to integrate and synchronize with other
electronic instruments and controllers with the introduction of
Musical Instrument
Digital Interface (MIDI) in 1983. First proposed in 1981 by
engineer
Dave Smith of
Sequential Circuits, the MIDI
standard was developed by a consortium now known as the MIDI
Manufacturers Association. MIDI is an
opto-isolated serial interface and
communication protocol. It provides
for the transmission from one device or instrument to another of
real-time performance data. This data includes note events,
commands for the selection of instrument presets (i.e. sounds, or
programs or patches, previously stored in the instrument's memory),
the control of performance-related parameters such as volume,
effects levels and the like, as well as synchronization, transport
control and other types of data. MIDI interfaces are now almost
ubiquitous on music equipment and are commonly available on
personal computers (PCs).
The
General MIDI (GM)
software standard was devised in 1991 to serve as a
consistent way of describing a set of over 200 tones (including
percussion) available to a PC for playback of musical scores. For
the first time, a given MIDI preset would consistently produce an
instrumental sound on any GM-conforming device. The
Standard MIDI File (SMF) format (
extension .mid) combined
MIDI events with delta times - a form of time-stamping - and became
a popular standard for exchange of music scores between computers.
In the case of SMF playback using integrated synthesizers (as in
computers and cell phones), the hardware component of the MIDI
interface design is often unneeded.
Open Sound Control (OSC) is a
proposed replacement for MIDI, and is designed for online
networking. In contrast with MIDI, OSC allows thousands of
synthesizers or computers to share music performance data over the
Internet in
realtime.
See also
Notes
- Borthwick (2004), Giorgio Moroder'sFlashdance... What a Feelingfor
irene Cara in 1983
C129
- Borthwick (2004), 130
- Borthwick (2004), 128
References
- Gorges, Peter (2005). Programming Synthesizers,
Wizoobooks, Germany, Bremen, ISBN 978-3-934903-48-7.
- Schmitz, Reinhard (2005). Analog Synthesis,
Wizoobooks, Germany, Bremen, ISBN 978-3-934903-01-2.
- Shapiro, Peter (2000). Modulations: A History of Electronic
Music: Throbbing Words on Sound, ISBN 1-891024-06-X.
External links
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