Microtonal scales?

amundsen · Post by **amundsen** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 2:03 am

Does any of the STS samplers offer the possibility to use microtonal pitch scales or are they all sticked to the chromatic scale?

If the answer is positive, are there user scales or factory scales only?

Thank you for helping.

Best,

Amundsen.

w_ellis · Post by **w_ellis** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 5:30 am

Hi there Amundsen,

The Powersampler manual (from v2.5) has all the information about tuning for STS3000. You will get at least this much control in any of the STS samplers.

http://www.creamware.de/en/download/man ... efault.asp

Check page 38 for full details. I wanted to post a section of it here, but not sure how to embed pictures in a post?

Cheers,
Will

amundsen · Post by **amundsen** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 6:04 am

That's what I thought : they sticked to the Akai choice in this field. It means you can build any 12-tones scale but it's impossible to build macro- or microtonal scales.

Duh!

Thank you for the information.

Best,

Amundsen

w_ellis · Post by **w_ellis** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 10:36 am

I think the STS's are supposed to be 'exact' copies of Akai samplers, hence the similarity here. You might want to post a question in the Modular section of the forum to see if there's any way of constructing a Modular device to do this job. I don't have the Modular 2, so can't help I'm afraid.

eliam · Post by **eliam** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 11:48 am

I think it would be possible to build unusual scales, but I'm not sure how... Have you tried to play with every tuning functions of your STS? If you want to use micro-intervals as occasional expressions dispersed in a chromatic context, I suggest you to use the pitch-bend, like I do.

The basis of the STS is the 12 semi-tone scale, and you can modify each note independently in the >program>tuning menu.

Otherwise, you can play with each sample's tuning in >keygroups>zones>add. Make sure you uncheck "edit all" if you want to change an individual sample.

Please tell us what are your findings...

paulrmartin · Post by **paulrmartin** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 12:13 pm

Exactly what I thought! I would imagine that the big job would start if you want to, say, play a quarter-tone piano...

amundsen · Post by **amundsen** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 2:07 pm

I do not want to build a microtonal scale by tuning each keygroup!

Is there any musician in Creamware's team?

Best,

Amundsen

eliam · Post by **eliam** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 3:47 pm

What exactly do you want to do? For macrotonal scales, just play the notes you want, but for microtonal that's another story... Tell us what you wish to do precisely.

w_ellis · Post by **w_ellis** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 4:23 pm

I suppose a cunning, if potentially arduous way of acheiving this would be to have several sample programs playing the same sample with tuned sub-sections of an octave and use the midi-splitter module to map your keyboard to the various samples.

I'm not sure how you're expecting to actually play the instrument, so I don't know if this will be of any help. I thought I'd let you ponder it though!

Are there any examples of samplers or sound modules which do allow this? It would be easier to think of ways of doing this with an example of how it could work. I've always been quite interested in trying to use some of the ancient Greek scales to see how they would sound.

Another alternative is to use something like Wavelab's batch processor to pitch shift incrementally a sample and map that to a sample program using Awave or STS Creator (or STS Add). This would avoid using the tuning on the sampler completely.

amundsen · Post by **amundsen** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 12:18 am

I was simply interested in microtonal scales with intervals like 1/4 tones or 1/8 tones.

I know this is possible with multi-sampling, but there are some sound modules which allow to do this with a single sample, Absynth for instance. I do not want to load a sample for each note.

After a trend to microtonal scales in the eighties (with machines such as Yamaha DX7 II), it seems it doesn't interest many people anymore.

Best,

Amundsen

subhuman · Post by **subhuman** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 9:13 am

<i>Another alternative is to use something like Wavelab's batch processor to pitch shift incrementally a sample and map that to a sample program using Awave or STS Creator (or STS Add). This would avoid using the tuning on the sampler completely.</i>

A really clever, and quite simple-to-accomplish workaround, nice thinking!

w_ellis · Post by **w_ellis** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 10:21 am

Cheers Subhuman. I'm still not sure I understand how it would be possible to 'perform' using this sort of scale though on a keyboard.

Amundsen: How does Absynth accomplish this?

w_ellis · Post by **w_ellis** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 10:28 am

Another thought, going slightly off topic! Has anyone on this forum used any of Awave's development components for C++ or VB? These look like they'd be really useful for this sort of task.

It's unfortunate that you'd have to come up with something commercially viable to justify the cost, as they are out of the financial reach of a casual developer.

I wanted to build a quick and simple tool to build and archive sample programs using these, as I find the whole process really frustrating (as I'm sure many other people do), particularly for quickly auditioning and selecting samples. However, when I contacted the guys at Awave, I immediately decided against the idea, as I think even I'm not lazy enough to spend a few thousand pounds just to save a bit of effort! They do look really useful though...

amundsen · Post by **amundsen** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 2:29 pm

On 2002-03-12 10:21, w_ellis wrote:

Amundsen: How does Absynth accomplish this?

Well, Absynth is a synthesizer so it works a different way, but it's quite simple : you simply choose between a list of scales whatever the instrument you play.

I simply do not understand why it's not included in every electronic instrument. It is not a difficult feature to implement.

Amundsen

amundsen · Post by **amundsen** » Wed Mar 13, 2002 1:26 am

At last I found a good solution using the Max environement.

I insert a Max patch between the MIDI keyboard and the sampler/synthesizer.

The synthesizer/sampler has to be be multitimbral.

For instance, to get a 1/8 tone scale, I use four channels (half tones divided by 4).

The patch uses the pitch bend to set an offset of a 1/8 tone on the second channel, 2/8 tone on the third channel and 3/8 tone on the fourth channel.

Then, the incoming notes are split over the four channels.

It is much easier and lighter than using multi-sampling.

With 16 input channels, the shortest interval possible is the 1/32 tone.

I guess it should be possible to program such a device in Scope too.

With programs like Keykit, Pd or MIDI Building Blocks, one should be able to achieve the same result.

Best,

Amundsen

Post by **garyb** » Thu Mar 14, 2002 1:03 am

maybe mention it in the scope forum....

j9k · Post by **j9k** » Thu Mar 14, 2002 9:17 pm

try using a multiplier in the modular 2 with two mvc's set to different midi channels.

this is something i am actually interested in. i don't know how much the multiplier might throw off your tuning but it sounds like it could be just a math problem.

amundsen · Post by **amundsen** » Fri Mar 15, 2002 12:09 am

The trick is to divide the MIDI note number by 2 if you build a 1/4 tone scale or by 4 if you build a 1/8 tone scale. Then use a "modulo" object (don't knof it such a thing exists in Pulsar). Modulo returns the remaining part of a division. Following the result of modulo, the note is routed to one of the 2 channels (1/4 tones) or to one of the 4 channels (1/8 tones).

Best,

Amundsen.

YiannisK · Post by **YiannisK** » Tue Apr 13, 2004 7:18 am

Hi guys. microtuning is one of my main issues for the sts.
If there was a way to edit the sts sampler's
microtuning from +-25cents to +-50 all our troubles would be over.
Using separate samples is quite a pain
cuz when you use the same sounds for different scales or keys you need different
patches, so you have a mess of waves in your HD.
I use the FM7 alot for microtuned scales cuz its quick and easy, but using synthy sounds for this type of music is hard to create the mood of sound I'm looking for.
I play microtuned instruments like the sazi and the cumbus, and fretless like oud and violin. FM sounds don't really mix in.
I just need the wind instrument sounds
and string sections in microtonic scales
using a sapmler like the sts.
I do know how to manipulate the sts for microtuning but there must be a qiuck and easier way.
Maybe the developers at CW will consider adjusting the sts tuning like i mentioned before from +-25 to +-50 or more. seems to me this could be done be changing a few lines in the sts's device scripts.

Oh i forgot you could use your pitch bend to achieve cent displacement with your sts but thats a totally different feel.
more or less for solo's. but not for string, brass sections etc.(my opinion)

Herr Voigt · Post by **Herr Voigt** » Tue Apr 13, 2004 5:39 pm

Take one .sts-sound, tweak the tuning as you like and save it under a new name. Do this as often as necessary. Example: oud.sts / oud-scale1.sts / oud-scale2.sts etc.
Give all tweaked sts-sounds a separate MIDI-channel, but a common output in STS.
So making microtonal melodies in your seq is a hard piece of work and you have to fiddle much, but it's possible. In Cubase you can edit more than one track at once.
Only a tip.