Hey guys, I’m writing a user manual for some software I’m publishing. It’s a software synthesizer design toolkit, for making your own software synthesizer in your programming language of choice. Of course, in order to make your own synthesizer, you must know how one works.
My goal in writing this user manual is not only to document my code, but also to teach how synthesizers actually work, so that anyone can make their own. That’s where this post comes in. I need inspiration on what exactly it is people don’t already know about them, and what all the hot topics are.
I’m happy to actually explain these things in the comments below!
For somebody who has no idea about them at all:
When I was a kid in the 80s, a “synthesizer” was an electronic keyboard. Now, a “synthesizer” is a mess of knobs and buttons that looks more like a drum machine than a piano.
So, uh… my Q: “what’s a synthesizer?”
There are synthesizers, and there are electronic keyboards. Main difference is, synths generate completely novel sounds using circuits like oscillators, filters, etc, while regular keyboards just play back prerecorded sounds. A synth can come with a keyboard to control it, or it may be a completely independent unit, maybe rack-mountable, that’s controlled digitally from a control keyboard or sequencer using MIDI signals.
Thanks! I’ve heard a million explanations but this is clear - so the synth is taking the composition as input from what most people would think of as the “instrument” (as in, the place where somebody is picking notes and rhythm), but the synth is the thing that controls the shape of the actual soundwaves, and ideally that waveform is fully constructed within the synth from first principles, instead of just being a set of samples that are just pitch-shifted to hit each frequency to play different notes, right?
And obviously, adjusting the parameters synth itself is also part of the performance and composition, just as muting a trumpet or hitting an effects pedal is part of that, even though it’s not really part of “what note do I play when”, and with far more parameters available since the sound is wholly constructed instead of just being modifications of eg. a vibrating string or brass.
So when people talked about “synthesizer music” in the '80s and the popular image was of a guy jamming on the keyboard, what was actually meant was that the keyboardist was playing a keyboard that was using a synth to generate the actual sound, which might or might not be a separate unit from the keyboard.
Funny that you mention it. Synthesizers are very much a product of university research programs. Back in the 60’s and 70’s, when synthesizers as a concept was still new, there was heated debate between the pioneers of the field (Robert Moog in New York and Donald Buchla in Berkley, California) over whether or not synthesizers should even have a keyboard.
The origin of the word “synthesizer” isn’t actually “synthetic”, as many believe, but rather synthesis, as in the academic sense of the word, from the idea of breaking a sound down into it’s individual parts and reassembling them.
This is exactly right!
Fantastic question! A synthesizer is a device that generates audio signals. I remember reading somewhere that they were sometimes referred to as “noise machines”, in regards to I think the Minimoog specifically. A drum machine is a type of synthesizer, as were the electronic-keyboard-having synths of the past.
That mess of knobs and buttons has been around since the '50s — longer than the more compact '80s synths: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modular_synthesizer Because of their size they are usually considered studio gear and not stage gear, which may also explain why the more compact synths were more visible earlier, because you rarely got to look into studios then compared to now.
To answer your question: A synthesizer (when talking about sound) is an instrument that generates sound by creating waveforms and possibly combining them in different ways to achieve different sounds. Typically they come with filters and envelopes, that further affect the resulting sound.
And I thought “Wait a second I know the synthesizer, why don’t I use the synthesizer, Which is the sound of the future”
-Daft Punk
Something that allows you to design and shape sounds.
You may be thinking of a modular synth with knobs?