nord Stage 3 - Voice Section; Mono Voice Mode; Legato Voice Mode; Glide

7. SY N TH | 39
VOICE SECTION
The Nord Stage 3 synthesizer has a number of different voice
modes, selectable in the VOICE section. There are several
options for monophonic and polyphonic playing, as well as
three different Unison modes.
MONO VOICE MODE
In MONO mode only one note is played at a time, just like on a traditional monophonic synthe-
sizer. Also, every time a note is played the envelopes are re-triggered, which gives all notes the
same characteristics in terms of modulation and filter behavior.
LEGATO VOICE MODE
In LEGATO mode only one note can be played at a time, just like with the Mono mode. However,
each new note will replace the previous one at its current Envelope stage, as long as the previous
key was not released before the new one was played.
If Legato is turned on, glide is active only when you play legato. You have to press a new key
before you release the previous key to get the Glide effect.
M When none of the Mono and Legato LEDs are lit, the Synth section is in its default poly-
phonic mode.
GLIDE
The GLIDE function makes the pitch “glide” from one note to the next when playing (traditionally
often referred to as portamento) and is available in Legato and Mono mode only. The glide
characteristics can be described as “constant rate”, which means that the greater the distance
between two subsequent notes, the longer the glide time. Turn the Glide knob clockwise to
increase the glide rate.
UNISON
The Stage 3 synthesizer oscillator has a number of “hidden”, slightly detuned, oscillators which
can added to the basic sound for those fat, classic synthesizer sounds. Note that using Unison
does not reduce the polyphony! A UNISON setting of 1, 2 or 3 equals a classic dual oscillator
de-tuning effect with an increasing amount of de-tune between the oscillators.
SOUND INIT
To start with a “clean slate” when programming sounds you can use the SOUND INIT (Shift +
Unison) function. This will initialize all areas of the synthesizer section except for the oscillator type
and its selected waveform.