Sequential Prophet VS - SECTION 8 - ENVELOPE GROUP; ENVELOPE GENERATORS OVERVIEW

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SECTION 8
ENVELOPE GROUP
This section covers adjustment of the mixer, lter, and amplier envelope
generators.
ENVELOPE GENERATORS
Sounds have beginnings, middles, and ends, and what occurs during each
stage may vary widely. For example, the end of an organ sound is as loud as
the beginning, but a piano note or snare drum begins at a certain level then
quickly falls to zero. It is important to remember that when describing the
shape of sound in this way, we are most often talking about its amplitude
envelope—how its loudness changes over time.
The envelope generators give synthetic sounds their identities of transient
beginnings, sustained timbre and volume, and nal release characteristics.
They do this by changing one or two values over time. The rate of change is
much slower than an audio wave, so that the envelope is considered an event,
and the voltage, dc.
The envelopes mingle intimately with your keyboard technique. The speed
at which notes are played has a great deal to do with the appropriateness of
certain envelope settings. Programs with short envelope timings invite faster
playing than those with longer timings.
Each voice has three independent envelope generators: for the oscillator
mixer, lter cuto, and amplier level. The oscillator mixer envelope application
forms the basis of “Vector Synthesis.” The lter and amplier envelope
applications are a little more traditional, but completely new sounds are
possible due to the way in which the envelope shape can be drawn. These
envelopes go far beyond the traditional ADSR scheme: they have ve stages,
plus looping functions. This makes them capable of a variety of eects, such
as multiple attacks, echo, etc.
The essential points to be aware of for performance are that the envelope
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