Manx SJ-2, User Manual

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KEY FOLLOW (3)
There are several factors which determine the pitch of the SJ-2’s oscillators, besides their specific tuning
settings; other factors include; master-tune control , pitch-bend midi data, modulation sources and of course
the keyboard itself.
The way the oscillator’s pitch responds to the keyboard is known as ‘key tracking’ and as you may imagine,
normally it is tracked such that 12 keys up the keyboard will equal a 1 octave pitch increase, just like a piano.
Its quite rare for synthesizers to offer alternatives to this configuration - other Manx V2 synths don’t - but the
SJ-2 does: the two controls at the far left of the oscillator section control this:
If the switch is set to VCO1 (another term for oscillator 1), the second oscillator will continue to track the
keyboard in the standard (12v keys = one octave) way, but the first oscillators key tracking will be tempered by
the key follow slider next to it - fully open, this slider will again produce one octave for 12 keys but when this
slider is set to zero, oscillator 1 will not track the keys at all; it’s pitch will then hang purely on the other factors
mentioned above.
Setting the key follow switch to VCO2 will set the oscillator 1 pitch to track the keys normally with oscillator 2
being tempered by the slider, whilst setting the switch to ‘off’ will cause both oscillators to follow the keyboard
normally.
Use the key tracking facilities however you like, but please note that this can be a really useful feature if the
oscillators are synchronised.
The important characteristic of oscillator synchronising is that changing oscillator 2’s pitch will change the
timbre of the oscillator section but the pitch of both oscillators will track the pitch setting for oscillator 1.
By modulating the 2nd oscillator’s pitch using the SJ-2’s envelopes or LFOs, sync’ing will provide another means
to have your patch’s timbre evolve as a key continues to be held down (along side with filter modulation -
described later in the user guide).
3
3
7 Programming -Oscillators
Normally, the two oscillators are free running (simulated); they operate independently. This means
that when you press a key multiple times, the resulting sound may not be exactly the same each time,
because the oscillators will interact with each other differently each time.
However, when Oscillator Sync is turned on, the 2nd oscillator will be forced to reset to the
start of its wave-cycle, every time the 1st oscillator naturally works round to the start of its
cycle.
If your new to synthesis and this sounds complex - don’t worry. Simply try it out - you will
recognise the kind of sounds sync’ing can produce since they appear everywhere in
popular recorded music.
OSCILLATOR SYNCHRONIZATION (2)