VIRGIL - the FREE Pipe/Church Organ Synthesizer

YouTube via syntesen
"Levo Sound Tools presents VIRGIL - the world's first free pipe organ synthesizer.

"Organ synthesizer" means that absolutely no samples are used in the sound generation. Each tone is generated by 52 oscillators, which are on/off switchable. The pipes range from 64' profound (sub-sub octave) to 1' flageolet. There are also combination (mixture) stops, some of which fatten up the sound in unpredictable ways, as well as a tremulant.

To guarantee authenticity, the synthesizer is not limited to a 100% pitch pure pipe simulation; rather, the user can detune the pipes slightly to recreate that authentic pipe organ sound. On top of this, the pipe noise feature adds authentic pipe blowing noise. For good measure, we've thrown in a global low pass filter as well.

The quality of the synthesizer is selectable to guarantee low CPU usage on all systems. (10 tones with all stops enabled results in 12% CPU usage in 64-bit mode, 5% in 32-bit mode on a Core 2 Duo 2.4 GHz processor)

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VIRGIL is, and will always be free, but as the principal developer is a poor medical students, donations are very much appreciated. In return for a $5 donation, you will receive the pre-release version of VIRGIL used in the background music of this video.

All donations will be put to use in further developing VIRGIL, as well as, eventually, porting the synthesizer to Windows."
http://www.youtube.com/user/syntesen

The Discovery (Beverly Hills Cop) - Syntesen's SD-50 Remake!

YouTube Uploaded by syntesen on May 16, 2011

"So I've been playing around with my Roland SD-50 "workstation synth" (it's based on the Roland Fantom series workstations, sadly it's not really programmable, but with Midi CC's you can play around with the almost 2000 presets), and...

I decided to cover this great track made by Harold Faltermeyer on the Beverly Hills Cop 1 soundtrack. It's from the scene where Axel Foley and Jenny Summers discovers the cocaine hidden by the coffee grounds in the warehouse. :P

I hope you like it! :D

__________________
Gear list:

Roland SD-50 synthesizer
MacBook Air 11.6"/Core Duo 2 1.4 GHz/2GB RAM
Ableton Live Suite 8.2.2
IK Multimedia TRacKs mastering suite"

3 synthesizer Bach chorales (Switched on XioSynth)

YouTube via syntesen
"In this video, I have realized 3 Bach chorales with the $299 XioSynth synthesizer in the style of Wendy Carlos!

None of these chorales are included on any J.S. Bach synthesizer album, so they are "all new". Sheet music courtesy of CPDL (http://cpdl.org)!

Hope you like it! :)"

4th Brandenburg Concerto on the MoPho analog synthesizer

YouTube via syntesen
"After having realized other Bach pieces on very diverse gear, I decided to try and do a full scale electronic realization of a movement of a Brandenburg concerto on the Dave Smith Instruments MoPho analog synthesizer, in the style of Wendy Carlos.

This is the result - the third movement of the fourth concerto.

The MoPho was controlled by a Novation ReMOTE 61SL, and everything was recorded straight into Ableton Live 7 as audio (24-bit, 48 KHz) - no MIDI sequencing. Effects (mild phasing on some sounds, reverb and delay), equalization and mastering was also applied in Live.

All the patches were programmed by me, and there is a lot more timbral variation to the individual instrument voices than in my earlier realizations."

Two Bach pieces on two synths - in the style of W. Carlos

YouTube via syntesen — April 09, 2010 — "Just two short pieces this time ;)

The Ach Was Soll Ich Sünder Machen choral prelude. And a new version of "O Jesulein Süß". The former is played on the Access Virus TI synth, the latter on the Nord Lead 2X.

They are in two very different styles - the choral prelude is a fast staccato piece, whereas the SATB choral has a more sustained, ethereal feel."

J. S. Bach on synth - Gavotte from Orchestral Suite no. 4 in D

YouTube via syntesen
"Yet another "switched-on bach" project in the style of Wendy Carlos. This time, a wonderful dance from the fourth Orchestral Suite, the Gavotte.

In 4/4 time, but with the emphasis on the 3rd beat of the measure, rather than the 1st, the Gavotte was a royal court favourite in the francophile countries of the Baroque period.

This piece marks the beginning of my "Soft Synth Odyssey", realizing different tracks with different software synthesizers. To start out on familiar ground, this track was realized with the Arturia Moog Modular V2 emulation synthesizer, recorded in Ableton Live.

I hope you enjoy it.

-David"

Axel F - on the MoPho

YouTube via syntesen. sent my way via fischek.
"I recently got the Dave Smith Instruments MoPho real analog, monophonic synthesizer (serial #281), and while I'm already putting it to good use in my own music, I decided to make a demo of a well-known song to show how powerful, this very affordable analog synthesizer is.

I chose the Beverly Hills Cop theme music by Harold Faltermeyer, because it's based around synthesizers and really demonstrates the range of sounds from the MoPho - from fat, powerful basses to searing leads.

All of the sounds in this demo except for the sampled drums and a single DX-7 piano sound are from the MoPho, programmed by myself. Except for the drums and bass, all of the parts are hand-played without correction.

In my opinion, the MoPho is probably the best sounding synthesizer that's affordable for most people on the market right now. It's warm, thick but even deadly aggressive if you want it to. It even has 4 16-step sequencers ;)

_____________________

MoPho part list:
- Bass
- Leads
- Chords
- Xylophone
- Hihats
- Noise pops
- Dubbed snare sound

The short E-piano sound is courtesy of the Yamaha DX-7, and the drums the LinnDrum (or rather, samples of it ;))

___________________

All in all, I hope you like the demo - if not for the music, then because of the sounds! Remember, the MoPho is a $299 instrument ;)"

Update: It's more like $399 in the US. Not sure where he found that price.

Bach's GIGUE FUGUE in G Major - on an 100% analog monosynth - PREVIEW!

YouTube Uploaded by syntesen on Apr 26, 2011

"-EDIT: To see where I'm currently at with the track, here's the Ableton screenshot shown briefly in the video: http://dave.gl/jsb_ableton.png !!!

This is a quick preview of my latest work. I recently purchased an MFB Microzwerg analog patchable synthesizer, so I just had to record a beautiful Bach work with it.

The Microzwerg is, indeed, 100% analog. The only digital part is the MIDI to CV/Gate converter. Apart from that, it's VCO's, not DCO's... and it's just sheer beauty to play around with!

Now, to record the track - totally like Wendy Carlos did, I suspect - just one note at a time, without MIDI sequencing, just pure hand-played... and creating patches as you go, as there's no patch storage, so the sounds will change (which rather makes the track come alive!) is really great fun, but it's also a hefty amount of work!

So please, comment, say what you think! If you like it, great, I could use some encouragement to finish the last ~65% of the music score. If you don't, well, I'd like to hear that as well!

All the best & love,
David

————|RECORDED WITH|————
-- Apple iMac 21.5"/Core 2 Duo 3.06GHz/8GB DDR3RAM
-- MFB Microzwerg synthesizer
-- Lexicon digital reverb unit
-- Bode-like Linear Frequency Shifter (used for phase-shifts)
-- Extremely cheap Behringer Chorus Pedal
-- M-Audio KeyRig49 cheapcheapcheap MIDI keyboard"

LUX ÆTERNA - Mozart's Requiem on synthesizers, PREVIEW

YouTube via syntesen
"I have been working on this for some time, on and off between medical school exams, et cetera.

It is is basically a slightly atmospheric rendition of some of W. A. Mozart's beautiful Lux Æterna from his Requiem (probably written by F. Xaver Süßmayr though)

I do not know whether I should complete it or not! If you like it, please write a comment. If you don't, do the same! If enough people like it, i'll definitely complete it.

=============== GEAR
Native Instruments Pro53 with Werckmeister-III well-tempered tuning
Ableton Vocoder
DSI MoPho (carrier for vocoder)"

Bist du bei mir - Switched-On Bach

YouTube via syntesen
"Bach's lovely Bist Du Bei Mir (Abide by Me) realized with an analog synthesizer (ARP 2600)."

Bach's Bourrée #1 from Orchestral Suite no. 2 on synth

YouTube via syntesen. follow-up to this post. more
"For this fast-paced piece from Bach's second orchestral suite, i chose the Native Instruments Pro53 software synthesizer (emulation of the Sequential Circuits Prophet-5) as the logical continuation from the Moog Modular on the Gavotte (suite #4 in Bm).

Even though the Pro53 only has two oscillators, a single filter, I was able to coax some very nice sounds from it, naturally tuned in Werckmeister III-tuning for maximum authenticity.

The continuo (improvised chordal and ornamental line, typically played with a harpsichord) is one of my finest yet, I believe. And it was fully improvised in one go to guarantee that taste of synthetic authenticity you just don't find these days ;)

Anyway, I hope you enjoy it."

Nord Lead 2X - jazzy improv

YouTube via syntesen
"This was really a first take improvisation over a preprogrammed bass and drum line, all running in real time off the Nord Lead via MIDI. Which is why it's not good, it's more like fun ;)

The lead sound is a composite of a self-programmed electric piano sound and a self-programmed brassy kind of sound. It sounds quite DX7-y actually."