Navigating Attack/Release Issues In Roland Guitar Synths

[Rhcole]

I like to catch up on the zillions of pages and topics on this site from time to time. I was reading the thread about the GR-55 sitar voices not playing well, which corresponds to my own topic about piano patches being "lame". The primary issue in guitar synths (as opposed to COSM voices) comes from glitching/mis-triggering that occurs at the front end of a note (attack) and at the tail end (release), these being part of the ADSR envelope (Attack Decay Sustain Release). The middle part of most voices play fine as long as you have picked and fingered the notes cleanly. Thus a flute voice with a slow attack and a distinct release tracks really well, but pianos, sitars, and any number of other voices glitch or turn sour from the percussive attack or as the notes hold and fade. This isn't limited to Roland products, I used to have the same issue with my Axon and every other guitar synth I've ever used.

I have my own limited toolkit for solving these instances, which mostly rely on fooling the ear. For example, I may team a nylon guitar with a harp voice, delay the attack of the harp, and hope that the pluck of the nylon guitar sounds like the pluck of the harp. If the COSM voices had ADSRs it would work better, because then I could use the COSM voice solely for the pluck sound without having the sound continue through the duration of the note. And, in this instance, it still wouldn't solve the sour back-end of a sustained harp note. My only tricks for the back-end are to use high-quality programmable reverbs such as the Strymon Big Sky to simulate the tailing off of the note, or a sustain pedal for the voice itself. Then, I can truncate the Release of the ADSR and rely on these tools to simulate a longer release than what is actually being generated in the ADSR.

With the GP-10 coming out, I am hoping to have a new range of tools to accomplish this, as the VCO synth patch has dual ADSRs. Used in conjunction with the GR-55 I anticipate that I can do a BETTER job of managing complex voices in the GR-55 by using the COSM synth to fool the ear on the front and back-end in the manner described above.

But, I sure would like to hear how others solve these issues. My guitars are well set-up and I either play cleanly or if I don't that's my problem. Probably a third or more of the sounds in the GR-55 are troublesome to me for these issues and I steer clear of them unless I have to use them.

[thebrushwithin]

I have my own limited toolkit for solving these instances, which mostly rely on fooling the ear. For example, I may team a nylon guitar with a harp voice, delay the attack of the harp, and hope that the pluck of the nylon guitar sounds like the pluck of the harp.

Things like this do work, and I do it all the time. My attitude has not been to find "the real deal" on guitar synth, but to get to where I want to go sonically. This has the benefit of creating hybrid sounds, although anyone with a purist's attitude may not approve. Mostly one can end up with something much more interesting in the process. The "obstacles" we guitar synthesists encounter, I feel are an opportunity for exploration.

[DreamTheory]

Sometimes the sourness at the end of a note can be eliminated if you turn 'Chromatic" parameter ON. You lose the ability to pitch bend, but that is no great loss in some cases (piano). Looks like you have read the previous threads, so you may know this already.