Decay

[Stereohead]

Hey guys,

I picked up a M-AUDIO Oxygen 49 MIDI-keyboard last week and I've had a blast with it so far.
There's one thing that I can't really figure out though.

At the moment I'm using a ComboF Organ VST Plug-in combined with a phaser, octaver and an envelope filter in Ableton Live Lite to get a nice spacy organ sound.
However, when I release a note or a chords, there's no decay slope, it just instantly stops.
I do have a sustain pedal but if I press that the sound will not decrease in volume and just continue.
There's no decay knob on the ComboF plug-in and the release only goes up to 50ms.

How can I let the sound ring?

Thanks in advance.

 

[happyrat1]

https://www.google.ca/search?num=10....4.0....0...1c.1.53.serp..2.3.377.3dC5JZLqhMw

Gary

 

[Stereohead]

Hey there Gary, thanks for the reply!

I tried out a couple of those plugins but it didnt really fix it. Even with the sustain maxed out, the note would still stop almost immediately after I let go of the key.
I also tried adding a compressor (built-in Ableton one), almost no impact on the decay/sustain of the sound.

 

[happyrat1]

Well Organ notes aren't really intended to sustain for long periods. Your VST is actually functioning normally in this case.

What you could do however, is add a reverb or echo effect to stretch out a note a bit past its natural lifespan.

Gary

 

[happyrat1]

You could always try a freeware Analog Synth Plugin like these to create the actual sound you're going for as well.

http://www.studiotoolz.net/abakos-vst-virtual-analog-synth/

http://www.hercsmusicsystems.com/old_index.html

https://www.google.ca/search?num=10....0....0...1c.1.53.hp..4.23.2395.0.F6BbawiU2Us

Gary

 

[CowboyNQ]

G'day Stereohead,

Not sure if if this is helpful or not as I don't use VST's, but it's actually "release" you're trying to extend, not "decay". Decay occurs immediately after you have depressed the key, while you're still holding it down. So if you're fiddling with your decay times it will make zero difference to what happens after you lift your fingers off the keyboard.

So you'll need to find a patch where you can extend the release time to achieve your goal of letting the note extend for a while after you've let it go. If your patch/keyboard has an envelope generator (which allows you to modify attack, decay, sustain, release) this should be easy enough. Or your other option is to add a reverb effect as Gary suggested.

Cheers,

Paul

 

[delaware dave]

Organs don't have extended release so if the plugin is a faithful replication of an organ it won't either.

 

[Stereohead]

Thanks for all the help guys.

I've been trying different set ups with reverbs and filters added but nothing gets the desired sound.
What i'm trying to replicate is this sound

(around 0:30 you hear the chords being played on the background, you can hear it better at 1:15)
The closest I can really get to that is by using an organ VST but that prevents me from getting decent release.
Anyone got a clue how I could remodel this sound?
I'm trying the synth VST now but can't really get close to it.

 

[SeaGtGruff]

Definitely sounds more like a synth than an organ. It also sounds like just about everything in the song is being fed through some heavy reverb and echo.

 

[CowboyNQ]

Yeah definitely sounds synthy to me too. If your virtual synth is the subtractive kind you might try some kind of dual oscillator polyphonic patch. Maybe sine on OSC1 and saw on OSC 2. Sounds like there might be a bit of phaser in there too. Then just have a play around with your LFO, cutoff, resonance, envelope generator. With a bit of trial and error I reckon you could get pretty close to this. Sorry to sound vague but it's hard to be precise as all synths are different in character.

 

[Stereohead]

Thanks again,
I'm still very new to all this stuff and all these sounds so it's still kind of hard to distinguish them.
I'll mess around with some different synth VST's to see if I can get something good out of it.

 

[SeaGtGruff]

Since just about everything in the song sounds like it's got echo, reverb, and other effects, you might not be able to get the results you're hoping for just by adjusting the sound's parameters or the virtual instrument's settings. You may need to do the best you can to get a reasonable starting point, then feed it through an effects processor-- possibly more than one. Since a lot of those effects were probably added in the studio after the fact (after the performances were recorded), you might not be able to get an equivalent sort of sound unless you have someone sitting at a mixing board while you're playing, applying effects and moving the sound around (panning) for you as you play. That's assuming you're wanting to get this kind of sound during a live performance. You might be able to do that yourself if you have some pedals or other controllers you can manipulate with your feet while playing (assuming you want to use both hands for playing), but having a sound engineer at a mixing board do it for you lets you focus on your playing without having to worry about the effects. Or if this is for a recording rather than a live performance, then you can apply the effects yourself after making the initial recording.