Editing Programs
76 QuadraSynth Reference Manual
Decay & Sustain (00 to 99)
As soon as the attack portion of the envelope finishes (when the level reaches
maximum), the envelope will decay (decrease in level). The level it reaches is set by
the Sustain control; how long it takes to get there is set by the Decay control. In the
special case where the Sustain level is all the way up (99), then there is no decrease
and the Decay time segment is bypassed. Whatever level the sustain is set to is the
level that the decay section of the envelope will head for. Depending on the setting of
the Sustain Decay control (see below), the envelope will either hold at the sustain
level until you release the note on the keyboard, or decay to 0 at the Sustain Decay
rate (which is on page 2 of the envelope). You can create a long "plateau" at the start
of a note by setting the Sustain to 98 and the Decay to 99. This will cause the
envelope to take the maximum amount of time to get from peak level to a level of 98,
before the Sustain Release portion of the envelope begins.
Release (00 to 99)
Eventually, you will let go of the note that youÕve been holding (either by releasing
the note on the keyboard, or releasing the sustain pedal if it was pressed). It is at this
point that the Release portion of the envelope takes effect. The Release is the time
that the envelope takes to get from its current level back down to nothing. Setting the
Release time to 99 will take the envelope a very long time to reach zero level.
Pitch Envelope (Page 2)Delay (00 to 99)
This is the amount of time that the envelope will wait before doing anything; very
useful if you want to affect one element of a sound sometime after the sound starts.
When the Delay is set to 0, the envelope attacks right away, without any delay. Play
some notes while turning up the delay and see that the time between playing the
note and hearing the effect of the Pitch Envelope gets progressively longer as the
Delay control is turned up.
Sustain Decay (00 to 99)
This is the amount of time that the envelope will take during the sustain stage to
bring the level down to 0. If this is set to 99, the envelope will remain at the Sustain
level until the note is released. When set to 0, the envelopeÕs level will immediately
jump down to 0 upon reaching the sustain stage.
Trigger (Normal, Freerun, Reset, Reset-Freerun)
The Trigger mode determines how the envelope will function. You may select either
Freerun or Reset, or both (Reset-Freerun) or neither (Normal). When set to Normal,
the envelope will always start at its current level (i.e., if another note had been played
which triggered the envelopeÕs cycle, playing another note in the middle would not
interrupt the cycle). Also in Normal mode, the envelope will immediately advance to
its release stage upon releasing the note. When set to Freerun, the envelope will
complete its entire cycle, even if the note is released in the middle. When set to Reset,
the envelope starts at the beginning whenever a new note is played. When set to
Reset-Freerun, the envelope will start at the beginning whenever a new note is
played and will complete its entire cycle, even if the note is released in the middle.