VA-76 Owner’s ManualVA-76 clinics

Adding realtime expression

Things you ought to know about VariPhrase

The VariPhrase technology allows you to change the pitch of a phrase (by playing melodies) while the speed (tempo) and character/timbre are kept constant. On the other hand, you are free to change the tempo without affecting the pitch/timbre of a phrase.

This is remarkable for two reasons:

a)Usually, the pitch of recorded/sampled material can be changed only by playing the data at a higher or slower speed, so that the tempo changes. (Conversely, changing the tempo also means that the pitch changes.) Consider the following illustration.

VariPhrase analyses the frequency content of your audio material and is therefore capable of (a) keeping the formant constant, or (b) deliberately changing the formant, so that you can modify the character of a phrase to an extent that it almost sounds as though you had changed a woman’s voice into a man’s, or vice versa.

The VA-76’s controllers can be used to modify these – and other– aspects. Here’s how:

D Beam controller

1.

Press the D Beam Controller [ON/OFF] button

(button must light) to activate the D Beam Control-

ler.

2.

Select a phrase with a man’s face (for “male voice”).

Traditional Sampler

Too fast & too brittle

Original

Sounds like a tape played back at half speed

"HerecomesVariPhrase"

"Here comes VariPhrase"

"Here comes VariPhrase"

"Here comes VariPhrase" "Here comes VariPhrase"

See the table on page 46.

 

3. Activate the VariPhrase part.

 

4. Move your hand over the “eyes” while playing

something.

 

The function currently assigned to the D Beam Con-

troller is called “Cut & Reso Up and

 

 

Formant Up”.

 

(Cut& Reso is for the VA-76’s Keyboard parts, while

Formant Up is for the VariPhrase part.)

 

On a sampler, playing higher notes will speed up the phrase, so that a = 120 rhythm suddenly changes to e.g. = 144, which would make the material useless for live performances. Besides, traditional samplers do not allow you to lock a phrase’s tempo to the tempo of a sequencer (or Arranger), while VariPhrase does.

VariPhrase

Higher, but

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

natural. No

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

tempo change.

 

 

 

 

"Here comes VariPhrase"

 

 

 

 

 

"Here comes VariPhrase"

 

 

 

 

 

Original

 

 

 

 

"Here comes VariPhrase"

 

 

 

 

 

"Here comes VariPhrase"

Lower, but natural.

 

 

 

 

"Here comes VariPhrase"

 

 

 

 

 

No tempo change.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

b)Sampled or recorded audio consists of frequency clusters that describe the kind of sound, its timbre, etc. We’ll spare you the details… Such clusters also contain certain frequencies that make a sound (e.g. your voice) recognizable. No matter how hard you try to imitate someone else’s voice, you will always produce fre- quency clusters that will betray you. Such frequency clusters (partials) are called the formant.

Changing the pitch of recorded/sampled audio mate- rial means that the formant is also transposed. And that’s precisely why a piano sample of the note “A4” sounds like a cheap electronic piano when you use it for the note “D5” (the D further to the right). Why? Because the speed is different (see above), and –more importantly– because the “typical piano frequencies” are shifted to a different range.

The male voice you selected in step (2) changes drasti- cally as you move your hand closer to the D Beam’s eyes.

Other controllers

Of course, you can also use the remaining controllers: the Ribbon, the BENDER/MODULATION lever, Aftertouch, the Foot Switch and the Foot Pedal. Based on what you will learn on page 55 and following, you should be able to try them out now. See page 186 for how to assign other functions to these controllers. The important thing to remember is that only the parame-

ters marked with a will influence the VariPhrase part.

Please bear in mind that the formant is only one aspect that can be influenced in this way. The others are: Pitch, Time (speed), and sometimes Level (vol- ume).

Yet other parameters affect the VariPhrase indirectly or change its behavior. They allow you to use a con- troller to increase or decrease the influence of an LFO (an oscillator used for modulation effects that result in vibrato, WahWah, etc.) on various VariPhrase parame- ters.

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Image 46
Roland VA-76 Adding realtime expression, Things you ought to know about VariPhrase, Beam controller, Other controllers