9
Getting Started
The VL1 offers many advantages in terms of musical performance.
Not just in terms of sound, but also in terms of the “behavior” that
makes acoustic instruments so … well, musical! But this is not
because someone has programmed a certain sound or pattern of behavior
into it. The physical model can be programmed to have certain attributes
— the length of a pipe or the stiffness of a reed, for example — but the
actual sound produced by any configuration can only be accurately deter-
mined by playing it. Of course, the same applies to the design of acoustic
instruments. Because of its natural acoustic behavior the VL1 is undoubt-
edly a little harder to play than conventional synthesizers, but when mas-
tered this is the very characteristic that is its greatest strength. The Yamaha
VL1 is the most musical synthesizer ever made. A soloist’s dream!
• The VL1 sounds better, has more depth, and is more realistic in
the musical sense than any other synthesizer system.
• Simply pressing a key in the same way does not always produce
precisely the same sound. The instrument is responsive and
“alive”.
• Note-to-note transitions have the same continuity exhibited by
acoustic instruments. What goes on in between the notes is just as
important musically as the notes themselves.
• It has extraordinary expressive capability. Rather than simply
controlling parameters like volume or pitch, you can control
characteristics such as breath and reed pressure with appropriate
complex effects on the timbre of the sound.