Kurzweil with external dynamics

[Theo Verelst]

My PC3 experiments in the face of the studio processing I've worked on (there is a interesting congruence between my huge DSP processing graphs running on Linux with improvement effects on the Kurz, in this case) have led me to try out a sort of "Equal Loudness Curve" or amplifier "Loudnesss" button on the right material.

 

The main thing I try is to make use of the internal effect corrections (is what I've called it) but feed them through a separate output from the "normal" main audio out of the Kurzweil (original PC3), which allows me to use an external analog dynamic processing step, using the compressor circuits in my MG16. The thinking behind this is is related to the idea of sample reconstruction filtering in every DAC (thus also in the PC3) is far from perfect, and that there are high quality audio designs which dissociate from those errors only in a very convoluted way. The thing is: the trip the DAC filter makes at every input wave goes through an analog compressor and a little equalisation, because both are hard to get done in the same way digital, because they'd need to be perfectly prepared fpr the sh*tty reconstruction, which is extremely difficult to do with high accuracy.

 

Anyhow, the setup lets me play with the sounds in the synthesizer a lot better, and I think this little recording makes that very clear:

 

pc3sweetpow1.mp3 recorded from analog at 96kHz/24b with a digital eq setup favoring lows and highs at 44.1kHz stereo 320kbps

 

T.

[Mighty Motif Max]

Not sure I quite understand, but it sounds good. I think the acoustic piano is a bit artificial sounding still, but your playing was very enjoyable. If I read this right, you are sending the effects out a separate output on the PC3 to your MG16, adding a compressor, and somehow then routing the PC3 sounds (piano etc) through them, perhaps by using the outputted fx as a channel strip fx send on the mixer? Or somehow routing them back into the PC3 and processing the sounds through them?

[Markyboard]

I see your efforts no different than someone working with a modular. No one else may appreciate it or understand it, but who cares? Keep on doing what you enjoy Theo.

[Mighty Motif Max]

I see your efforts no different than someone working with a modular. No one else may appreciate it or understand it, but who cares? Keep on doing what you enjoy Theo.

 

Same. If it works for you, and you are happy with the results, go for it.

[Theo Verelst]

The PC3 has no audio input facilities like some older Kurzes had, unfortunately, and the processing is partially non-digital, in the mixer console. I search for the, let's call it, "Mixing Rules" that allowed so many of the great acts to sound so appealing most people still love the Good Music.

 

Never I hear such music being made here, partially because sounds and production are well tried, but at best so-so, and certainly never great.

 

I know from my own research mixing elements, tricks and serious signal processing exist that, as it were, compare with the nice sounds I and many remember, even to make digital sound great. The latter I've arrived at only lately, because "great" isn't usually achieved!

 

These sounds (ROM sounds with volume adjusted, into a special effect chain, master effects, and two (fixed, strange sounding) layered sounds) benefit from a mix trick with the analogue processing consisting of specific compression and parametric equalizer settings, both fairly accurately adjusted.

 

Of course there's a non-specific single effect unit Lexicon reverb overall, which in this "live" recording actually sounds proper and that's, for deep reasons probably, very hard to achieve; at least to me it appears that way.

 

T