Cymbols is a percussion synthesizer specifically designed for electronic cymbal and hihat sounds. The methods it uses to synthesize sounds are derived mostly from old analog drum machines (with a few tweaks), though it is not designed to specifically emulate any one machine or series of machines.
Cymbals contains 3 individual cymbal-synth modules with nearly identical controls, plus a bonus fourth module which produces sound using elements from the three others. Each module can be assigned to an individual MIDI key for triggering, with the exception of the first (HiHat) module, which can be assigned to two keys for triggering the open and closed hihats with their own key. The two hihat sounds also have their own dedicated envelope generators. Note that the open hat can be “choked” (muted) by the closed hat. The other main difference in controls is the “AMFX” section on Cymbal 1 and Cymbal 2, which is an amplitude modulation effect. See instructions for more detail on this. The “NZ” module takes the oscillator signal from the HiHat module, before the filters, and sends that to a VCA controlled with an Attack-Sustain-Release envelope (sustain is always full). This module also includes an amplitude modulation effect, which uses the first Cymbal module as the second input. The NZ module is just a sort of “bonus feature” that can be used for various sound fx and such.
Audio demos:
Video demo:
FSA Cymbols demo – VST3i cymbal/percussion synth
Cymbols is a percussion synthesizer specifically designed for electronic cymbal and hihat sounds. The methods it uses to synthesize sounds are derived mostly from old analog drum machines (with a few tweaks), though it is not designed to specifically emulate any one machine or series of machines.
Downloads:
Acknowledgements
FSA plugins made with SynthEdit make use of modules from the following developers:
VST and VST3 are trademarks of Steinberg Media Technologies AG
