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ian-s
Joined: Apr 01, 2004 Posts: 2669 Location: Auckland, New Zealand
Audio files: 42
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Posted: Mon Jul 19, 2004 5:00 am Post subject:
KORg MS20 |
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KORG MS20 1978
Unlike its sibling the MS50, the MS20 was not fully modular. The patch panel provided lots of options for modulation routing but apart from an external input to the filters, the signal path was hard wired.
After a lot of trying, I think I have a passable emulation of the sonic character of the original. Possibly the most distinctive and recognisable effect was the sweeping of the High Pass frequency with lots of 'peak' (resonance). By themselves, the Nord high pass filters couldn't reproduce the effect. An additional negative feedback path and some simple distortion, does get quite close.
The oscillator section has some more 'hand made' waveforms. The triangle is derived from the sawtooth using a switch that selects positive or negative on every half cycle, then uses level shifting. Again this is a technique borrowed from real analogue VCO design (not claiming that it sounds more analogue, just an exercise really)
I have put a RingMod on the effect page which functions the same as the last option on VCO2's wave selector.
Var 1 - Classic HP sound, use MOd wheel to sweep HPf up.
Var 2 - RngMod example
Var 3 - Heavy FM with Mod wheel controlled LFO Shape, MG1 sweeps rate.
Var 4 - Typical bass
Var 5 - Interval tuning
Var 6 - Pulse FM
Var 7 - Lame noise
Var 8 - Another typical bass
Have not implemented the ESP section, as the name implies, this could provide a trigger output a variable number of milliseconds before an input signal arrived.
Seriously, it was useful. I used to put pink noise in and adjust the threshold level to get random trigger pulses. It made a pretty good distortion effect as well.
The system really came together when combined with a MS50 (or two MS50's and another MS20) and lots of patch cords.
The MS20 by itself is a bit overrated IMO, no PWM, no sync, only one decent EG and a half arsed patch panel. No denying its distinctive sound however, love it or hate it.
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Last edited by ian-s on Mon Jul 19, 2004 6:24 pm; edited 2 times in total |
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General Elektrick
Joined: Apr 06, 2004 Posts: 254 Location: Berlin/Germany
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Posted: Mon Jul 19, 2004 5:59 am Post subject:
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I definitly love my MS 20,
but I am not using it as a synth, more as a distorsion filter
with the audio input, this is so powerful!
I am at work so I have to check the patch later!
Best,
General Elektrick |
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egw
Stream Operator
Joined: Feb 01, 2003 Posts: 1569 Location: Asheville NC
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Posted: Mon Jul 19, 2004 9:06 am Post subject:
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The MS-20 was a classic, and a sentimental favorite as it was my first synth.
I agree it's somewhat limited, especially the patching. So I'm surprised that Korg produced that ridiculous hardware emulation.
But the filters on the MS-20 are awesome, not just the sound but the knob layout (dedicated knobs for cutoff, resonance and modulation for each of the LP and HP filters).
Now I use a frostwave resonator, which is an exact clone of the MS-20 filter section. All the cool sounds of the MS-20 in a tiny blue box!
http://waltzer.crosswinds.net/egw/equipment/frostwave.htm |
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General Elektrick
Joined: Apr 06, 2004 Posts: 254 Location: Berlin/Germany
Audio files: 1
G2 patch files: 15
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Posted: Mon Jul 19, 2004 9:21 am Post subject:
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can you overdrive the input of the frostwave the
same way as the MS 20 inputs?
I really like the distortion sound from this!
Best,
General Elektrick |
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mosc
Site Admin
Joined: Jan 31, 2003 Posts: 18197 Location: Durham, NC
Audio files: 212
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Posted: Mon Jul 19, 2004 2:15 pm Post subject:
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I never owned on of those MS20's but from what I remember, your patch sounds a lot like them. |
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elektro80
Site Admin
Joined: Mar 25, 2003 Posts: 21959 Location: Norway
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Posted: Mon Jul 19, 2004 4:17 pm Post subject:
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I have had the Korg legacy Collection and the MS20 controller here.. .. and I love it. The MS 20 was magnificent for improvisation .. a great live instrument and the MS 20 emulation is pretty much just the same. I agree that the patching is not that sensible.. but it did add a little extra back then.. and of course .. matcthing the MS 20 with the VC 10 and the MS 50 and also of course with the SQ 10 was great fun. Only problem back then was that Korg was plagued with production problems of some sort or another and too many of these were far too noisy.. and often the filter would start to breathe noise. Anyway.. all this could be fixed and when these instuments were in good condition they were very playable and very musical. However, they did not quite deliver what one might expect.. they looked far cooler than they were.. but this was the rule back then anyway. _________________ A Charity Pantomime in aid of Paranoid Schizophrenics descended into chaos yesterday when someone shouted, "He's behind you!"
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ian-s
Joined: Apr 01, 2004 Posts: 2669 Location: Auckland, New Zealand
Audio files: 42
G2 patch files: 626
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Posted: Mon Jul 19, 2004 6:00 pm Post subject:
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Oops, bug in re-trigger logic for hold stage, caused another trigger on key up. Have fixed that and made minor tweaks to variations. To be honest, I can't recall if the HADSR did re-trigger with long HOLD times. It was not a feature I used a lot.
For the purists VCO2 should only be used in Sine or Triangle mode when using the Ring Modulator option. Also the Square LFO wave was only available through the patch panel, here a switch is used. |
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