MATRIXSYNTH: Yamaha SK-30 | The Ambient Organ


Saturday, January 30, 2021

Yamaha SK-30 | The Ambient Organ


video by MIDERA

"Yeah... So I picked up a Yamaha SH-30.

It's big.

Very big. And heavy.

It probably was not the smartest idea to get this, as I literally have no room for it. But did it intrigue me? Yes. It did.

It's got 4 different parts. A monosynth engine, an organ, a 'string synthesizer', and a 'polyphonic' synth section (which is a lie, it's actually paraphonic, but there is a bandpass filter setting which is cool).

The monosynth part has aftertouch (but only on the 'SOLO' section - but that makes sense because the 'Manual Bass' section was meant to be like for a foot pedal? I don't know. I don't use organs or foot pedal bass things. But aftertouch is cool anyway on that part. The monosynth engine is AWESOME. I think the SK-30 is worth it for that alone.

The organ section - used here - is kinda cool too. Good for ambient stuff mixed with FX. Which is what I did. El Capistan and Eventide Space mixed. I wanted to bring in other things, but I didn't do it. Anyway, pretty basic, no real ADSR (organ's usually don't anyway?), but it does allow you to have sustain and decay. That's cool.

The string section doesn't seem to have a dedicated section on the front panel. I think it also uses the Poly-synth section, but it's not that interesting to me. Mixed with the poly-synth section IS COOL.

So... the Polysynth section. I'll admit that when I agreed to buy it - or had committed, was prior to when I realized the Poly Synth section was PARAPHONIC, meaning all the sounds go through a single filter. That sucks. But yeah, it sounds pretty good anyway, but nothing to write home about. If this had actually a proper poly synth egine, I'd probably be over the moon with this synth.

As it stands, I'd say the best part is the monosynth engine. Also cool is the ability to mix all these parts. Mixing the monosynth with the other parts can give it a much fuller and interesting sound for the monosynth. You could probably just mix a mono and a poly synth to get a better effect, I'm not actually sure. That said, it's really beautifully made.

If I were to rate it after one day of use, and not being someone interested in organs or string synthesizers - well, I think that would be unfair. It doesn't really 'sing' to me yet. And it might not either. Being that it's too big for my studio, I am hesitent to grow attached to it.

That monosynth engine is beautiful though - I should probably look up what else uses that VCO, because it's good. Funny that here I am gushing over the mono when all I used here was the Organ part alone, hehe. I guess that's just the way I am. I'm not really good at coming up with interesting mono sounds, because... what am I going to actually do? Anyway... more to come, surely."

1 comment:

  1. Bought one back in the 90's for $300 and had to carry it home on a bus. Was it heavy....yes it was heavy.

    ReplyDelete

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