AJH Synth Patch of The Week: Lo-Fi Claps - all-analogue crowd clap sound

video upload by AJH Synth Official

"Rather than copying the way many vintage drum machines tackled their 'clap' sounds, here is a simple, yet more organic take on it. Some of the most famous analogue claps were achieved by using a series of very fast envelopes to control the amplitude (VCA), simulating the effect of multiple hands clapping simultaneously, along with their imperfect timing (humans aren't the most accurate drum machines). However, using fast, random modulation instead of a repeating envelope creates a more natural effect, and a simple noise source can provide this, and with longer envelope decay times it can produce an effect more akin to a large crowd clapping. Pink noise is especially suited to this, as it's lower frequency (speed) will have more audible results. White noise is still used as the audio source for the sound itself, and a bandpass filter is used as it will allow a more appropriate range of frequencies to form the timbre of the sound than lowpass filtering. Resonance is also important in forming the shape of the sound. The VCF I've chosen for this example is the Sonic XV Diode Transistor Ladder Filter. Patch Notes and PDF link further down the page.

Index:
00:00 Start
00:22 Overview
00:53 Constructing the patch
02:27 Example Performance
03:24 Patch Sheet"

AJH Synth Patch of The Week posts