
Real-Time Touch Controller for the Yamaha DX7 Synthesizer - processing
https://spectralplex.com/incredible-real-time-touch-controller-for-the-yamaha-dx7-synthesizer/
======
Doctor_Fegg
Pretty much every synthesiser for 15 years had the same two-row LCD interface
as the DX7. My first job out of university in 1995 was as assistant editor of
Keyboard Review magazine (UK), and the vast majority of synths I reviewed -
wonderful beasts from Ensoniq, Roland, Korg, technologically way ahead of the
DX7 - had exactly the same bloody awful UI. Akai's S-series samplers, which
everyone was using back then, did provide a decent display... but at a price.
When someone finally made a sampler affordable by the home market (Ensoniq's
ESI-32) it too had a greatly compromised display, though at least four rows
rather than two.

I've always suspected this actually influenced the electronic music styles of
the time. The 90s were the start of the analogue resurgence. Sure, an 808 or a
303 is a fabulous-sounding beast in itself. But twiddling knobs is just so
much more rewarding and responsive than spending hours squinting at a two-line
LCD.

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
Having made the impossibly un-portable CS80, Yamaha decided to try something
different with the DX7 UI.

The DX7 was designed to be a gig-able synth that anyone could throw in a car
and set up on their own. It was a brilliant success because you had good-
enough epiano and other stock sounds in a package that was far more portable
than a real epiano, clav, basic poly, etc.

This was purely a cost/weight issue. The hardware required for one-knob-per-
function would have doubled the weight and probably tripled the cost.

E.g. a company called Jellinghaus made a full-sized analog-style programmer
and it was bigger than the DX7.

[https://www.matrixsynth.com/2008/01/jellinghaus-dx-
programme...](https://www.matrixsynth.com/2008/01/jellinghaus-dx-
programmer.html)

People like analog synths because they have a very simple programming model
that only makes a relatively small range of sounds, most of which sound good
more or less by default. You trade immediacy against sophistication.

The DX7 etc went the other way, which infuriated musicians used to those
analog sounds, but created an entire support industry of sound designers and
libraries.

If you want a tactile UI now you can create one on an iPad. The surprising
thing in 2019 is that synth designers still haven't fully explored touch
screen interfaces, and are mostly just recycling ideas from 30 years ago.

~~~
holy_city
>People like analog synths because they have a very simple programming model
that only makes a relatively small range of sounds, most of which sound good
more or less by default. You trade immediacy against sophistication.

Well and they sound completely different.

The UI differences don't come down to number of controls but the fact that
most analog designs have a 1:1 relationship with the sound, every knob you
turn has a very distinct impact on the sound and usually, applying that to any
input generates more or less the same impact on the output. It's extremely
intuitive to learn how changing a knob changes the sound.

FM is completely different, where altering simple things like the operator
ratios and modulation index have _massive_ changes on the sound and don't
create the same effect on different sounds - it's naturally non-intuitive.
Most FM wizards get there through tons of experimentation, not through
established fundamentals.

Imagine playing a wind instrument and changing your embouchure alters the
pitch of the differently depending on what note you finger. That's what
programming an FM synth is like.

iPad synths are a dime a dozen these days. Lack of a physical interface is as
big a problem on them as with larger synths. They are hardly tactile.

A corollary here is the success of wavetable synths compared to granular,
additive, and FM in the softsynth space. Wavetables have the same subtractive
model as traditional analogs, and incorporate many of the same features as
semi-modular synths. But they are extremely versatile because of how their
interface is intuitive even for first time users - it's stupid easy to change
the sound, the only additional dimension is the wavetable but that's quick to
pick up. Compared to say, granular synths which are possibly the most
versatile paradigm, but whose controls are extremely divorced from the timbre
of the sound you design.

~~~
gdubs
The first version of Polychord for iPad had a fully-functioning FM synth under
the hood, but I ended up disabling it because it didn’t fit with the
simplicity of the product. Even providing a nice set of presets to choose from
was turning into a time-suck — it really is an art.

------
cmroanirgo
The DX7 is directly the reason I'm where I'm at in the world. As a kid, when
the DX7 was new, I'd spend hours making sounds and writing music on it. I
explicitly went to uni (an Electrical/computer systems Engineering degree) to
learn how to make my own synth. I learnt pretty much how in the first 12
months (although I never got around to making my own). I got head hunted from
uni and here I am 3 decades later.

If it weren't for the DX7 I would have stayed in the classical instrument
stream and done a music degree. I wouldn't be on HN today.

So, it's great that people are still applying new tech and gizmos to the DX7.
It's got a special place in my heart.

~~~
romwell
Have you seen the Reface DX?

It's the new life of a DX7. Still FM, but something you can bring to a
campfire. Or a party. Or to the office. Always at your fingertips.

I never leave this thing at home; it's either in my car, or my backpack.

[https://usa.yamaha.com/products/music_production/synthesizer...](https://usa.yamaha.com/products/music_production/synthesizers/reface/dx/index.html)

------
dontreact
I have spent a few months this year trying to wrap my head around FM
synthesis. Unfortunately I don’t think the DX7 is hard to program just because
of the user interface. I have read up and thoroughly understand the theory
behind FM synthesis. I have followed various tutorials to design patches. At
the end of the the day FM synthesis is powerful but it is inherently much less
intuitive and also much easier to get horrible ugly sounds out of than
something like the subtractive synthesis seen on most analogue synths.

The reason FM synths need to be digital is that very precise pitch ratios
between oscillators are important in order to get good sounds. For example you
may want to modulate the pitch of one oscillator with another exactly a fifth
up (3 to 2 frequency ratio). It can easily sound terrible if the fifth up
oscillator goes slightly out of tune.

These sort of precision and nonlinearity in output are also one thing that
makes FM synthesis a lot harder to use.

~~~
sramsay
> Unfortunately I don’t think the DX7 is hard to program just because of the
> user interface.

That was my first thought. And actually, I kept trying to understand (from the
article) how exactly this UI makes FM programming easier. Does it? Or is that
not the point?

Because one of my "sound designer dreams" is being able to get the sound in my
head coming out of the machine using FM. I can do that with regular
subtractive synthesis (more or less) but with FM, I feel like I'm twiddling
knobs until I like the way it sounds. And that's with a really good interface!

~~~
mntmoss
I think the trick to getting FM into a better UX would be to apply more
computation to it to identify ahead of time which parameters and ranges will
produce dramatic variation from a given starting point, and so reduce the
programming to a model where you aren't repeatedly searching for where sweet
spots are, but rather quickly paging into the zone desired and then adding
minor adjustments.

However part of the challenge of this would be in covering numerous
combinations and identifying places where two or more parameters need to be
changed simultaneously. Still basically a problem governed by combinatorial
constraints.

------
acomjean
I had a dx7. I will vouch for it being difficult to program decent sounds for.
Despite having a map of how the 6 oscillators interacted on top of the
Keyboard. See photo: [https://mn2s.com/news/features/brief-history-yamaha-
dx7/](https://mn2s.com/news/features/brief-history-yamaha-dx7/)

It didn’t help that in the 90s when I had that keyboard they’re weren’t many
online sources of info about it..

The dx7 was neat but couldn’t make very realistic instrument sounds. Very
popular though.

------
cawlin
The DX7 uses FM synthesis which is all digital meaning one can more or less
the same results with vastly more flexible interface (Bazille, Dexed, Operator
etc.) all inside a computer software. Despite that fact this is incredibly
cool and impressive!

~~~
indigochill
On this topic, something I don't understand which is probably just a limit of
my experience in the field is if one is sufficiently talented at digital
synthesis, why not use CSound for everything? It supports virtually any
synthesis technique and can run in real-time. It also gives designers the
freedom to define their own parameters on their instruments. And it's open
source. But it seems mostly relegated to art projects, which confuses me.

~~~
brandonmenc
> why not use CSound for everything?

Because there are a ton of alternatives to CSound.

I use Max/MSP. But you could also use PureData, SuperCollider, Chuck, JUCE,
etc.

------
IAmGraydon
For those who are interested in the DX7 but can't obtain one, there's a VST
version that is literally a perfect recreation. It's called Dexed and you can
get it here:

[https://asb2m10.github.io/dexed/](https://asb2m10.github.io/dexed/)

Personally, I'm a synth nut and Dexed is my go-to when I'm in the mood for FM,
but I prefer good old subtractive synths over FM most of the time.

~~~
JoeyJoJoJr
And if you don’t want to use a PC to get the DX7 sound you can purchase a Korg
Volca FM for really cheap. It’s sound engine is modelled from the DX7 and you
can load in DX7 patches.

------
rylos
The key concept of this control pamel is the ability to recall a patch preset,
and have all the real-time controls immediately present the new paramaeter
values, ready for tweaking. the only way a knob box can do that is by using
motorized pots, or rotary encoders & LEDs.

The fact that it's running a DX7 series synth is simply because I wanted to
see how much easier it would make a synth to operate, so why not try it out on
the one with the scariest reputation, a DX7. The result was much more than I
had bargained for, it actually made it a fun instrument to play with. Of
course, it could operate about anything that can be digitally controlled.

I wanted to use capacitive-type touch sensors, but the problem with touch
technology is it's sensitivity to ambient electrical noise, which can wreak
havoc with the sensing signals. So I designed a variation that ignores
electrical interference. This lets it be responsive & reliable; no lag, ever,
giving it a more natural feel in use than you'd expect.

------
jancsika
Has anyone tried to take the parameters of an FM synthesis chain as if they
were the hash of a particular timbre?

In other words, you start with a recording of the sound you're after and then
just start brute-force iterating through the parameter choices until an
analysis of the output looks close enough to the input?

I mean, fftw3 takes about a full minute on my Chromebook to measure the
quickest algo. So I'd hope that generating output analyses would be fairly
snappy...

~~~
xkcd-sucks
[https://fo.am/activities/midimutant/](https://fo.am/activities/midimutant/)

An Aphex Twin collaboration, naturally

------
malthaus
For anyone interested in FM synthesis without the DX7 "baggage" and more
limitations which help you steer away from too harsh sounds, check out the
Elektron Digitone.

As an added bonus you get a very capable sequencer and it can act as a
groovebox on its own for quick sketches.

------
yowlingcat
Wow, very cool! This seems like a great thing to pair with a DX7 and a Reface
DX [1], which seems like Yamaha's attempt to take the linage of the DX7 and do
it justice in modern form with an increased emphasis on usability. I once had
a DX7, and I loved it to pieces.

The DX7 is one of my favorite synthesizers in history, and its software
successor, FM8 [2] by Native Instruments is my favorite synthesizer that I
regularly use. As with many of the 61-key workhorse keyboards of the 80s, the
DX7 is extremely solidly built and has excellent synth key action which makes
it a joy to play. It's not weighted, but it also doesn't feel like a toy, and
the velocity range (while oddly bound to 0-100, one of its few unnecessary
flaws) is very playable throughout the entire range. Beyond that, the DX7 as a
synthesizer is technologically a legendary synthesizer that contributed
heavily to 80s and 90s music [3][4]. It had great presets, the most
recognizable of which is the default patch which is it's rendition of a Rhodes
piano. Many folks bought it for that purpose, and you'll that patch in many
songs that you may recognize.

The DX7 uses a type of synthesis called FM synthesis, which (sort of like FM
radio encoding) allows any of its 6 operator oscillators to be used additively
or as an operator which feeds its signal to one or many other oscillators,
potentially in a cyclical manner. Operators can use frequency multipliers and
dividers with base oscillators (I believe only sine waves for the DX7 although
there's a fair amount more in FM8) so that you can have operators sound
harmonically many octaves above a base oscillator, or vice versa. In FM8, you
can use multipliers anywhere from 0-64 with a 0.001 resolution. Through
careful usage of envelopes and oscillator feedback structures, you can go
quite a bit beyond your usual virtual analog style subtractive synthesis. but
you can do quite a bit of semi-realistic physical modeling and beyond, whether
it be orchestral instruments, drums, or punchy cartoonish caricatures of
either. It's easily the most versatile form of non-sample based synthesis I've
ever found.

The wonderful thing about FM8 is how intuitive and flexible the synth gets
once you begin to get used to it. The envelope editor makes it straightforward
to create arbitrary stage envelopes with the curvature of each stage
customizable and really straightforward to visualize. I personally lean on FM
synthesis so heavily for a variety of reasons. It's a taste thing, but it's
also a matter of practicality. If you're judicious about patches you use, it's
easier to tune FM instruments to make them take up less spectral space, and
clash with other elements in a mix without extra post-processing. Additionally
that they tend to be quite CPU light, so the number of distinct instances you
can run in realtime without maxing out your CPU is a fair amount higher than
hefty virtual analog synths like Massive (it may potentially be the same for
Spire). Finally, when it comes to soundscape design possibilities, long
envelopes and frequency modulation open the door to ambient shape design that
is borderline impossible to do otherwise. I believe this is why the DX7 became
Brian Eno's favorite synth [4].

FM8 is not free (although it and Komplete were some of the best investments I
ever made in my music) but there are a variety of free DX7 synths out there
that you can use, some of which are compatible as editors for DX7 SysEx
patches. The one I'd recommend is Dexed [5], which is open source and pretty
nice, because you can use it with the giant free DX7 patch ecosystem that's
built up over decades. Give that a go with REAPER (trialware), LMMS (open
source but a little hard to use with VST/AU plugins), Live (evolving and
likely the best for professional musicians to create on), or a DAW of your
choice and you're in business. Which reminds me, I have a track I need to
finish...and based on my commentary, you can probably accurate guess whether
there's at least 1 instance of DX7 on it.

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3PGO_DiuYU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3PGO_DiuYU)

[2]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lx_L9dPIa78](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lx_L9dPIa78)

[3] [https://reverbmachine.com/blog/exploring-the-yamaha-
dx7](https://reverbmachine.com/blog/exploring-the-yamaha-dx7)

[4]
[http://bobbyblues.recup.ch/yamaha_dx7/dx7_examples.html](http://bobbyblues.recup.ch/yamaha_dx7/dx7_examples.html)

[5] [https://asb2m10.github.io/dexed/](https://asb2m10.github.io/dexed/)

~~~
romwell
I have a Reface DX, and it's my most favorite keyboard of all time.

Frist, it _is_ a DX. While the architecture is not identical to the DX7, it is
a 4-OP FM synth with feedback on each operator, which gives it a huge tonal
range.

Second, the UI is _great_. And yes, there are 4 realtime controls that make it
easy to change the timbre of the sound as you play it.

But the most important part is its compact size and built-in speakers. I've
brought the Reface DX to campfires, into the desert, on an airplane, to the
top of a mountain, on hikes, to the beach, to the office. I jammed with
strangers in the streets of Madrid. With me, I bring cheesy 80s music (FM was
all the rage back then), jazz (the e-piano sound on the DX just cuts it), and
whatever else I want.

~~~
yowlingcat
I tend to do most of my music composition in the box nowadays, so there's much
less jamming for me and more noodling around on a keyboard until I come up
with an idea (if that), and then developing the rest of the idea fully in the
sequencer. But even so, it might be nice to play around with and be able to
take places without having to worry about or deal with a computer -- just
having the immediacy of the machine and nothing else seems nice.

The main question I think about is whether I want to grab it or one of the
volcas. When it comes to live jamming, it's likely that a groovebox is closer
to my cup of tea.

~~~
mntmoss
One of the simplest options is also the cheapest - just get a Casio toy
keyboard. You wouldn't get those for the sound quality, but if you opt to run
one through a multi-FX pedal you can achieve a pretty sizable lo-fi tonal
palette in a small package.

~~~
romwell
Well, to note: Reface DX, in addition to sounding great, has built-in effects
(2 FX that can be chained), and is smaller than any Casio keyboard currently
on the market (that I know of).

My next-size-down setup is an Akai LPK25 controller running into the cellphone
(running an FM synth, for example).

------
brokenmachine
This looks like basically a MIDI controller that has some software so it can
send presets to the DX7.

I wonder how much those touch sensors cost, because I'm sure it could quite
easily be used as generic MIDI controller.

~~~
rylos
Anything that can be computer controlled, it could work for if built
appropriately. As it sits, the midi interface will let it work with about any
midi-based device, if the software is written to match. My next step is going
to be having it run my Ensoniq VFX. At that point I'll have it be able to
switch between the DX7 and VFX at the touch of a button. I've already used it
with a DX7 MkI, and a DX21.

A very early prototype got hooked into a theatrical lighting system, just
because. I only had it wired in for a few minutes, the guy that did the
lighting design for that theater really, really, wanted me to leave it. The
ability to be able to be so interactive with the lighting appealed to him.

As to cost, the sensors themselves would be dirt cheap to mass-produce, the
most expensive part would be the display. This one uses discrete LEDs, but I
think an old-style, low-res, low cost monochrome LCD would be plausible,
allowing more sensors in the same space, and a alphanumeric for labels & such.
Most of the circuitry could be replaced by a simple microcontroller, it
doesn't require any high-power math or signal processing.

------
jacquesm
There is this:

[https://www.musicradar.com/news/tech/dtronics-dt7-has-
just-m...](https://www.musicradar.com/news/tech/dtronics-dt7-has-just-made-
the-yamaha-dx7-easier-to-use-636276)

~~~
mrob
Looks like a clone of the Jellinghaus DX-Programmer. Supposedly only 25 were
made, and it's hard to find info on it. There's a good picture from when Brian
Eno's was auctioned:

[http://www.spheremusic.com/Bargaindtl.asp?Item=4626](http://www.spheremusic.com/Bargaindtl.asp?Item=4626)

------
brandonmenc
Nowadays, Patch Base is the way to go.

[https://coffeeshopped.com/patch-base/editor/yamaha-
dx7](https://coffeeshopped.com/patch-base/editor/yamaha-dx7)

