A couple of weeks ago, we briefly reviewed Blofeld, a wavetable synthesizer from Waldorf. As was (hopefully) conveyed in the sound demo, wavetable synthesis can be quite vibrant and dynamic in terms of tonality. The first mainstream application of this technology came from PPG in the early 1980’s in the form of the PPG Wave 2.2. Without a doubt it has come a long way from its beginnings, but not just in a manner confined to its own synthesis method.
Evolution:
In the late 1980’s into the early 1990’s, a new method of synthesis came forward in a similar vein to wavetable synthesis; this method was called vector synthesis, or in some cases (Korg’s implementation, in particular), wave sequencing. This style differed from traditional wavetable synthesis in that instead of having all of the waveforms that are stored in the ROM of the instrument consolidated into one indexed table, the waves are stored independently of each other in the ROM of the instrument and the change between waves over time is programmed by the user in any fashion they choose. This lead to a huge increase in the flexibility of the dynamic changing of waveforms, and in Korg’s case, it lead to one of its flagship instruments, the Wavestation.
Where the separation begins:
In many ways, the sounds produced by the instruments are similar: the sound evolves over time as the waves being played cycle and shift between each other, and the sheer variety of waveforms always ensures an exotic sound can be had. Most of the time, however, the underlying character can be quite different between individual instruments. Where the wavetables within a PPG/Waldorf instrument typically have waves that evolve in a harmonically linear fashion, the user is not restricted in this way with an instrument like the Wavestation, and because of this the apparent tonal shifts can be very wild in terms of harmonic content. As mentioned above, the flexibility is much greater in vector synths: where in a wavetable synth, one can only scan forward or backwards relative to their position in the wave table at a rate of their choosing, one can move freely between waveforms, typically in an x-y matrix format, in the vector synth, at any rate and on any path they should so choose.
Who has the edge?
Which method is better, then? Given the large gaps in time between which the instruments that employ these synthesis methods were produced, it’s a hard call, and not entirely fair. Thanks in large part to PPG/Waldorf’s efforts, the common interpretation of wavetable synthesis has a sound that cannot be exactly duplicated, even by wave sequencing synths. On the other hand though, a basic wavetable synth would never be able to fully duplicate the type of sound (and more specifically, the intensely complex automation capabilities of a wave sequencing synth for waveform shifting over time) that a Wavestation, for instance, would be able to create. On a personal level, I find both types of instruments to be very rewarding, with wavetable synths giving very immediate satisfaction with a nice degree of tonal complexity, and vector synths being an incredibly engaging experience that yields stellar results when I have a lot of time to set aside for programming.
Audio demo:
The best way to illustrate some of the differences is, of course, through audio demo. This particular demo shows some preset sound samples from a software replica of the PPG Wave 2.2 instrument firstly, then a few factory presets from the Korg Wavestation followed by a few patches of my own on the same instrument.
Wavetable and Wavesequence Demo by Mr Blu Gruv
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