Monday, August 12, 2013

Firebird 2.0 software synth now free from Tone2.com

Tone2.com, a small German music software company, has released its Firebird 2.0 software synthesizer for free (August 2013). Firebird, when it first appeared seven years ago, introduced a new type of subtractive synthesis Tone2 called Harmonic Content Morphing (HCM), "...based on a large, expandable repertoire of standard waves, like saw, pulse, as well as more complex wave material, like multi-waves, trumpets, organs, pads, pianos and voice samples.These waves are modified in real-time, by for example transposing the wave by one or two octaves and adding it to the original wave, altering its harmonic structure, syncing, compressing or even expanding the frequency domain of the spectrum. Making the wave for example sound more fat using only one oscillator, transforming each wave into a hyper-wave or selecting some cycles of a sample and moving through them over time (comparable to wavetable synthesis)."

HCM later made an appearance in Tone2's Gladiator soft synth.