Home › Forums › Instruments › TERRA › Love – Scales & Glides
Hey 🙂
I still love my Terra, used it a lot on stage recently, mainly at impro sessions (experimental, ambient music).
I already wrote some suggestions in another forum post to improve on the already amazing concept. I really love that it plays and feels like a “real” instrument. My friend called it a “hang pan” from the future, which sounds quite accurate to me 🙂
1.) Anyways, I wonder if it would be possible to expand on the tuning system a bit. I think tuning the synth sounds can sometimes be really annoying with the current procedure (same for the pitch shifters). As it is amazing for live impro soundwise, at some point it would be more useful to quickly load some predefined scale and being able to switch between them. I wondered if “tuning fork” + “triangle” would be a possible loading option?
And then having minor, major, whole tone, 47 ET, gamelan and whatnot quickly accessible. This would be even more awesome if I could fill the 6 triangle slots with my own scales which I could edit via a browser-app or similar, and the load it on the machine via USB.
I don’t think this would destroy the concept of Terra, but just make it way more useful.
2.) The “smart” glissando / glide only really works when both note buttons are pressd fully (loudest). Every time I want to have glides when played quietly I get these unpleasing tone jumps. Would it be possible to get at least some slew or glide for that?
Thanks again for this great piece of Synth 🙂
Herman,
If you update your Terra with the latest firmware, you can do exactly as you describe!
Hey 🙂
Thank you for your response.
1. I’m already aware of this function and even used it quite often. But in a live situation it is a different story, if I load a scale from a preset (with the tuning of the root of the preset), or if I have already 1 note tuned (say pad 1) and then select a scale on which the consecutive note pads get tuned. Also, especially with microtonal scales, it would be just more convenient to use an editor on a computer, where one could actually type in a numerical ratios or frequencies. I use terra a lot in live situations (mostly improvised experimental music) and find the tuning process very limiting, as it needs a lot of time and can’t be really done live. Having a small repertoire (6 slots) of ready-made scales I can use over 1 defined root note within the preset would help a lot.
2. I tried it so many times, even after the last update. I just can’t get a smooth glissando between two low velocity notes, even when I “fade out” the other one. As soon as I release the first pressed note (even though I just barely touch it by then) I get a pitch jump. As said, the glissando work perfect when I go on full contact with both notes.
Besides all of that, thank you for the last update. Tap tempo for the echo, Omnichord and the pitch down options are amazing features! :))
