Partials Advanced

Converge

Converge moves all the partials together along the pitch axis. Pull it down (−) and they compress toward a single pitch — the harmonics crowd in on each other and the sound thickens into a dense cluster. Push it up (+) and they spread apart, pulling away from the natural series into wide, bell-like, slightly clangorous territory. It’s one of the quickest ways to take a normal-sounding patch somewhere metallic or otherworldly.

Phase

Phase is a bipolar phase spread, and it’s subtler — it doesn’t change which partials are present, only how their waveforms line up. At the center it’s off. Push it positive and you get a linear (Schroeder) phase ramp; the slider behaves a bit like a pitch bend as you move it. Pull it negative and you get a triangle peak at the middle partial, which reads more like a spectral tilt. Phase changes are easiest to see on the oscilloscope and easiest to hear on sustained, bright sounds — the timbre shifts without the pitch or the harmonic content changing.

Clamp

Clamp sets a hard band on which partials are allowed to sound — a harmonic floor and ceiling, anywhere from partial 1 to 24. Clamp the bottom up and you thin out the low harmonics; pull the top down and you cap the brightness no matter what else is going on. It’s a blunt, dependable way to keep a patch in a register — especially useful when the Overtone Scan or modulation would otherwise push partials past where you want them.

Re-excite

Re-excite revives octave layers below the current Fold position — bringing back lower-layer harmonics that a high Fold setting would otherwise have crossfaded away. In practice, reach for it when you’ve folded a sound down hard (see Fold, Gin, and Tonic) and want some of that lower-octave body back without dialing Fold itself back.

What to Practice

• Hold a bright sustained note and sweep Converge slowly from − to +. Listen for the cluster tightening, then spreading into a bell.
• Park Converge at center and move Phase while watching the oscilloscope. The shape changes; the pitch doesn’t.
• Set a Clamp band around the low partials and play across the keyboard — the sound stays in its register no matter how hard you push the matrix.