Ambient Sounds with Rings

One of the main reasons I got into modular synth/Eurorack was because of the music you could create, specifically ambient generative. 

Ambient generative is a subset of the ambient genre. This is music that is ambient in nature but the music itself is self-developing and randomly changing. No two songs are the same and in fact, it is quite hard to replicate a patch, even if you wired it up identically. The idea behind using a modular synth to create ambient generative patches is that no human input is required to develop the music, it does it all on its own!

This is my first attempt at something that you could quasi-call "ambient generative" and it features the Mutable Instruments Rings module. I've gone into much detail in previous posts about how powerful of a module Rings is and in particular, I'm using it in this patch as the main voice. 

I'm very happy with this patch! It hit all the notes (no pun intended) that I wanted it to, that smooth ambient strumming, all randomly modulated and changing! The randomness, particularly with the rhythm generation was something I was experimenting with for quite a bit.

Now let's break this patch down in detail, as it is slightly more complex than previous ones.

Rings provides the "ambient" component to the patch. It is set to duophonic sympathetic strings mode (yellow-yellow), which allows for those overtones as the pitch changes from note to note. Rings receives notes from 2HP Arp.

The "generative" component is provided by 2HP TM and the random octave mode of Arp. TM generates random notes, which are then quantized via 2HP Tune to a melodic scale. The quantized notes are sent to 1) Arp, to set the root note of the octave, 2) the length input of 2HP Euclid, to set the length of the rhythm Euclid generates and 3) the steps input of Euclid, to set the rhythm that is generated. Euclid also triggers Arp.

So every time TM generates a note, we have a new pattern, pattern length, root octave note and, as a result, a new sound.

To add some more randomness to the patch, I use Mutable Instruments Tides as the clock source, in cyclic oscillation - different shape mode (yellow, OFF, yellow). Tides tells Pam's Workout when to turn on and commence the triggering for TM and Euclid.

And to top things off, I use the Doepher LFO to modulate the slope function of Tides so that the on/off gates generated by Tides for Pam's Workout are not of equal lengths, but varying lengths. This means that sometimes notes will be generated quickly and others slowly.

Whew! That was a lot to explain. I hope it all makes sense. And of course, here is the diagram of the patch, which will hopefully make things a bit clearer:

If you have any questions or suggestions, let me know in the comments below.

Happy patching friends,

-Uncle Peter