How-To/Tutorial: Wurlitzer Electric Piano patch on Analog Synth (Minilogue)

Here's how I go about making a very basic Wurlitzer-style electric piano synthesizer patch and the general thought process behind it. I'm using the KORG minilogue, but the same principles apply to any polyphonic analog (or virtual analog) synth.
This is my first tutorial of this sort. Pardon my noodling, rambling, and mumbling. I'm going get better at these! Leave a comment with feedback or whatever patch you want me to do a tutorial for next.
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[@Thoracius]

I wasn't sure how deep to go into the weeds on either theory or technical aspects. I hope I struck a good balance. I wanted to keep it sort of general, so I didn't talk about "decay at 2 o'clock" or anything that specific because ultimately you need to use your ear. I also assumed you already know the basic parts of the synth (Osc, Filter, Env, LFO). But I'm open to feedback if I could make it more helpful in any way. I was thinking for the next tutorial it would be fun to do some famous, classic synth sound -- but anything goes! Let me know what sound you guys are interested in learning how to synthesize. I can also do anything from any of my patch demo videos.

[@sethbrochu7152]

I think the way you went about it worked well, where you described what we were looking for first, and then explained the technical aspect. Now I also have some key words I understand more because of the way you went about it. Thanks! Keep doing this kind of stuff it’s great.

[@sleepingpillzzz]

Thank you very much for the tutorial. I missed this sound in my Minilogue. It's amazing how seemingly insignificant changes in timbre can greatly affect the overall picture of the sound. Had a lot of fun with this tutorial.

[@Thoracius]

Great! Do you have any requests for other tutorials?

[@sleepingpillzzz]

@@Thoracius I'm currently diving deeper into analog synthesis with the Minilogue, and would appreciate any tutorials focused on this synth. Nothing definite, any non-obvious sounds/techniques would be interesting.

[@henrycobb9544]

Wow. Thanks so much for this! I have made a lot of patches on my Minilogue but I have never been successful at making a piano style sound. This is a great tutorial!

[@grigalat]

Ordered my minilogue yesterday. So this will be one of the first patches i'll try). Thank u!

[@Packbat]

Was curious about how you would make a Wurlitzer synth sound - thanks for the video!

[@dustincassidy]

Very nice explanation, very easy to follow along.

[@thewistfulsnail]

Absolutely beautiful patch! Thank you for you detailed and well paced explanation

[@sweeneyted]

What a brilliant walkthrough, and what a fantastic result.

[@legoub1]

fire video. Exactly what I was looking for, do more stuff like this, nobody else does.

[@Metamere]

Nice tutorial. Thanks for explaining the reasoning behind it. I was able to make a similar sounding patch using the xd while following along.

Simple and awesome! Nice tone

[@particular_noise]

gonna try this on my prologue

[@Woodhead567]

Really cool and educational!

[@pierrebernasconi1010]

Very cool, thank you for taking the time!

[@dannypmusic_]

Loved this video. Super helpful. Would love to hear dx7 type pianos. Also the everything in it’s right place sound would be cool :)

[@jamesnoellert]

I learned a lot, thank you!

[@kurisuchiinathecrocodile333]

beautiful! thanks

[@ryanmelvey8764]

wow. that sounds amazing!!! im gonna give it a shot on my novation synth... thanks!

[@martinwicker7015]

Which novation do you have? I have a xio and find the velocity settings for a piano sound tricky to use.

[@ryanmelvey8764]

@@martinwicker7015 I have summit. Piano patches are pretty difficult for me too

[@torocruz1192]

Excellent!!! 👍🏽🔥🔥🔥

[@mrdavidacampbell]

Thanks for this! Could you do a tutorial on synthesizing a clavinet sound?

[@dietervdw]

Awesome! Thanks!

[@ronnieaux5290]

Awesome Thank you for sharing! :)

[@TheFreeRadikal]

Great tutorial, thanks, I'd be interested in a classic organ sound tutorial for the Minilogue?

[@Thoracius]

Yeah, organs are no problem. Send me an example of what you consider a classic organ? Here are some of the organs I've done on the Minilogue: kzbin.info/www/bejne/Zn2baIyenJeljsU

[@okgoogleplay3500]

I made a wurlizter sound of my minilogue as well even though it sounds different.

[@michaeldemartino1204]

This was a dope video. I really like the format of it - easy to follow you and great to learn about sound design. Idk if you listen to Tame Impala, but if by CHANCE you do and have any idea how to come up with the sound of the synth in the 2nd half of the song "Posthumous Forgiveness", I'd be super interested in seeing your thought process on recreating a sound like that!!

[@Thoracius]

Thanks! And yeah, I dig Tame Impala, and it would be fun to do a video recreating some of their synth sounds. Are you referring to the lead synth that comes in at 2:43 (there's two different synths hard-panned left and right)? Or a different synth later in the song, like 3:51? (I think the main sound during that part is actually be a guitar with a ton of effects (fuzz, reverb, reverse delay).) Or a different sound?

[@michaeldemartino1204]

@@Thoracius thanks for getting back! I was actually referring to the part at 3:51, but I could see it being guitar now that you say that. Idk why but that sound has always been very appealing to me lol. Very impressed by your skills to identify and recreate sounds! A tame impala video would be so cool too

[@anang7300]

Thank you for the video its really cool to do this with a Minilogue. I had a sound close to your preset but it doesn’t sound really the same. Is it possible that you share the value you’re using on the video or the preset, that way i can compare both.

[@nubeslocas]

Thanks!!

[@Hinge45]

ty mate!

[@akissparaskevopoulos]

Cheers man

[@manunagel2996]

Nice video! It taught me a lot about creating my own patch. What would you recommend when trying to recreate the something about us-daft punk main piano? Thanks in advance

[@Thoracius]

A little bit longer decay. For me it helps if I've got the synth and the song playing back in the same speakers or headphones so I can easily compare back and forth and tweak things to match as closely as I can.

[@manunagel2996]

@@Thoracius Thank you so much!

[@dougie6897]

Have you ever tried to recreate some human voice choir patches ? The Roland JX8 p had an amazing choir preset …. but I could never understand how it was created.

[@Thoracius]

That JX8p "voices" sound is really nice. I think that would be a fun type of sound to do a tutorial for. I've come up with something similar on the minilogue but not as refined: kzbin.info/www/bejne/Zn2baIyenJeljsU Basically you crank up the noise to get the breathy bit. Dial the filter cutoff and crank the resonance to give it a bit of a nasally sound. On the JX8 you can hear there's a pitch envelope so that it slides into the note, like a singer who misses the note and adjusts to hit it. Effects like chorus (or ideally ensemble) and reverb really help sell a choir patch. The JX8 has chorus, huh? The minilogue doesn't have chorus, so you just need to dynamically detune the oscillators to get a similar effect. And of course you need some vibrato, like a singer would have. I'll try to record a tutorial video for it some time soon.

[@dougie6897]

@@Thoracius wow i can’t wait to see that analog human voice video!!

[@deedou4871]

Thank you for the patch Do you think the microkorg XL + is a good investment or the minilogue (XD) is better ? Thank you for all

[@Thoracius]

XL+ has digital waveform (DGWS) options, so basically a handful of built-in digital samples. So, for example, it is capable of things like an acoustic piano. But it does have a digital sound to it whereas I prefer the tone and sound of the minilogues -- an audible difference between digital vs analog, I guess.

[@joeemery5648]

This is so cool. I wanted to do the same thing on an Alesis Micron but have been told this won't work because the Micron is an additive synth? Do you know if there's a way to do the same thing on a Micron?

[@Thoracius]

I don't have a micron but just looking at it it looks like it has all these subtractive synthesis features. Just give it a shot.

[@joeemery5648]

​@@Thoracius I took it to a vintage keyboard shop and sent them your video but they told me it's not the same as the Korg, but I'll check with some other folks on this. It's amazing how quickly you dial in that sound on that Korg.

[@Kilomenjaro]

How to do this on Minilogue XD: VCO1: Square (last octave down and shape at 100 to 175) Cutoff: 500 Resonance: 100 Key track: mid-way Attack: 0 Decay: 700 Sustain: 0 Release: 650 Chorus (optional): Light (Mod Time: 15% Depth: 100%) The rest requires a daw unfortunately, but you can decide how to use these effects... Tremolo Another low pass filter (70% up, idk) Graphic EQ

[@NewKidOnTheBlock100]

nice dude thank you for this

[@Kilomenjaro]

@@NewKidOnTheBlock100 you're welcome! ;3

[@josephwright5921]

I will need to give this a try now

[@digitalsea9147]

Nice buddy, this is the way to explain a patch. You know sometimes you justvwant that patch but don’t wanna listen to someone talk forvan hour. I liked this video but i wish dude would have gave us a big shot of his whole board.

[@digitalsea9147]

Nice buddy, this is the way to explain a patch. You know sometimes you justvwant that patch but don’t wanna listen to someone talk forvan hour. I liked this video but i wish dude would have gave us a big shot of his whole board.

[@zacsmith4629]

why does the keys have a click sound to them?

[@Thoracius]

I guess they're just clicky keys. It's getting picked up by the mic I'm talking into.

[@jackielegs8010]

velocity is kinda shitty on the xd. tough scene.

[@Thoracius]

what don't you like about it?

[@jackielegs8010]

@@Thoracius doesn't really respond well and doesn't really work to the filter. I'm probably just doing something wrong

[@suga4all]

Very good tutorial man! Unbelievable how simplistic it is. Just one OSC. Should be even possible on a Juno. Awesome! 🎶 Just imagine, dialing in an overdrive or a phasor on this! 🔥

[@Thoracius]

Definitely can be applied to most any polyphonic subtractive synth. What happens if you apply overdrive to a square wave? Little to nothing, I'd imagine. A square wave with clipping is still the same square wave.

[@suga4all]

@Thoracius I programmed it on the Rev2 and added some drive to it. It becomes louder, similar to a compressor and a little bit fuzzy. Sounds really good. 🔥🔥 On the Rev2 it is also possible to send noise to the resonance. Sounds super lo-fi vintage. Very simple but effective and versatile patch. Thanks again! 👍