XILS-Lab PolyKB

The PolyKB is a recreation of a very rare, very powerful polyphonic synthesizer released in the 80's by a french company.

PolyKB Features

The PolyKB is a polyphonic subtractive synthesizer based on two waveform morphing, aliasing free oscillators and a self oscillating 4 poles low pass filter.

The oscillators are responsible for large part of the sound of this synthesizer, but the filter recreating a standard analog chip of the 80's with the help of of very complete modulation section allow the PolyKB to create incredible and warm sounds, from gorgeous bass to a slowly evolving pad, through aggressive leads and crystalline keyboards. Along with a huge range of special effects.

The modulation section of the PolyKB acts like a matrix with five dedicated sources (LFO, ADSR,VCO,NOISE,VELOCITY) and five dedicated destinations (VCO 1 and 2 pitch, VCO 1 and 2 waveform,VCF frequency).

To increase the sound design possibilities, six menus have being added, two for the sources, four for the destination, from which a wide range of modules can be choosen

(Velocity, sequencer ouputs, LFO freq, Filter res, VCO levels, to name but a few)

The PolyKB brings also a very powerful polyphonic sequencer.

The sequencer can record and play 8 voices independently as well as the pitch and the velocity. To control the sequence, a 2 to 128 step clock system allows a wide range of rythms and patterns.

Of course the sequencer outputs can be assigned as a source of modulation, opening up endless sound posibilities.

PolyKB Detailed Features

The PolyKB offers:

two aliasing-free morphing oscillators: from triangle to pulse, through saw.
One 4 poles low pass self oscillating filter
two envelope generators (ADSR)
two MIDI synced LFO
One MIDI synced Sample and Hold
One 128 steps polyphonic sequencer
One arpeggiator
Chorus and delay effects
Mono/Unison/Poly playing mode with up to 16 voices of polyphony
All parameters are MIDI controllable

The PolyKB is available with the following formats:

Mac OSX 10.3.9 and later : VST, Audio Unit, RTAS (Protools 7.0 and later)
Windows XP, Vista and 7 ; VST, RTAS (Protools 7.0 and later)

Minimum system requirements: 1 Gigabyte of RAM and a 2 GHz processor.

The PolyKB is a plug-in and is not yet available in a standalone application.