Mike Carey wrote:

> Has anyone found a synthesizer that can duplicate the sound of a Dutch
> street organ solo section?  I'm talking in terms of the ranks of pipes
> with tremolos (such as some of the flutes, violins, etc.).

Some time ago I wrote a program to allow me to listen to some of the
tunes from Mike Ames' big Mortier dance hall organ.  Mike plays the
Mortier via MIDI.  Of course the MIDI file is just an image of the book
music, so one has to go to some trouble to emulate the organ.  This
includes interpreting the lock & cancel register changes, adjusting the
percussion timing, and handling the Tremolo Flute pipes.

I used a Roland SC-55 Sound Canvas as the output device.  This synth can
be instructed, in real time, to assign varying numbers of sound
generators to different MIDI channels and note ranges.  This makes it
possible to have multiple stops in a given division by simply turning on
more sound generators.  Consequently, it is not necessary to duplicate
the MIDI events to get them to sound on several sound generators.  This
is important because there are sometimes *lots* of events all at once,
and you can only send one MIDI event per millisecond!

Since the Tremolo Flute pipes in a European organ are actually frequency
modulated, I used pitch-wheel changes to vary the frequency in real time.
The SC-55 allows you to tell some of the sound generators to ignore the
pitch wheel, so the pitch wheel can affect only the Tremolo Flute
generators.

The SC-55 is not the perfect device for this project because the
underlying sounds are weighted towards rock-and-roll sounds, and there
consequently aren't a lot of organ pipe sounds.  The results are credible,
however -- certainly good enough for previewing and balancing a new
musical arrangement.

> I'm also curious if anyone has found a synthesizer that can create
> a reiterating xylophone.  I have a Casio CZ-101 synthesizer that can
> produce an excellent-sounding xylophone (great for nickelodeon songs).
> A Casio CZ-1000 is the same as a CZ-101, but with full-sized keys.

This might be a good project for an old '286 computer.  With an MPU-401
sound card and a small-ish "C" program you could receive the MIDI signal
in real-time, convert the xylophone events into multiple-events, and
output the results back out on the MIDI out port.

Jody Kravitz

P.S.  My thanks to Robbie, who's giving me time to spend with my family
and even enough time to respond to some of the messages here.

 [ You're welcome, Jody!  :)
 [
 [ I wrote a little program which makes any channel 1 notes in the Midi
 [ file reiterate while they're on.  I use it mostly for audition of
 [ arrangements which will be played on an instrument with a reiterating
 [ snare drum, because my old synth doesn't create a snare roll sound.
 [ -- Robbie