Making an FM8 Growl Synth – Part 5

Welcome back to the fifth and final tutorial of the FM8 Growl series. This tutorial will demonstrate how to improve the FM8 Growl by using a Formant Waveform to modulate other Operators. Formants are a vital part of the human speech frequency spectrum, thus it is only natural that Formants would play a vital role in providing the vocal characteristics of the FM8 Growl.

Start out by activating and assigning Operators F, E, and B with a 10th Formant Waveform. These Operators should be routed to the output of the FM8 Growl via the FM Matrix. Next, activate and assign Operator D with a PWM Ramp Mod, and activate and assign Operator C with a Sawtooth. Activate the Noise/Saturator (Operator X) and the Filter (Operator Z), and route them to the FM8 output. Make sure to enable Key Sync on all Operators.

Inside the FM Matrix, route Operator D to modulate Operator E. Operator E should be routed to modulate the Filter (Operator Z), Operator F, and Operator B. Operators C and F should also be routed to modulate the Filter (Operator Z), and the Filter (Operator Z) should be routed to modulate the Noise/Saturator (Operator X). Make sure that Operators B, E, F, X, and Z are all feeding the output of the FM8 Growl.

Now that we are done routing inside the FM Matrix, all that is left to do is map the Cutoff, Spread, Resonance and Mode parameters to a macro inside your chosen DAW. The FM8 Growl relies heavily on the constant change of the parameters. Without their manipulation you will not be able to reproduce the vowel like sounds that are so desired. It is important to map these to a MIDI controller or to automate the parameter change so that the vocal characteristics of the FM8 Growl really come to life.