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Table Of Contents
422 Appendix Synthesizer Basics
Other Oscillator Waveforms
Waveforms (waves) are named sawtooth, square, pulse, or triangular because of their
shape when displayed as an oscillogram (as in the Sample Editor of Logic Express). This
is the triangular wave:
The triangular wave has few harmonics—which is evident by the fact that is shaped
more like a sine than a sawtooth wave. This wave contains only odd harmonics—which
means no octaves.
Classic synthesizer literature encourages the use of the triangular wave for the creation
of flute-like sounds. In the age of sampling, however, its pretty hard to sell a triangular
wave as a flute sound to anyone.
The screenshot above shows a rectangular wave. The rectangular wave contains all odd
harmonics, the amplitudes of which decrease proportionately with their number. The
pulse width can be set to any value and serves as a modulation address.
Classic synthesizer literature likens the rectangular wave to the sound of a clarinet, as
the clarinet doesn’t feature any even harmonics in a certain frequency range either.