FM-1 Workbench

Pads: click or keys 1–9 (Shift = soft). Click a track name or pad to make it active (library + adds voices to it); select a voice chip to shape it with the drum macros (double-click a slider to reset it). Each track can hold several voices: fixed uses the first, cycle steps through them per hit, random picks one. Track length sets polymeter. Shift-drag a step to move it, Alt-drag to copy it (all its settings). Accent = full velocity; Slide = legato into the next note (tie over empty steps). Ringing notes keep their voice when the next voice loads, so tails layer.

Each MIDI channel can get its own library voice (+ in the library adds to the active channel). The FM-1 has one voice at a time, so the player switches voices between notes with parameter diffs — held notes keep their sound. Channel 10 can drive the drum kit from the Drums tab. Marching band gives every part its own FMX engine and voice instead, in the room (FMX's Stage) and on the march.

Every 20 ms of speech becomes one FM-1 note with its own voice: three carriers tuned to the vowel formants (algorithm 22), or feedback noise for hiss. Typed text is stitched from sound units analysed from a text-to-speech voice; a recording is analysed directly. Intonation comes from the grammar: a part-of-speech tagger picks the accented words (nouns strongest, then adjectives, adverbs, verbs; shading shows the strength, hover for details), and each phrase turns on its last accent — falling for statements, rising for yes/no questions and before commas. Noun/verb pairs get their own stress (a REcord / to reCORD). Plays on the FM-1 or on the Software FM-1 (Out menu).

The keyboard (on screen, computer keys) and the MIDI player's melodic channels play in this tuning; drums and speech do not. The FM-1 has no tuning table: each note is sent as the nearest key with its pitch envelope moved in steps of 37.5 cents and, with fine on, the operators' detune moved a few cents. A note keeps what it started with, so chords are in tune too. "Off" in the last column is what is left over. Pitch bend still moves every sounding note.