Modulating gates on synth pads

Gating a pad has long been considered a classic effect. Adding real-time control takes pad-gating to the next level!

- Dave Gale

The ever popular and ubiquitous synth pad is the perfect example of a synth patch that has developed exponentially over its many years of production deployment. Emanating from synthetic string machines, which were one of the few polyphonic devices in use during the early ’70s, it didn’t take long for producers to find ever more ingenious ways of creating pad-like textures.

While the sound of string machines was relatively plain, bolstering their basic tones with modulation effects, such as chorus, substantially thickened the texture. This was often coupled with the use of some form of gating effect; the basic square gate, which effectively switched the sound on and off in tempo, became a popular device, used by everyone from Roxy Music to The Who. As polysynths became more prevalent, the string machine was largely replaced, in favour of patches of more generous scale that could be performed by two oscillators. Despite the initial signal being more substantial in stature, it still invited the use of gating, now with the ability to create, perform or program crescendo and diminuendo effects. This development is available, in no small part, thanks to the complexity of software synths.

Our favoured ZebraCM synth plugin allows the programming of perfect gating effects, which can be controlled using the modulation lever or wheel, in both live or programming scenarios. So, let’s get gating…

Step by step 1. Modulating gates on a pad