A to C
Amp Mod. The button that decides whether the envelope shapes the volume. Off, the key opens the amplifier like a switch. Envelope lesson.
Arpeggiator. Plays the notes you hold one after another as a pattern. Arp lesson.
Assign. One of three matrix columns whose target you choose by holding the button and turning a knob. Assign lesson.
Attack. How long a note takes to reach full level after you touch a key.
Band-pass. A filter that lets through only a band around the cutoff.
Category. A label a sound carries (Bass, Lead, Pad and so on) to help you find it.
Chord mode. Store a chord of your own, then play it from every key. Unison and Chords.
Cutoff. The frequency where the filter starts to cut. Filter lesson.
Cycling envelope. A second envelope with its own knobs that can repeat like an LFO. Cycling envelope lesson.
D to L
Decay. How long the level takes to fall from its peak to the sustain level. On the MicroFreak, the same knob also sets release.
Dice. A touch-strip function that rolls a new random variation of an arp or sequence. Spice and Dice.
Engine. One of the oscillator types selected with the Type knob.
Envelope. How a value changes over the life of a note: attack, decay, sustain, release. Envelope lesson.
Filter. Removes part of a sound’s frequencies. The MicroFreak’s is analog, 12 dB per octave.
Gate. The signal that says a key is down.
Glide. Sliding the pitch from one note to the next, also called portamento.
Grain. A tiny slice of a sample, used by the granular engines. Grains lesson.
Hold. Latches the notes you are holding so they keep sounding. In sequencer mode it becomes Tie / Rest.
Init. The blank starting sound.
LFO. Low frequency oscillator: a wave usually too slow to hear as a note, used to move other controls. LFO lesson.
M to R
MIDI Control Center. Arturia’s free computer app for firmware updates, samples, wavetables and backups.
Modulation. One control moving another automatically. Matrix lesson.
Mono, paraphonic, polyphonic. One note at a time; several notes through one shared filter; several notes each with their own filter. The MicroFreak is mono or paraphonic. Voices lesson.
Oscillator. The part that makes the raw sound. The MicroFreak’s is digital.
Pressure. Finger pressure on a key, or its velocity, depending on the Press setting. A matrix source called Press.
Quantize. Snapping notes to a scale (or, in a DAW, to the beat). The MicroFreak’s Scale setting does the first. Scales lesson.
Resonance. Boosts the sound at the filter’s cutoff; at the extreme it whistles. Filter lesson.
S to W
Sample. A recording the synth plays back. Firmware 5 added four sample-based engines. Samples lesson.
Shift. The button that gives many controls a second job, printed in blue.
Spice. A touch-strip function that morphs an arp or sequence’s rhythm away from normal. Spice and Dice.
Sustain. The level a note holds at while you keep the key down.
Sync. Locking a speed to the tempo, with note divisions instead of hertz.
Unison. Stacking voices on one note, slightly detuned, for a thick sound. Unison lesson.
Vocoder. An engine that shapes the synth’s sound with a microphone input. Vocoder lesson.
Wavetable. A set of waveforms the oscillator can morph between.