BasicSynth

Basic Synthesis

We can make a basic synthesizer out of an oscillator and an envelope.

Oscillator

As our oscillator source, let's use an OmniOscillator.

var osc = new Tone.OmniOscillator();

If we set the frequency of the oscillator to our desired notes, and starting and stopping it, we have a crude synthesizer.

osc.frequency.value = "C4";
osc.start().stop("+8n");

We have limited flexibility in terms of the timbre of our synthesizer, and we'll get a harsh click whenever a note is triggered.

Envelope

The trick to getting rid of the click is to apply an envelope to amplitude of the oscillator. Tone has a specific envelope type for doing this called Tone.AmplitudeEnvelope.

Let's connect our oscillator to the envelope and the envelope to the master output.

var env = new Tone.AmplitudeEnvelope();
osc.connect(env);
env.toMaster();

Start the oscillator, but there won't be any sound until you trigger the attack of the envelope

osc.start();
env.triggerAttack();

Read more about using envelopes here.

##SimpleSynth

Tone.SimpleSynth combines an OmniOscillator and an AmplitudeEnvelope just like we did above, into a convenient package.

Portamento

SimpleSynth also exposes a portamento value. Portamento is the amount of time it takes to slide from one frequency to the next.

Play around with all of SimpleSynth's attributes here.