Direction of legato for mono instruments

[michaelduffmusic]

Hey guys, brand new to the forum, and I'm sorry if this is a stupid question, but is there a reason in Analog Lab mono instruments that if you hold a note, only lower notes will sound upon subsequent presses and not higher notes? Is this how the modeled synths were built or is this an issue on my end? I'm using Ableton Live and the keylab49 mkii, but analog lab is the only instrument this happens with so I figured it's an issue (or feature? one I can't say I enjoy) with this.

[LBH]

Hi and welcome to Arturia forums.

You can't control note priority in Analog Lab without owning the full applications, and then you can only change it in the applications that have this parameter added, and that's in many.

Note priority is a normal authentic behavior and it's different from synth to synth.

In example in the original vintage hardware minimoog the note priority is LOW. This can be changed in Arturias version to LOW, HIGH and LAST note priority.
In the original vintage hardware ARP 2600 the note priority is HIGH, and that's actually a fault in Arturias ARP 2600 that it have LOW note priority, and that this unfortunately can't be changed. But it has been requested to add LOW, HIGH and LAST priority note priority to ARP 2600.
And yes having this would be great for all applications that use some kind of note priority with or without retrigger. But keep in mind, that note priority is'nt a fault or an issue, but something the original vintage synths have, and that even modern synths have a parameter for.

Note priority is also something players can use.
If you don't like it, then don't buy original vintage hardware synths with a note priority, that you don't wan't. (Many modern versions of vintage hardware synths have added a LOW, HIGH and  LAST note priority parameter, and also many modern synths have this.)
And if you wan't to be able to change note priority in the Arturia applications where it's possible, then get the full applications. It's a part of a presets programming. That's status.

[gphantom]

There are articles regarding monophonic synthesizers that explained these behaviours.  The MOOG MODULAR has (if I remember) a Low note priority while others have a high note.  The reason is due to hardware limitations.  In standard electronics, you can suppose that each key is tied to a resistor which defines it's note.  If you press one key, you might have a 1100 ohm resistor tied to a capacitor which might generate a 1000hz note while another key would use a 2400 ohm resistor which would generate a 4000hz note.  In a really simple device, if you were to press both keys at the same time, you would generate the equivalent of a 1750 ohm resistor which might give you a 2200hz note (simple electronics resistor calculations.)

However, synthesizers are a bit more complex and so they had to decide how multiple keypresses would behave so that one would have priority over the other.  Of course, they could have turned off all keys if that were to happen (and in some cases, that would be great to teach keyboard playing which would force you NOT to press more than a key at a time, like a manual typewriter.)

In polyphonic synthesizers (which are mostly digital since you can easilly synthesize polyphonic sounds - Like a telephone which generates dual tones in a matrix or 4 x 4 tones which creates overtones which are decoded by phase-lock-loop circuits to reconstruct the 4x4 grid on the other end.)
In one polyphonic analog synthesizer, it has a high frequency tone which is sub-divided by each key so that one key passes one of the sub-frequencies while another would pass yet another sub frequency tone which are then combined in a mixer to create polyphonic sound.

At least, these are simplistic explanations which should clarify how synthesizers (both Mono and Poly phonic) works.