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Sequential Circuits | MultiTrak

Description

Sequential's MultiTrak had everything - for its time - and to this day, it still sounds great! During the era of the Roland Juno synths, Sequential overhauled their programmable little SixTrak analog sequencer synthesizer and came up with the MultiTrak. It's a six voice analog synth with sophisticated filters, envelopes, modulation capabilities and built-in sequencing.

As was the developing trend around this time in the mid-eighties, programming was being streamlined into using the buttons on the matrix keypad to assign parameters to a rotary knob. (The only dedicated knobs are for sequencer volume and speed, chorus depth and rate, master tune and volume.) There are 99 memory patches for your analog sound creations. It also features a nice arpeggiator with hold and transpose functions. But lying at its heart is a sophisticated (for 1985) onboard sequencer. It could store up to four polyphonic sequences with a metronome, 1600 note memory, an overdubbing mode and quantizing (autocorrect) functions, individual track volume and speed controls. Sequences could be chained together and patches could be changed on the fly. Sequences are recorded in real-time (no step-time modes here).

Additional features include MIDI in/out, six separate audio ouptuts (one for each voice) and a stereo output, built-in stereo chorus effect and a 5-octave keyboard with velocity sensitivity and split/layer modes (layer up to six different patch sounds onto one note), stereo chorus, and backup via tape dump.. With an original list price of about $1,500, these days they can be found closer to $300 - a great bargain for classic Sequential sounds with onboard sequencing and patch memory.

BrandSequential Circuits
ModelMultiTrak
DeviceSynth
TypeKeys
Engine TypeAnalog
EngineVCO
Voices (max)6
Multitimbral1
Oscillators1
LFOOne LFO with square / triangle / depth / rate
NoiseY
Engine DetailedOne VCO per voice. Saw / tri / pwm / noise with Tuning and glide
Filter (VCF)cutoff, resonance and key follow + ADSR
Envelope (VCA)3 ADSRs per voice
FXStereo chorus
Memory99 patches
ArpeggiatorArpeggiator (up/down)
Recording1600 note sequencer with quantize and overdub.
ControllersSync pulse IN/OUT
Keys61
Key typeKeys
VelocityY
AftertouchN
MidiI-O
Produced:1985 - 1985
Legend: Obvious Y: Yes, N: No, N/A: Not Applicable
VCO Voltage Controlled Oscillator DCO Digital Controlled Oscillator
LFO Low Frequency Oscillator Sub Sub Oscillator
VCF Voltage Controlled Filter VCA Voltage Controlled Amplifier
Velocity As with a piano, the harder you hit a key, the louder the sound, unlike most organs which always produce the same loudness no matter how hard you hit a key. Aftertouch Pressing a key after you activated it. Channel Aftertouch, no matter which key, it will send a Channel message. Poly Aftertouch, sends the pressure per key instead of the whole channel.
Values for OSC, LFO, Filter, Envelope are per voice unless stated otherwise.

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