Beehive

Beehive from After Later Audio is a smaller version of the legendary Plaits and strikes a good balance between size and playability.

Beehive offers four good-sized pots on slim 8te and the full functionality of Plaits. It delivers 16 forms of synthesis, each editable in three parameters. CV inputs allow for a variety of modulations. True to its predecessor, it is even possible to jump back and forth between synthesis shapes. On top of that, a low-pass gate and a mod envelope have been implemented. Wildly clanging “Richard Devine drums” are therefore already possible with this module alone.

The synthesis forms of the Beehive, called models, are divided into two banks of eight algorithms each:

• Bank 1: Models for tonally playable sounds.
• Bank 2: models for noisy sounds and drums

(A listing of the synthesis algorithms can be found below).

For tuning the Beehive, a coarse potentiometer is provided whose control range can be varied. More precisely, ranges from 14 semitones to eight octaves are feasible.

Each synthesis algorithm can be edited by means of timbre, morph and harmonics potentiometers. The operation of the parameters varies depending on the selected program. Simplified, the whole thing can be described as follows:

• Timbre: Influences the spectral content of sounds. – Should your sound be dark and thin or bright and massive?
• Morph: Serves timbre variations.
• Harmonics: Controls frequency spreads or the ratio of different components of a sound program.

Complementing the 1V/octave input, which allows Beehive to be played over a range of eight octaves, is a trigger jack. Incoming signals trigger the integrated decay envelope, exciting physical and percussive sound programs, and activate the low-pass gate. Alternatively, the LPG can be controlled via level CV input. Response and decay are editable.

Frequency, timbre and morph can be influenced by CV inputs with bipolar attenuators. If no external modulator is connected, the internal decay envelope is used. Harmonics parameters and synthesis algorithm selection are also voltage controllable, but there are no attenuators and no normalization to the mod envelope here. If the trigger input is busy, Beehive switches between sound models only once per attack. Very cool for IDM drums.

In addition to the main output, there is also an aux audio tap. At it, depending on the selected sound program, either a by-product, an addition such as a sub-oscillator signal, or a variation of the set sound is output.

The synthesis forms of the Beehive at a glance:

• Classic waveforms: Two VA waves that can be detuned against each other, following the analog model.
• Waveshaping oscillator: An asymmetrical triangle is processed by wave shaper and wave folder.
• Two-operator FM: Two sine wave oscillators connected as modulator and carrier plus feedback.
• Granular formant oscillator: Simulation of formants and filtered waveforms by multiplication, addition and synchronization of sine wave segments.
• Harmonic Oscillator: Additive program that uses harmonically related sine waves.
• Wavetable Oscillator: Four banks of eight by eight waveforms accessed by rows and columns, with or without interpolation.
• Chords: Generates chords with four notes played by VA or wavetable algorithm.
• Speech synthesis: A set of vowel and speech algorithms.
• Granular Cloud: A sawtooth swarm consisting of eight envelope-equipped oscillators.
• Filtered Noise: White noise with variable clocking, processed by a resonant multimode filter.
• Particle noise: Digital noise processed by an all-pass or band-pass network.
  Discordant string modeling
• Modal resonator bank: A resonator excited by trigger input or particle noise. – Quasi mini rings.
• Analog bass drum model
• Analog snare drum model
• Analog hi-hat model

Beehive has incorporated the Jakplugg PCB, based on the design by Émelie Gillet.