who goes there

16 HP · quantizer

A quantizer that takes on what it hears. Patch the band into AUDIO and four CVs that know nothing about music come out on its notes: in its key, or only on the chord it's playing now, following it when the chord changes.

The WHO GOES THERE panel: black, with a sled dog's face in gold dots, its ears up either side of a ring of twelve small round lights of bare circuit board round the big knob TAKE, a short tick inside each, its pale eyes either side of the JUMP jack. AUDIO and TEST at the top corners, the TEST button under the name, IN 1 to IN 4 down the sides, OUT 1 to OUT 4 below them with a small round light beside each, MEMORY at the foot of the middle. who goes there at the top, daylight noise at the bottom.

Turn a knob: drag it, roll the wheel over it or use the arrow keys; a double click puts it back. TEST is a button to press. The patches step on by themselves until you touch anything.

The hearing, the ring and the notes are WHO GOES THERE's own. The band, the drums, the four CVs and the bells playing its outs are made in the page as you listen.

example patches

The hearing, the ring, the notes and every out here are WHO GOES THERE's engine as it's designed, running in your browser. The band, the drums, the CVs, the bells and the hand on MEMORY are a stand-in for the rest of a rack.

What it hears

Patch in the band: the mix, a pad or a bass. It hears which notes are sounding, folded into the twelve note names, and keeps a running profile of them. The ring round TAKE shows it: twelve lights, one a note, C at the top, each lit by how much its note is heard. The notes it has taken on hold steady; the rest stay dim.

AUDIO: the band, up to ±5 V.
MEMORY: how far back it listens, from a beat (it follows every chord) to a minute (it settles into the key).

Taking on

Four CVs come in and go out on the notes it has taken on, 1 V/oct. A CV sitting between two notes holds one of them and doesn't chatter. The tick inside the ring lights where each channel is.

TAKE: at 0 the CVs pass through untouched. Turned up, it pulls them onto semitones, then onto the key it hears, and at full onto only the chord it's playing now.
IN 1 to IN 4, OUT 1 to OUT 4: each CV on the nearest note it may land on.
Leave IN 2, IN 3 and IN 4 empty and they follow IN 1, each the next note of the chord up, so one CV plays a four-note voicing.

The test

Each channel's note is checked against what's sounding right then. One that doesn't belong jumps: its out leaps an octave and falls back, and the light beside it flashes red. One that belongs doesn't move. Send TEST a bar's clock and the voices that clash with the chord become accents.

TEST: the button, and a trigger in. The test, now.
JUMP: a gate when any channel jumps.