The Hamamatsu Tines shell-voicing figure on the Moog Muse

The technique

Two notes a chord: the third and the seventh, and nothing else. The root is the bass player’s, and on a tine a root in the right hand only doubles it. The fifth is in every chord here and tells you nothing about which one is sounding. Those two notes are the chord’s quality, and they are enough.

Four chords, a bar each: a major seventh on I, minor sevenths on vi and ii, and a dominant seventh on V. In the key’s degrees the pairs are the third and the seventh, then the fifth and the root, then the fourth and the root, then the fourth and the seventh.

Turn the pair over as you go. The third is on the bottom for the first chord, the seventh for the second, the third for the third, the seventh for the last. Do that and the hand barely moves: the top rises a semitone, holds, and falls back, and the bottom rises a minor third, falls a tone and holds. It works because each chord’s seventh is a step from a note of the next pair, and turning the pair over lets the hand take that step. Keep the third on the bottom every time and both notes leap at every change, even placed as close as they go: down a major third, up a fourth, then up a tritone and a fourth.

The last pair is a tritone, the key’s fourth under its seventh. It is the one interval that says dominant by itself, and on the repeat the fourth falls a semitone to the third and the chord is home. That is the whole cadence in one voice.

Two strikes a bar, on one and on three, and hold each until the next. The pair lands with the bass, not after it: the root and the shell together are the chord, and apart they are two fragments.

Never play the key’s fourth while the first chord is sounding. It sits a semitone above the third the shell is built on, and on a held tine it rubs for the whole bar. Over the last two chords the same note is in the shell.

Let every pair ring into the next. The sound has a long tail and the figure is written for it; a short release turns a ballad into a study.

read in

The chords

4 chords over 4 bars, in Eb major.

Degree	Chord	Notes	Bars	Under the figure
I	Eb	Eb · G · Bb	1–1	●
vi	Cm	C · Eb · G	2–2	●
ii	Fm	F · Ab · C	3–3	●
V	Bb	Bb · D · F	4–4	●

The figure is played over these chords; supply them separately if your rig allows.

The rules

Over I, never the 4th — it sits a semitone above the third the shell is built on, and a tine holds it there.

The notes

4 bars in Eb major. Each note is in force across the steps shown.

steps 1–8·over I Eb·G4 D5·degrees 3 7·MIDI 67 74
steps 9–16·over I Eb·G4 D5·degrees 3 7·MIDI 67 74
steps 17–24·over vi Cm·Bb4 Eb5·degrees 5 1·MIDI 70 75
steps 25–32·over vi Cm·Bb4 Eb5·degrees 5 1·MIDI 70 75
steps 33–40·over ii Fm·Ab4 Eb5·degrees 4 1·MIDI 68 75
steps 41–48·over ii Fm·Ab4 Eb5·degrees 4 1·MIDI 68 75
steps 49–56·over V Bb·Ab4 D5·degrees 4 7·MIDI 68 74
steps 57–64·over V Bb·Ab4 D5·degrees 4 7·MIDI 68 74

The grid

Every step below strikes the note in force at that point. The grid is where the figure is played.

1 x··· ···· x··· ····

17 x··· ···· x··· ····

33 x··· ···· x··· ····

49 x··· ···· x··· ····

—1, 17, 33, 49 (all vel 96)
—9, 25, 41, 57

On the Moog Muse

Muse · Timbre 1

Settings for this voice

Settings for a stab · bright voice on this box, written here. They are not the preset’s own values: load the preset to hear it as it ships.

Settings

VOICE CONTROL

UNISONOFF
Stacks every unused voice onto the first note held, so the timbre plays one note at a time
MONOOFF
DETUNE20%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 92
Between voices when poly, between stacked voices under UNISON, between the two oscillators under MONO
TIMBRE A VOICE COUNT8(0…8)
The counts always sum to eight, so setting this sets the other — TIMBRE B gets the rest
VOICE CONTROL, then MORE
DYNAMIC VOICE ALLOCATIONOFF
Its printed default. On, a busy timbre steals from the other and the count above stops holding
VOICE CONTROL, then MORE

PROGRAMMER

MIDI IN CHANNEL1
TIMBRE A listens here
PROGRAMMER, MENU, MIDI
MULTI IN B CHANNEL2
TIMBRE B listens here under MULTI MODE. Both default to 1, so this must differ or the two timbres double on one channel
PROGRAMMER, MENU, MIDI
RECIEVE CCON
Defaults to OFF, so the box ignores CC until this is set. The manual's spelling
PROGRAMMER, MENU, MIDI

OSC 1

OCTAVE4'
FREQUENCY0st(-7…7 st)
Bipolar, in tune at noon; a perfect fifth either way
TRI/SAW0%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 46
Triangle fully counter-clockwise, sawtooth fully clockwise
PULSE WIDTH30%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 47
A square wave sits at noon
WAVE MIX100%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 48
The slider: triangle/sawtooth on the left against the pulse wave on the right

OSC 2

OCTAVE4'
FREQUENCY0st(-7…7 st)
TRI/SAW0%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 51
PULSE WIDTH35%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 52
WAVE MIX100%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 53
SYNC 2▸1OFF
Locks oscillator 2 to the phase of oscillator 1

MOD OSC

AUDIOOFF
Sub-audio: eight per-voice LFOs, one for each voice
WAVEFORMSINE
FREQUENCY30%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 25
The range of this knob differs with the AUDIO button above
PITCH AMOUNT0%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 31
PITCH ▸ OSC 1OFF
PITCH ▸ OSC 2OFF
FILTER AMOUNT20%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 39
FILTER ▸ 1OFF
FILTER ▸ 2ON

MIXER

OSC 185%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 58
RING MOD0%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 60
Sum and difference tones of the two oscillators — inharmonic as they detune
OSC 285%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 59
MOD OSC10%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 61
NOISE0%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 62
White noise
OVERLOAD0%(0…100 %)
OVERLOAD RANGELOW
LOW narrows the drive range for finer control
Press MORE in that section

FILTER

ORDERPAR
SERIAL, STEREO or PARALLEL — with HIGH PASS this decides bandpass, stereo lowpass or notch
LINK FILTERSOFF
Off, so FILTER 1 CUTOFF is an absolute cutoff rather than the spacing between the two

FILTER 1

HIGH PASSON
Highpass: the knob is fully open counter-clockwise, the opposite of lowpass
CUTOFF150Hz(20…20000 Hz)· MIDI CC 67
RESONANCE25%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 68
Self-oscillates into a sine fully clockwise
ENVELOPE AMOUNT0(-100…100)· MIDI CC 69
Bipolar, no modulation at noon
KB TRACKING1:1

FILTER 2

CUTOFF8000Hz(20…20000 Hz)· MIDI CC 72
RESONANCE30%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 73
ENVELOPE AMOUNT50(-100…100)· MIDI CC 75
Bipolar, no modulation at noon
KB TRACKING1:1

FILTER ENV

ATTACK0s(0…10 s)· MIDI CC 79
DECAY0.4s(0…10 s)· MIDI CC 80
SUSTAIN0%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 81
RELEASE0.3s(0…10 s)· MIDI CC 82
LOOPOFF
Looping, the envelope runs like an LFO

VCA ENV

ATTACK0s(0…10 s)· MIDI CC 86
DECAY0.4s(0…10 s)· MIDI CC 87
SUSTAIN0%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 88
RELEASE0.2s(0…10 s)· MIDI CC 89
VELOCITYON

VCA

LEVEL80%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 7
Light TIMBRE A or B first
PAN0(0…100)· MIDI CC 10
Bipolar, centred at noon — the screen reads 100L through 0 to 100R
PAN SPREAD45%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 9
All voices sit at the PAN position fully counter-clockwise
PAN SPRD MODEL/R
Press MORE in that section

DELAY

CLOCK SYNCON
Both TIME knobs jump between divisions of the global TEMPO
SYNC TYPECOMBO
Its printed default — every division rather than only straight, triplet or dotted ones
Press MORE in that section
LINK DELAYSOFF
Off, so TIME-L is the left delay time rather than an offset against the right
TIME - L1/8· MIDI CC 93
Straight, against the dotted right
TIME - R1/8 D· MIDI CC 94
Dotted, so its repeat falls between the left one’s
FEEDBACK40%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 103
Single repeat through to infinite
CHARACTER50%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 104
Noon, where the default DJ-style filter on the repeats is doing nothing
MIX30%(0…100 %)· MIDI CC 105
TIMBRE A / TIMBRE BON
Two separate buttons, one per timbre — engage the one for the timbre this part is on. Disengaged, this part bypasses the delay on a fully analog path

This block draws on the Muse User's Manual v1.4.0, pp.27-111 and the instrument at firmware 1.4.0; its values are starting points.