Chapter 9: Adding Harmonies In A Specific Key (The Synth Harmonist); About The Harmonist - Roland GR-30 Manual

Chapter 9: Adding Harmonies in a Specific Key
The GR-30 lets you use the "TRANS 1ST (2ND)" set-
ting (p. 34) to shift the pitch of the first and second
tones in parallel to the guitar notes, creating a harmo-
ny effect.
However, if you want to obtain harmonies that are
more musical, it's necessary to vary the differences in
pitch between two parts according to the key of the
song and the scale being played.

About the Harmonist

Let's take a look at how Harmonist is put together,
and compare it with the Transpose function.
The differences in the results of these two methods
are shown by the arrows in the figure.
The harmonies produced are areas by parallel trans-
position may feel unnatural. The position on the scale
where this problem occurs depends on the key,
whether the key is major or minor, the interval
between the main melodic line and the harmony, and
so on.
The GR-30's Harmonist uses information such as the
key that is already set for a patch to adjust the interval
between the guitar sound and synth sound (or
between first and second tones), creating melodious
harmonies.
The GR-30's Harmonist also fully supports chord
play. This means that complex chords can be created
just by playing a simple three-note chord, greatly
reducing the chances of fingering mistakes during
rough performances with no muting.
64
Transpose
Transposed note
Normal note
Harmonist
Harmony note
Normal note
(The Synth Harmonist)
This is achieved by the GR-30's Synth Harmonist
function, also known as "Harmonist."
By setting the key of the melody being played to a
patch, you can create beautiful harmonies by adding
synth sounds to guitar sounds (or to other synth
sounds).
The sample score shown below compares the effects
of the Transpose function and Harmonist when play-
ing the scale in the key of C.
<<fig. 9-1>>
The GR-30's Harmonist lets you make settings for the
following four items.
ON/OFF
This toggles Harmonist on and off (p. 65, selected
with pedal 4).
"harmony SEL" (Harmony Select, p. 66)
This sets which tone is the harmony.
"h-style" (Harmony Style, p. 66)
This sets the interval between the main melodic
line and the harmony.
"h-key" (Harmony Key, p. 68)
This sets the key and the major or minor aspect of
the melody that is played.
"h-remote" (Harmony Remote, p. 69)
This allows the function of the key-setting using
an external MIDI pedal to be toggled on and off .