Now lets look at creating a snare to go with the analogue kick. The snare circuits found in classic drum machines aren’t overly complex but they have a very specific set of features that can be difficult to recreate with a standard subtractive synth.

There are two distinct elements to the sound: the initial, short, somewhat pitched, “snap” and “poing” of the drum itself, and the noisy rattle of the snare springs that continues longer than the initial part of the sound. What makes this tricky is that we need multiple envelopes to control these elements, and that each element benefits from a different type of filtering to the other. It’s nothing BLEASS Megalit can’t handle, though.

Start by loading the Default patch. We’ll use the noise generator to create the rattle of the snare’s springs, so increase the GAIN of Megalit’s NOISE section, and tune its tone using the dedicated HIGH PASS and LOW PASS filters.

The snare rattle is typically the longest part of the sound, so shape its volume using the main AMPLITUDE envelope: fast attack, and a quick decay to a sustain level of zero. It’s a good idea to set the release time to match the decay time so that you get the same result however you trigger the sound. Also, give the sound some dynamics by increasing the envelope’s VELOCITY fader.

For the pitched element of the sound we’ll use Megalit’s first two oscillators. Ensure the Basic wavetable is loaded into both OSC 1 and OSC 2, then use the wavetable position faders to set OSC 1 to a triangle wave and OSC 2 to a sawtooth wave. Decide what note (or notes) you will use to trigger the snare, then turn up OSC 1’s GAIN, start playing your chosen note, and adjust the oscillator’s OCTAVE, TUNE and FINE controls until the sound’s pitch is close to what you want for your snare drum.

Increase OSC 2’s GAIN to bring it into the sound, and use its OCTAVE, TUNE and FINE controls to complement OSC 1. Typically the tuning of the two oscillators should result in a dissonant sound, and we can enhance this further by applying frequency modulation to the oscillators. For this, switch to Megalit’s GENERAL tab, enable FM for the two oscillators, turn up the FM AMOUNT, and explore the impact of the various FM parameters.

We’ll use an assignable envelope to create the characteristic “poing” of the snare. Go to ENVELOPE GENERATOR 1 (under the MODULATION 1 tab), create a very snappy envelope with instant attack and very fast decay (again, set the release time to match), and assign this envelope to control the synth’s master PITCH. Increase the AMOUNT, and adjust the envelope decay time, until you get an effect that you like.

Next we need a short, fast envelope to reduce the decay time of the oscillators so that they are shorter than the noise/rattle element of the sound. We can use ENVELOPE GENERATOR 2 for this. Create a short, snappy drum-like envelope, and assign this to both OSC 1 GAIN and OSC 2 GAIN, with an AMOUNT of 100% for both destinations. Return to the oscillators and reduce their GAIN so that the envelope can do its thing (the envelope adds to the gain, so if set too high the effect will be lost). Bear in mind that the volume of the oscillators is already being shaped by the main AMPLITUDE envelope, so the two envelopes will interact and affect each other.

Now for some filtering. Switch to the FILTER tab and, under GENERAL, select the second ALGORITHM option. Doing this allows us to apply different filtering to the noise and pitched parts of the sound.

Enable HIGH PASS filtering on OSC 3 + NOISE and LOW PASS filtering on OSC 1 + OSC 2. Adjust the cutoff and resonance of both filters, listening to how they affect the sound, and hone-in on a sound that you like. You may find it easier to disable one filter whilst setting the other, as this makes the filter visualisation easier to read. Also, use the FILTERS ENVELOPE to create another snappy, percussive envelope, and experiment with applying this to both filters.

Finally, go through all of the settings, tweaking them and honing-in on the desired sound. Notice how there are many different ways to adjust the character of the sound, and that small changes can have a big impact, so be experimental.