Do you want to make your own electronic music composition?
Do you want to learn to play your favorite electronic song?

Do you want to try something new and amazing?

If so, then the Nord Lead 2X Synthesizer might be just the thing for you!

This is a guide to the Nord Lead, and other synthesizers like it: how to operate them, how they work, and how to create your dream composition with them.

Well, the Nord Lead 2X is part of a series of keyboard-based, virtual analog subtractive synthesizers, manufactured by the Swedish firm Clavia. The Nord Lead's entire design is unique and revolutionary, but it is actually a recent addition to a long line of machines.

The first modern synthesizers (instruments that can copy the sounds of any and all others) appeared in the 60s and 70s. They were giant banks of wires and dials: complicated, expensive, unwieldy, and as a result not very popular. 

It wasn't until the 80s that smaller synthesizers, like the famous Minimoog, became mainstream. The synths up to this point all had at least one thing in common: they used electrical components on a circuit board to create audio signals. This worked decently, but soon these instruments became notorious for the inconsistent, shifting pitches of their notes. Most companies decided to solve this by moving away from this "analog" technology and building advanced digital synthesizers. However, Clavia's Nord series was a step sideways: the Nords are digital synthesizers that mimic the sounds of the old analog ones, but with 100% predictability. This is why the Nord Lead is so renowned today.

The Nord Lead is very easy to set up: just make sure your computer is running compatible software and that you plug everything in the right way. Consult your instructions manual if you don't know where anything goes.

The on/off button on the Nord is located on the rear side, near where the power cable is. From the moment you turn it on for the first time, it is ready to play.

You can try to experiment on the keyboard portion for now. Just like a piano, the higher notes are to your right and the lower ones are to your left. If you want to synthesize a different sound, look to your far left, past the keyboard. There is a small display with a three-digit number, labelled "Program". Below that are four buttons marked A, B, C, and D. To the side of the Program display are two arrow keys, and they can be used to select your program. A, B, C, and D selections will remember the last program that they played, so you can have up to four different sounds ready to go. There are 999 different programs on the Nord Lead, plus an additional few drum kits that are after programs 100, 200, and 300.

If you want to play two or more different programs at once, activate the "keyboard split" function, that is located to the upper left of the program display. This will make the left half of the keyboard play A or B selection, and the right half play C or D. You can choose which one to use by holding down the button.

Also try out the modulation wheel and pitch bend. :)

However, this is great and all but the true magic comes from creating your own sounds. On the Nord, this is done via a subtractive synthesis process.

The Nord Lead uses a system called Subtractive Synthesis - this is pretty standard for mainstream synthesizers, but if you want to know how the Nord Lead works, it is essential to know how Subtractive Synthesis works.

Basically, Subtractive Synthesis means that one rich, harmonic waveform is created, and then various controls remove elements of that waveform to create the optimum sound. The human voice works in this way, too.

The Nord Lead and many of its counterparts use four modules to do this - 

Oscillator

Filter

Amplifier

LFO (Low Frequency Oscillator)

The Oscillator creates a sound, that can be processed in a number of ways by the Filter, and is then sent to the Amplifier, where the volume of the sound is controlled. The LFO's purpose is to modify the sound by generating a low-frequency backing wave pattern.

As mentioned, the Oscillator's role is to create one continuous, harmonic wave form that can be easily modified. In the picture of the Nord Lead's controls area, the Oscillator is bounded in orange.

Inside this orange box, you will see five dials and four buttons. The Nord Lead's total oscillator component is itself split into three parts; OSC1, OSC2, and their combination. There are two basic elements to an oscillator: waveform and pitch. Both OSC1 and OSC2 have an independent waveform, but OSC2 has more features in the way of pitch control. I encourage you to experiment with different waves, pitches, and mixes to see what sounds the best to you.

The purpose of the Filter is to "filter out" the excess sounds that the oscillator is making, to create just the right harmony. In the picture of the Nord Lead, the Filter is bounded in blue.

On the right of the filter is a selection of "Filter type". This is the choice between high pass and low pass - i.e. whether everything higher or lower than the "cutoff point" will be deleted. On the lower left of the box are the dials for frequency and resonance, which can drastically change the sounds of the oscillator.

The Filter also features an envelope, which is also known by the letters ADSR, meaning Attack Decay Sustain Release. The envelope is cool because it controls the shape of the effects of the filter on the note. This is another fun specification to play around with.

There isn't much to say about the amplifier except that it controls the volume. Nothing complicated. However, note that the amplifier includes an envelope modulation as well - this controls the shape of the note's volume. Simple, yet very powerful

The amplifier has the fewest controls of any of the segments, and it doesn't need any more. It is highlighted with the color green.

Finally, we have the LFO, which I grouped together with some other minor functions with the pink box. The LFO is very similar to the regular oscillator, but rather than transmitting sounds, it transmits values that further modify the sound. These low-frequency values cannot be heard on their own but their effect on the oscillator's output can be heard. To give you a better idea of what the LFO is, know that dubstep music relies heavily on it.

Now, there are other types of modulation that are present on the Nord, and there are certainly more functions, but I won't get into them for now because they are not essential. 

Instead, I'm going to finish up with some examples of Nord music that other people have created. Use this as inspiration. :)

Additionally, here is something I created with the Nord Lead on my first day, just experimenting. At this stage, I had absolutely no idea what I was doing and the note sounds terrible!

And here is what I created later on:

I hope that you liked this guide and that you learned something. Remember that if you can understand how your machine works, it will be much quicker and easier to both program the sounds out of your head, and to analyze and recreate some cool sounds that other musicians have created.

You can't get good in one day, but as the saying goes: practice makes perfect.

Experiment with every function of your Nord Lead 2X and you will eventually become a professional - and have a lot of fun in the process!