FIRST LOVE is the first instrument from Reykjavík-based LOVE Synthesizers: a standalone, polyphonic and multitimbral FM synthesizer built around a 7" touchscreen, hardware knobs, buttons and pressure-sensitive pads. It is designed for players who find FM programming hard to approach. It is quick to start with and still has plenty of depth, and it runs without a computer.
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Four FM parts: each part is a 4-operator FM engine with user-definable algorithms. You draw the operator connections directly on the touchscreen.
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Wave shaping on every operator: sine operators pass through a wavefolder and a sine-to-square shaper before modulating, so you can build FM, additive and hybrid tones.
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Multitimbral play: up to four timbres at once, each polyphonic or monophonic. Each part can have its own MIDI channel, or the parts can be stacked into one patch.
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MIDI looper and riff arpeggiator: a 4x4 looper for creating, overdubbing, multiplying, bouncing and merging loops, played free or quantized to a backbeat.
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Microtonal tuner: up to 256 user scales, quantized or freely tuned.
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Portable: built-in stereo speakers and optional operation on four lithium batteries.
A central waveform on the screen morphs between the four timbres in real time. Morphing envelopes, a flexible modulation matrix and an effects section with reverb, delay, chorus, freezer, bit-cruncher and flanger handle further sound shaping. The four L-O-V-E knobs give hands-on control alongside the touch interface.
For performance, you can play the pads, the touchscreen and the looper at the same time. The riff arpeggiator sequences notes and rests in any order at an adjustable rate. Connections include stereo or separate mono outputs, MIDI DIN in and thru, sync in and out, and USB-C. The synth ships with the FIRST LOVE JAM patch collection from invited artists. FIRST LOVE won the Sonicstate Best Innovation award at Superbooth 2024.