How to Make Your Sound Sing with Vocoders
Pages: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Speech, Speech!

Human listeners relate strongly to the sound of the voice—not surprising, really. The vocoder is only one of the tools with which we can create high-tech hybrids of human and machine sounds. (Granular synthesis, in which a spoken phrase is broken up into tiny "sound grains," is another.) Filtered, ring-modulated, and pitch-shifted voices offer further opportunities for creating effects that are emotionally affecting, yet exotic. If you're looking for a way to give your music a new dimension, vocal processing would be a great place to start.

Vocoder Links

Websites

Software Vocoders

Hardware Vocoders

Roland VP-550 Vocal Processor Keyboard

The Roland VP-550 packs vocoding, harmonizing, and other handy vocal effects into a simple interface. (Click to enlarge.)

Famous Vocoder Songs

Pop artists have been coaxing evocative sounds out of vocoders for decades. (Check out this 1947 recording called "Sparky's Magic Piano.") Until recently, Wikipedia had an extensive list of vocoder songs, but then some contributors complained that lists don't belong in an encyclopedia and deleted it. Fortunately, you can read Google's cached version here.

Following are links to audio clips of more interesting vocoder songs. All go to the iTunes Music Store unless noted.

Not Vocoder

Some of the classic sounds people think are vocoded, such as Peter Frampton's "Do You Feel Like We Do," were actually made with a talkbox, a small speaker connected to a hose that the performer sticks in his mouth. Here are a few other talkbox hits:

Bad Vocoder

Of course, powerful tools can be abused as well. Neil Young's Trans album was so swamped in vocoded vocals that his record company sued him. Here's an even more abrasive example:

  • 8kHz Mono (click the "S" button for sounds)
…and a really annoying disco podcast with wall-to-wall vocoder:

—David Battino

Jim Aikin writes about music technology for a variety of publications and websites. His most recent books are Power Tools for Synthesizer Programming and Chords & Harmony.

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