> Step by step

5. Crafting a bouncy rave bass with u-he Diva

1 Let’s create a classic, bouncy rave bass using u-he’s beastly Diva synth. After dropping the Tutorial Files into a blank 140bpm project, call up Diva on a fresh MIDI track. Start by opening the Presets menu and choosing the Init –

Minipoly preset to reset the synth. Next, set Oscillator 1’s Waveform to Sawtooth and Oscillator 2’s to Square.

2 To give the patch more low weight, tune Oscillator 2 down one octave by setting Range to 16'. We can accent this more by turning Oscillator 1’s Volume down to 42 and Oscillator 2’s Volume up to 100. Now, we can sculpt our sound using Diva’s filter and envelope. Set the Filter type to Multimode for a sharper, brighter sound.

3 After setting the Filter Cutoff and Resonance to around 50, modulate the cutoff with the Amp envelope: select Env 1 from the dropdown box, then set the amount to 50. We can now shape our sound using one envelope. Dial in the Attack, Decay and Release controls to around 15, then increase the Sustain amount to your taste.

4 We’ll finish off by fattening up the sound. First, tweak Oscillator 2’s Detune by around 40 cents to give a richer, detuned tone. Add a little Feedback and Noise to make the sound more organic and less perfect. Finally, setting the Note Priority to Last and Stack to 2 doubles the amount of voices used for a beefier overall signal.