SynthMaster Player

Learning how to sculpt sounds from scratch with the help of synthesizers is a fascinating and challenging endeavor. However, mastering a synth may take you quite a while, so if you want to start creating some music right away, you’re better off making use of its many presets.

If that sounds like a good plan, then you could check out an instrument that was specifically designed for people who prefer using presets rather than creating their own. This is SynthMaster Player.

Created by KV331 Audio, SynthMaster can be considered the little brother of the SynthMaster super-synth and the SynthMaster One wavetable synthesizer. Unlike its complex siblings, Player has a minimum amount of parameters and tweaking capabilities. Instead, it comes with hundreds of well-crafted presets that you can start using right away, and they all sound great.

For this reason, the interface consists of one large preset browser, one section for easy-to-use parameters, and another section for effects. You can quickly find the presets that you’re looking for by using the three main category filters: Instrument Type, Music Style, and Author. The free version comes with only 550 presets, while the full version offers you 1,800.

The “Easy Parameters” section does what its name suggests by allowing you to tweak a few parameters… easily. I can’t tell you much about any of them, because the parameters are different for every preset, but you’ll always find eight knobs and two XY pads in that part of the interface. The effects section can also differ from preset to preset, but it also enables you to switch some of the modulators on and off.

It’s already obvious that SynthMaster Player is a great tool for beginners. While it doesn’t really help you learn the ins and outs of any type of synthesis, it offers you plenty of quality sounds that you can start with, and even the possibility to tweak them a little, depending on your taste.