Combine Stage, Booster Stage, Hostage, and Upstage modules to generate complex, interesting, multi-stage envelopes.

Here are some common envelope types:

• AR: Attack-Release Envelopes
• AHR: Attack-Hold-Release Envelopes
• ADHR: Attack-Decay-Hold-Relase Envelopes
• ADSR: Attack-Decay-Sustain-Release Evelopes
• More Stages Than You Can Count

For additional ideas: see Techniques and Variations, which describes how to wire multi-stage envelopes, how to add hold and sustain stages, and how to create retriggerable envelopes, uninterruptible envelopes, looping envelopes, and other interesting variations.

AR: Attack-Release Envelopes

• Connect:
  1. A Stage for the attack stage
  2. A Stage for the release stage
• To start the envelope at 0V, leave the attack stage’s IN input disconnected.
• To set the peak attack voltage, adjust the attack stage’s LEVEL.
• Set the release stage’s LEVEL to 0V.

AHR: Attack-Hold-Release Envelopes

• Connect:
  1. A Stage for the attack stage
  2. A Hostage for the hold stage
  3. A Stage for the release stage
• Set Hostage to HOLD mode.
• To start the envelope at 0V, leave the attack Stage’s IN input disconnected.
• Adjust the attack Stage’s LEVEL to set the peak attack voltage. This also sets the hold level.
• Set the release Stage’s LEVEL to 0V.

ADHR: Attack-Decay-Hold-Release Envelopes

To generate an Attack-Decay-Hold-Release (ADHR) envelope, start with an Attack-Hold-Release envelope and insert another Stage before the Hostage:

ADSR: Attack-Decay-Sustain-Release Envelopes

To generate a sustain stage, we need to wire one module a little differently than normal. Note the bold text below.

• Connect:
  1. A Stage for the attack stage
  2. A Stage for the decay stage
  3. A Hostage for the sustain stage
  4. A Stage for the release stage
• Connect Hostage’s GATE input to the same gate source that triggers the first stage. This configures the gate source to both trigger and sustain the envelope.
• Set Hostage to SUSTAIN mode.
• To start the envelope at 0V, leave the attack stage’s IN input disconnected.
• Adjust the attack stage’s LEVEL to set the peak attack voltage.
• Adjust the decay stage’s LEVEL to set the sustain level.
• Set the release stage’s LEVEL to 0V.

Note that the envelope uses the LFO’s square wave both to trigger the envelope and to sustain it.

More Stages Than You Can Count…

… unless you can count to eighteen.