[LAD] Synth/Sampler why the distinction?

[Philipp Überbacher]

Excerpts from James Morris's message of 2011-06-10 00:37:15 +0200:
> On 9 June 2011 23:30, Folderol <folderol at ukfsn.org> wrote:
> > On Thu, 9 Jun 2011 23:22:58 +0100
> > James Morris <jwm.art.net at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Hi,
> >>
> >> Since working on Petri-Foo I keep returning to the idea that perhaps
> >> it would be better to add a sampler-waveform to Yoshimi or another
> >> soft-synth. Too bad I'm not that great a coder.
> >>
> >> Anyway, the idea seems so obvious now. Are there any good reasons for why not?
> >>
> >> Just an idea I wanted to put out.
> >>
> >> James.
> >
> > Personally, I'd hate that. I'm very firmly in the school of 'Do just one thing,
> > but do it well.'
> 
> But are the two really so different? They both do exactly the same
> thing except one does it with synthesised waveforms and the other does
> it with sampled waveforms. From thinking about the fact that most soft
> synths use wave-tables, it can't be that difficult to put a sample in
> there? Aside from synthesised waveform and sampled waveform, I think
> (but don't quote me on this :-) that it is perhaps only certain
> conventions which distinguish the two.
> 
> 
> James.

I too think that there's not that much difference between a wavetable
synth and a sampler. I guess you could distinguish them if you like, use
things like typical sample length, user control over samples and so on,
but this rather artificial.

I think samplers and synths have a lot in common, typically midi in,
audio out, note logic, filters and more. There's no good reason not to
marry those two things.

Philipp