Nord User Forum

hello. first time post here. my daughters (age 13) have an Electro 3 and we're trying to get that rock organ (hammond?) sound and just can't figure it out. they're in a a jam cover band and doing "carry on wayward son" by kansas. one of my girls is doing both piano and organ for this song.

here's the song:

the organ comes in around 3:03.

if anyone has the magic formula i'd appreciate you showing pictures of the setup or a detailed list of steps.

if you have created this sound: did you download a special patch? are you using a pedal? do you need some special outboard gear?

someone please help me out. make me look like a good dad. i don't play any instruments at all so all i can do is reach out and get help.

i'll even paypal someone a few bucks if that's what it takes.

thanks in advance.

-dad

Not at any organ right now, so this is how I'd go about it from scratch.

2nd percussion, some distortion.
No vibrato/chorus
I'd start with drawbars around 888058004 or so and see if that gets close.

Add "Stage" reverb.

It starts off with Leslie on fast for the "whirly" bits and on slow for the "smooth" bits.

The effect at the very end where the sound loses its bottom end before fading is achieved by pushing in the bottom drawbars to thin out the sound.

Here's a link to some common registrations that may be interesting to your daughters:

http://keyboardservice.com/Drawbars.asp

thanks for the responses. but we're really new at this stuff and i have no idea how to interpret the drawbar settings you noted, analogika

what do those numbers look like visually with the led's?

the other settings i think i understand.

thanks again!

Drawbars from left to right.

All LEDs lit: 8. No LEDs lit: 0.

You can use those "common" drawbar settings as a starting point, but be advised that every Hammond and every Leslie speaker sound different, and that exact settings used vary wildly depending upon that combination, and the PA, etc. I rarely use the *exact* same settings twice, ever, and I'm constantly tweaking the drawbars as I play.

Think of the drawbars as a sort of "equalizer" for the Hammond tone. What they do is add harmonic partials to the tone, in essence:

If you want a full, fat sound, you pull out the left drawbars, if you want a shrill sound, pull out the right-hand ones, adding higher registers to the tone.

If you want a warm, blubbery sound with just a touch of high-pitched whine (like a nice reggae organ), you pull just the lowest drawbar and add a touch of the highest.

The effect at the end of that song is what happens when you play a chord and push in the lower drawbars, removing the lower partials from the tone, leaving it sounding thin and shrill.

The percussion adds an audible "PING" to the beginning of each note (unless you're playing legato; it will only retrigger when you lift your finger off the keyboard.

Just to add to the useful advice already given:


*** First of all, on the Electro 3, make sure that the Organ model type is set to B3 ***


Generally for rock organ you use the three or four bottom (left drawbars) all the way out (ie full on) and add (or not) some of the higher (right) drawbars to taste.

The bottom drawbars I'm referring to are usually marked: 16' 5 1/3' 8' 4' . These are the "meat and potatos" of your sound.


The Leslie (rotary) effect should be on - that's an essential part of the sound. On the Electro 3, you turn do this as follows: In the EFFECTS section, look for the subsection marked SPEAKER/COMP and set this to ROTARY.

People frequently alternate the ROTARY speed from FAST to SLOW during performance for musical and dramatic effect. On the Electro 3 you do this by alternately pressing the FAST/SLOW switch which is the lower of the two switches marked ROTARY SPEED in the ORGAN section. The top switch marked STOP MODE should be off for this to work.

Next, you could try adding a little bit of distortion to give the overall sound a little bit more "grit" or "aggression". by turning up the knob marked DRIVE/COMP in the same section as the ROTARY select. (somewhere between a third and two-thirds of the way up should be fine, (though I don't own an Electro 3 myself and I'm just guessing here).

(Just as a side note, the rotary effect is usually referred to as the Leslie, because Leslie is the commonly used brand of rotary speaker and their brand name has become synonymous with the rotary effect - like Biro or Hoover. Nord obviously call it the rotary effect to avoid infringing Leslie's copyright).

You can also try adding some VIBRATO/CHORUS and PERCUSSION to taste. These are found in the ORGAN section.

For VIBRATO/CHORUS, the C3 setting is commonly used.

For PERCUSSION, try the FAST setting, and THIRD can be on or off as you prefer.

It's often difficult to exactly duplicate a sound you hear on a record, as so much depends on the player's style, the exact models used (and any modifications that may have been done to them), the recording process itself, plus whatever has been done in the studio to alter the original sound.

Would it be easier to understand if a picture was posted of what the organ section should look like when set-up this way?
Ed

Here's a good start:



That drawbar setting would translate as 766334413.

Organ model is set to "B3". As you can see, Chorus is set to "C3", but not switched on, and percussion is set to "3rd", "fast", "soft", but also switched off.

Only things you need to change is that the Rotary simulation is off, and the drawbar setting to those suggested above in the thread.

Another example:


This image would correspond to a drawbar setting of 888000000.

On slightly more "real"-looking drawbars, things look like this:


The left set has a setting of 888800000 (all lower tones, but no highs), while the right one is set to 006620000.