Developed in collaboration with composer and transmedia artist Gadi Sassoon, Physical Audio’s new Tetrad soft synth uses a combination of physical modelling and granular synthesis to recreate the sound of the sculpture-based synth installation featured on Sassoon’s album Modes of Vibration.
The new instrument, Tetrad, is described as a “digital twin” of Gadi Sassoon’s sound installation work, and is capable of generating a variety of tones and textures that go above and beyond what’s capable with traditional synths. It features four oscillators that each offer a choice of five modes, and are subjected to AM and granular processing before being fed into physical modes of the large resonant metal plates used in the original installation. There’s also an side-chain input that allows any external audio signal to replace the built-in oscillators.
Physical Audio say that Tetrad has been designed to encourage users to think differently about how they create sounds, and includes a comprehensive modulation matrix that’s capable of routing 45 sources — including eight LFOs, envelope followers and a selection of MIDI and MPE controls — to 10 different destinations, with each path benefitting from its own depth control.
Key Features
- 115 presets.
- Generate voices through Basic, Chords and Modal chord modes, and Free and Flex modes.
- ADSR envelope, FM Frequency and FM Depth for all oscillator types.
- Quad AM module to ‘pseudo-sequence’ or gently modulate voices, with control over phase.
- Per-voice Shape, Depth, Gain, Rate (up to 250Hz) and Phase Displacement parameters.
- Quad Granulator mangles the four voices into new textures individually or all together.
- Grain Size, Feedback, Rate (up to 50Hz), or individual Grain Size and Pitch per voice.
- Plate Resonators that can be driven and positioned graphically on the virtual sound stage.
- Set Decay, Metal Cuts amount and Preamp Drive globally, or adjust Drive and Decay per plate.
- MPE-compatible with a glide range of +/- 48 semitones.
- Comprehensive Modulation Matrix with over 40 destinations, eight LFOs, MIDI and MPE sources.
- Three filters (LP/BP/HP) to curtail and sculpt effects.
- Sidechain input and Quad output available.
Compatibility
Tetrad is supported on PCs running Windows 11, and Macs running macOS 10.13 to 15. VST3, AU and AAX plug-in versions are available.
Pricing & Availability
Tetrad is available now, and is being offered at an introductory price of $59£47 until 28 July 2025, when it will increase to its full cost of $99£79. Prices include VAT.
