A signal gate is really just a fancy on/off switch — and an inspiring creative tool for modifying existing sequences and creating new ones.

A few years ago, I acquired an esoteric module for my old Roland modular synthesizer that contained four signal gates and some multiples. I knew what multiples were, but I initially had some head scratching as to the function of ‘signal gates’. After some brief testing it became apparent that ‘signal gate’ was just dorky parlance for an electronic switch; a signal connected to a signal gate is either output or muted depending upon whether it receives a (+/‑) voltage or zero volts. Essentially, it’s no more complicated than having a quartet of remote‑controlled light switches.

Within an hour it became clear that with just four of these very simple switches, an enormous number of things were possible and after trying a bunch of them out I was reminded of a linear drumming technique a friend of mine had shown me decades earlier. With linear drumming only one part of the kit is played on a given beat, meaning that it’s almost like switching through parts of the kit on a per‑step basis. Inspired by this, I set up four parallel sounds with associated sequences and connected them to the signal gates and then used a separate sequence to switch through the gates so that only one of the four sounded on a given step.

In essence, this approach brings a vertical sequencing element to an otherwise horizontal scenario, and before you start looking for a vintage signal gate module, fear not: this can be done with modern hardware alternatives and also in any DAW, free or otherwise, with just a mouse and some automation. Furthermore, it doesn’t need to involve synthesizers at all, the principle can be applied to any audio in general.

Firstly, let’s look at how this is setup with the original hardware, as shown in Picture 1. The user creates four complete voices that are being independently sequenced. These can be polyphonic, monophonic, simple or complex, it doesn’t matter. All that matters is that they’re sync’ed to the same clock source. I’ve used matching cable colours to make it easier to see, and voice 1 is purple, voice 2 is red,...