LAYOUT: Clavia NORD LEAD 4 by stashhunter

The first version of the Nord Lead was released by Clavia in 1995. Gordon Reid from Sound on Sound called it, "a magic piece of electronics," and it demonstrated a new type of synthesis -- "Virtual Analog Synthesis" -- to an industry obsessed with PCM-based workstations and samplers. The Nord Lead 4 continues the evolution with "innovative new performance features, advanced layering and synchronization possibilities, new filter types and on-board effects." The problem, as usual, is how to control such a beast? The Lead 4 only has 29 knobs and some buttons. As layout author Stashhunter (Michael) puts it, tweaking on the knobs of the NL4 is "funny" (think "awkward"). So he created this layout, "to visualize the lots of parameters of the complex voices." It's got some limitations -- see the notes -- but overall it's a wonderful way to get some control over this monstrous and amazing synth. We're extremely grateful to our Community and pioneers like Stashhunter for their contributions.