Nota Pendulum

Nota Pendulum is a generative “warm electric keys” instrument with no direct equivalent elsewhere. Hold a chord and a set of balls swing like pendulums across a triangular field; each ball’s position picks a chord degree and plays it as it sweeps, so several balls at different rates weave an ever-evolving arpeggio out of one chord.

Overview

held chord ─▶ balls swing across the ∧∨ field ─▶ position → chord degree → trigger on crossing ─▶ warm keys voice ─▶ out

Hold a chord (or latch it with Hold); the balls do the rest. More balls, faster rates and wider spread make a busier, more polyrhythmic pattern. The voice is a soft additive-sine “keys” tone with a detuned partner for warmth.

Interface

The pendulum field is the instrument, so it gets the stage (mockup 2l).

• Live strip — clock source (Free / Sync), the division, a bipolar RATE (negative = reverse) and the MOTION swing curve (Linear · Pendulum · Ease · Bounce).
• Tab rail (left) — Balls / Voice, with the ball-count stepper (2–6) below.
• Balls tab — the swinging-ball field and a per-ball list (rate · phase · note); SORT (Up / Down), QNT quantize (Off · 1/16 · 1/8) and the Hold · First note · Reset actions.
• Voice tab — the wave (Keys · Glass · Saw · Sqr · Bell), tone/bright/FM and the amp envelope; a Spread rail (rate spread, detune, pan, humanize) and a Scale snap (root + mode).

Parameters

Motion:

Parameter	Range	What it does
Balls	2–6	How many pendulums (voices) swing.
Sync / Free	—	Lock the swing to the transport, or run free.
Division	1/1…1/16	Swing cycle length when synced.
Rate	-100…+100 %	Swing speed; negative reverses.
Motion	Linear · Pendulum · Ease · Bounce	The swing curve shape.
Quantize	Off · 1/16 · 1/8	Snaps triggers to a grid.
Chord Sort	Up / Down	Order the chord degrees map across the field.
Spread	0–1	Detunes the balls’ rates so they drift apart.
Pan Spread	0–1	Fans the balls across the stereo field.
Humanize	0–1	Gentle level/pitch jitter for a human feel.
Hold / First note / Reset	—	Latch the chord · restart on a new chord · restart the phases.

Voice:

Parameter	Range	What it does
Wave	Keys · Glass · Saw · Sqr · Bell	The base tone.
Tone	dark…bright	Overall timbre tilt.
Bright / FM	0–1	High-end and FM colour.
Attack Decay Release	—	Amp envelope (each trigger).
Detune	0–14 c	Detune of the warm partner voice.
Scale	root · Off/Major/Minor/Dorian/Mixo/Penta	Optionally snaps generated notes to a scale.
Volume	—	Output level.

Tips & recipes

• Instant generative pad: hold a chord, turn on Hold, and tweak Balls, Rate and Spread to taste — it plays itself.
• Polyrhythm: raise Spread so the balls fall out of phase and cross degrees at different times.
• Keep it in key: set a Scale root and mode so every generated note fits.
• Reverse shimmer: pull Rate negative and pick the Bounce motion.

See also

• Nota Arp — a step arpeggiator for MIDI-driven patterns.
• Nota Volt — subtractive synthesis.