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Swellboxes and their advanced control
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Left pedal: Positif expr. (manual II. in the default setting)
Right pedal: Récit expr. (manual III. in the default setting) Swellbox Condition: ‘heels up’ means swellbox shutters are opened in the default setting. |
Swellboxes are enclosures with vertical venetian blind-type shutters controlled by the swell pedals (or ‘swell shoes’). As a given shutter closes, the pipes contained in that swellbox will sound quieter and darker. The Palace of Arts organ’s swellbox characteristics, through careful measurement and accurate modeling, are brought to life with breathtaking realism.
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From the Extended Edition you can select the operation direction of the swell pedals. The sign with the arrow shows the pedal position in the closed swellbox state.
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Swellbox pedals and enclosed divisions
The PAB Gravissimo Edition contains 3 MIDI-assignable swellbox pedals and all divisions are virtually enclosed. This means that once you assign a swellbox pedal to an enclosed division, you can control its state instantly. By default, the following assignments are effective:
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Swell pedal 1 (Sw1)
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Swell pedal 2 (Sw2)
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Swell pedal 3 (Sw3) *
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Positive
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Récit
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Solo
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Each enclosed division has its own independent enclosure characteristics. Once you change the swellbox pedal to division assignment, you can control the enclosures of different divisions one-by-one, but multiple assignments (one pedal controls more) are also possible.
* Available only in Gravissimo Edition
Swellbox pedal assignments and swellbox pedal couplers (Gravissimo Edition)
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To set which enclosure the available three swell pedals controls you can use the assignment buttons on the Couplers page, near the divisions. Labeled with Sw1, Sw2 and Sw3 each swell pedal can be assigned to control one or more divisions. For example if you would like to control the Solo and the Positive together with a single pedal, just assign both of them to Sw1.
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However, in improvisations, there may be a need to temporarily control pedals together. For this purpose swell couplers are introduced which you can find on the Performance Page. These switches, looking like stop tabs will make the pedals follow each other and move together. For example: ‘Sw 1+2’ means the second swell pedal (Sw2) follows the first (Sw1). Note that the second swell pedal can be still moved independently, but when you touch the first pedal, the second will immediately follow it.
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Independent and global operational direction selection (Gravissimo Edition)
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You can control the operational direction for all swell pedals independently using buttons on the Performance Page. This means that you can have a pedal with a ‘heels-up is closed’ state while the others can remain ‘heels-down is closed’. The control buttons for this functionality are having small arrows on it indicating the direction of swell pedal in the closed state.
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In the Gravissimo Edition you can select the operation direction of all swell pedals globally by a single switch on the Center page. The sign with the arrow shows the pedal position in the closed swellbox state. If you change a pedal direction later the label will show ‘Various’ indicating that there are various operating directions active for the three swell pedals. If you push global Swell Dir. button once again, all pedals will have the newly selected operational direction active.
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Swellbox curve and range settings (Gravissimo Edition)
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Limiting the swellbox operating range is also possible when there is no need for the extreme attenuation the original swellboxes provide in the real organ. With the button labeled Full on the Performance Page, you can change the operating range between Full and Lim(ited). The limited settings corresponds approximately to the 00..10 range of original swellbox scale in the default setting.
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The curvature changing button, also on the Performance Page allows you to change how the swellbox opens and closes. The default setting corresponds to the original linear scale while the Log setting lets you control the closing and opening in a fine scale when the pedal is near their ends.
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Information
Last updated: 18 April 2019
Applies to