When Sequential Circuits finally went belly-up, their research and development into vector synthesis was picked up at Korg. This led to the hugely successful Wavestation Synthesizer which was based on Sequential's ProphetVS. The Wavestation incorporated the 2-dimensional vector joystick of the ProphetVS which allowed the user to alter and animate sounds.

Korg added to this a second break-through form of synthesis: wave sequencing, by which short segments of sampled audio waveforms could be played one after the other and cross-faded into each other for some complex and unusual tones, pads, textures and rhythms. The Wavestation had 2MB of ROM based samples at your disposal. Programming is not exactly easy but this great digital synth is capable of lush ambient sounds and strange effects. It has the obligatory lowpass filter, though it is non-resonant and digital sounding. Also on-board are some multi-effects which are pretty nice. This synth is easily upgraded and expandable with PCM cards too.

In 1991 the Wavestation EX, also called EXK-WS, was released (pictured above). The EX added 150 more waveforms (4MB) including acoustic instruments and drums. The EX also adds 8 multi-effects including: Mod Pitch Shift-Delay, Stereo Compressor-Limiter/Gate, Vocoder, Overdrive and Distortion effects, transposable keyboard and added MIDI implementation and control. Wavestations are used by Orbital, The Future Sound of London, Genesis, Jan Hammer, Depeche Mode, Toto, Vangelis, Legendary Pink Dots, Biosphere and Sin.

ricky d

February 23, 2009 @ 3:50 pm

Initially you would think it would sound like a Korg M1, which it does the Piano 16' as well and maybe a few other borrowed sounds, but IMO it's more serious sounding and less "plasticky". It's good for music that calls for some exotic-droney type of sounds geared towards techno. The presets are pretty good on their own I have to admit (The same can't be said for alot of synths), but programming the Wavestation will boggle your mind and will easily piss you off if you're not the patient type, and editing one patch will screw up another patch too. That is what I don't like about it. Another con is that it's kind of hard to sit the sounds in a mix at times. All in all though, the Wavestation is a keeper and is a staple instrument in my setup.

tony H

November 22, 2008 @ 6:25 am

ONE OF THE BEST GRAND PIANO SOUNDS YOU WILL COME ACROSS WHEN USED WITH WPC-O1 ROM CARD TOTALY BELIVEABLE

Work2it08

October 27, 2008 @ 7:52 pm

For examples in popular television's past, the Goosebumps series made gratuitous use of this synthesizer's factory patches as did Are You Afraid of the Dark? to an extent.

Daniel Westin

October 12, 2008 @ 3:36 pm

The Korg Wavestation is used by Alan Clark of Dire Starits and Daniel Fletcher Of D a z z - S y n t h as well...

(D a z z is taken from the word häagen-dazs, a american icecream company)

Alessandro

September 21, 2008 @ 11:33 am

owned one, the EX version, hmmmmm.. sold it quickly could not move me at all

<987654321>

 

Post Comment!

Your Name: (Required.)

Email Address: (Required, not published.)

Image verification: (required)

Message:

 

Posting Rules:
Please keep your comments relevant! Do not post requests for help, do not use for sales, do not post unless you have something interesting to say about this instrument, or we may delete your post.

I have read and understand the posting rules.