Do you keep one synth dedicated to a single role?

[davidlynch]

A few months ago, I decided to stop using every synth for every sound because I was spending more time browsing presets than actually writing music. Now I've been trying to give each instrument a specific job. One is mostly for basses, another for pads, and another for leads. The funny thing is that my sessions seem to move a lot faster, even though I'm using the same gear as before. The downside is that every now and then I stumble across an amazing sound on the wrong synth and end up questioning the whole system. I'm curious if anyone else works this way. Do you assign your synths specific roles to keep yourself focused, or do you just grab whichever instrument inspires you in the moment? I'm interested to hear if this is something other people naturally do or if I'm just overthinking my workflow.

[LPF83]

A few months ago, I decided to stop using every synth for every sound because I was spending more time browsing presets than actually writing music. Now I've been trying to give each instrument a specific job. One is mostly for basses, another for pads, and another for leads. The funny thing is that my sessions seem to move a lot faster, even though I'm using the same gear as before. The downside is that every now and then I stumble across an amazing sound on the wrong synth and end up questioning the whole system. I'm curious if anyone else works this way. Do you assign your synths specific roles to keep yourself focused, or do you just grab whichever instrument inspires you in the moment? I'm interested to hear if this is something other people naturally do or if I'm just overthinking my workflow.

Yes, I do this, sometimes keeping the designated roles for months at a time.   But it happens more on bass synths because not all synths are good at bass.  I do like to lock a synth into a particular role, keep a certain rotation of sounds on a bank or two so they are within easy reach, and then the physical placement of them in my set up becomes kind of important to the song writing process, like reach in this physical direction for pads, this physical direction for leads etc.  For my brain that's just an easier and more natural way of making music than for example tracking an entire project using a single synth.  I have done it with a single synth and that can be fun too, to capture the essence of that single synth in a whole track playing different roles... but it feels limiting because it becomes more like looping... finding something good and committing to it and moving to stage 2 where I'm finding something something good that lays on top of it.  But sometimes my good stuff comes from left hand on one synth and right hand on another, maybe get a bass and melody going, then I look at the unused synth right above the right hand and think "I know exactly where you're going"...  I love that flow... but its not the only way.

[Soundquest]

Yes,  The Pittsburgh Modular unit I have is my "steady" as I like the patch I have set up.  That that's all patch cords of course, so just being a little lazy too.