Parallel vs Series Chorus

mwd

mwd

Power User
After watching Marcos video about parallel ambient fx I started experimenting with a parallel chorus. It sounded good and, to my ears, a bit different than running in series. I wondered what discoveries others had made about this.
 
It depends upon the other effects in the chain. Alone, as @yek said, there will be no difference in sound with those settings.

Using other effects in series, the effects blend together- each block adding an effect to the signal from the previous effect. Series causes you to make decisions about the sound you want to create. Questions like 'do I want to delay the chorus sound or add chorus to the delayed sound?' need to be answered.

Parallel 'isolates' effects so they are not altered by another and mesh together after the parallel path allowing for better separation of the effects.

Both methods can yield great results, it just depends on what you want to hear.
 
JoKeR III said:
Parallel 'isolates' effects so they are not altered by another and mesh together after the parallel path allowing for better separation of the effects.
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I'm thinking I want most of my effects not to go through one another. Let's say I then put delays, chorus etc parallel, at what point do I bring them back to the serial path? Wouldn't I want to bring them back at the output and not put them back on the serial routing, as then they would have to go through the reverb and will get washed out?
 
violindave said:
I'm thinking I want most of my effects not to go through one another. Let's say I then put delays, chorus etc parallel, at what point do I bring them back to the serial path? Wouldn't I want to bring them back at the output and not put them back on the serial routing, as then they would have to go through the reverb and will get washed out?
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Funny, sometimes I think reverb is the glue. Depending on what you want. 👍
 
violindave said:
I'm thinking I want most of my effects not to go through one another. Let's say I then put delays, chorus etc parallel, at what point do I bring them back to the serial path? Wouldn't I want to bring them back at the output and not put them back on the serial routing, as then they would have to go through the reverb and will get washed out?
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There's no rule on where to bring them back into the chain. You may want a delay to run into the reverb but not the chorus, it's entirely up to you where each block is isolated then put back in the chain before the output. Experiment and find what sounds best to you and gives you the results you're looking for.

I love this about the Axe III, it's so easy to mess around with block placement and routing.
 
Chorus by design is a parallel effect. It's the mixing of the wet and dry signals that causes the effect. The wet signal alone is just pitch bending vibrato. Even if you route the block in series, it's still mixing in parallel with a dry copy of the input unless you set MIX to 100% wet.
 
mr_fender said:
Chorus by design is a parallel effect. It's the mixing of the wet and dry signals that causes the effect. The wet signal alone is just pitch bending vibrato. Even if you route the block in series, it's still mixing in parallel with a dry copy of the input unless you set MIX to 100% wet.
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Years ago, back in my "real amplifier" days, I ran a dry/wet rig. Pat Methany had arrived on the scene with his use of a stereo rig and a modulated signal, so I adjusted my TC Electronics SCF to vibrato and ran from the effects out of my Mesa-Boogie, through the SCF and to the input of a Yamaha G50 112 combo. The vibrato was very subtle but it caused a wonderful chorus effect that mixed in people's ears.
 
Yeah you'll usually get a less perfect mixing of the signals in the air as it bounces off of various surfaces in the room, so the result has it's own unique vibe to it.
 
I run my chorus block in series because on one channel I have it 100% wet for a vibrato effect which would be impossible if I ran it in parallel, and the rest of my chorus channels would sound identical with the compensated mix/level settings.
 
Yeah phase issues can be a nightmare with parallel loops. I run my MS50G in a parallel loop with full wet reverb effects, which works ok despite no kill dry function, but if I then switch to a modulation patch it just sounds thin and sad unless I switch my ls-2 out of parallel mode. I’m thinking of hotwiring a jack to the rotary switch pads to let me switch between those two modes with a footswitch.
 
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