The Music Stem / The Musician's Library / Composer's Handbook / Additive Synthesis
Composer's Handbook
Additive synthesis builds a timbre by combining individual sine-wave partials.
Combine a fundamental with chosen partials to design a bell-like tone.
Bell tones need partials that are not whole-number multiples, for example ratios near 1, 2, 2.4, 3 and 4.2, each fading at its own rate.