Sound · aka Arp, Sequencer arp
Arpeggio / arpeggiator
An arpeggio is the notes of a chord played one at a time in a repeating rhythmic pattern, usually generated by a hardware or plugin arpeggiator. In classic trance, tightly-programmed 16th-note arpeggios are the DNA of the genre — the rolling melodic figures that carry Robert Miles' 'Children', Energy 52's 'Café Del Mar' and virtually every Age Of Love-descended trance record.
The arpeggiator was already a standard synthesiser feature by the late 1980s, but classic trance is the genre that made it a lead instrument rather than a garnish. Producers used arpeggiators on the Roland JP-8000, the Access Virus, the Nord Lead and the Korg MS-2000 to generate the rolling 16th-note figures that sit at the front of the mix throughout a breakdown — the arpeggio is the melody the listener actually hums after the record ends.
Unlike the supersaw lead, which delivers the emotional peak at the drop, the arpeggio typically holds the whole track together underneath. It is what stops a five-minute trance record from feeling static in the sections between breakdowns.