Strymon Volante

The Strymon Volante is a stereo magnetic echo machine that models three distinct tape and magnetic delay technologies — drum echo, tape echo, and studio reel-to-reel — in a single pedal. Built around a four-playback-head architecture with individual control over each head's feedback and stereo position, it goes well beyond standard delay pedals to capture the character, degradation, and physical behaviour of vintage magnetic recording.

Who Is This For?

The Volante suits guitarists, pedalboard-focused producers, and anyone who wants the warmth, movement, and organic imperfection of tape and drum echo without the maintenance of vintage hardware. It works as a studio delay, a performance effect, and a creative looping tool via its Sound on Sound mode. The spring reverb adds a further layer of vintage ambience. Players who want pristine, transparent digital delay will look elsewhere — the Volante is about character and texture.

Three Echo Machines

Drum Echo models the rotating drum machines of 1950s and 60s echo units, with the characteristic smear and flutter of a spinning drum head. Head spacing can be set to Even, Triplet, Golden Ratio, or Silver Ratio for rhythmic variation.

Tape Echo captures the sound of tape-based delays — wow, flutter, saturation, and the way tape degrades over multiple repeats. The Mechanics and Wear controls dial in the amount of physical character and tape deterioration.

Studio Reel-to-Reel models longer studio tape machine delays with a cleaner, more controlled character than the tape echo mode — still magnetic and organic, but suited to longer, more studio-appropriate repeat trails.

Four Playback Heads

The Volante's four independent playback heads each have their own feedback level and stereo pan position, assignable across the output field. This lets you build complex, evolving delay textures — stacked rhythms, slowly drifting stereo washes, or single-head focused repeats. Infinite repeat mode freezes the signal; reverse playback runs the echoes backwards.

Reverb, Looping, and Modulation

A dedicated spring reverb algorithm sits alongside the delay engine and can be blended in independently. Sound on Sound mode enables overdub looping with natural tape-style degradation on each pass. The Record Level, Low Cut, Mechanics, and Wear controls shape how the signal interacts with the virtual magnetic medium.

Signal Path and Connectivity

The dry signal path is fully analogue with zero latency. Wet processing runs through 24-bit/96kHz converters and SHARC DSP. Stereo inputs and outputs support instrument or line level via a rear panel switch. Full MIDI In/Out on 5-pin DIN supports 300 preset locations and expression pedal morphing. USB connects to a computer for deeper editing.