The present invention is a musical synthesizer that can respond to a pitch wheel control by generating realistic slide-step-slide and slide-step portamento pitch curves. The musical synthesizer responds to a pitch wheel control in a context sensitive manner. When a first note-on occurs the pitch wheel behaves in the standard fashion. However, when a second-note on occurs, if the pitch wheel is still being held after the second note-on then the effects of the pitch wheel are disabled. The result is a clean slide-step portamento curve. In addition, the effects of the pitch wheel are delayed slightly relative to the raw pitch wheel signal. The result is that if the pitch wheel is released slightly before a second note-on occurs then the delayed pitch wheel signal will still be at substantially the previous held value when the second note-on occurs. The result is a clean slide-step portamento curve. In another embodiment when a second-note on occurs, if the pitch wheel is still being held after the second note-on, effects of the pitch wheel are disabled and, in addition, the pitch curve is forced to make a small ramp beginning towards the pitch of the second note-on. The result is a clean slide-step-slide portamento curve.