have you ever considered thinking about maybe using analog switches?

[travis]

how bad would they kill the sound? relays are so expensive and big. have you tried? what about for musical instrument/ PA stuff?

[paulb]

Yes, you can use them. Do a search here by part number and you might find some info.
There are specialized ones for audio use as well:
http://www.analog.com/Analog_Root/pr...SM2404,00.html

[paulb]

Distortion figures for analog muxes

[Jan Dupont]

Analog switches are used in QUAD 34 and 44 preamps, and I don´t hear any difference when I short circiut them...
I intend to use analog switches in my next preamp proj.

[MarcelvdG]

The on resistance of normal CMOS analogue switches varies substantially with the input voltage, especially at their minimum supply voltage. Therefore, if you want to minimise distortion with normal CMOS analogue switches, you probably have to come up with a circuit topology where there is either very little signal voltage on the switches or very little influence of the on resistance on the transfer, and you have to use the highest possible supply voltage (usually +7.5V and - 7.5V for switches in the CD4000B-series).

For example, with a FET input buffer op-amp directly behind the switch, signal-dependent variations in the on resistance will do much less harm than when you drive a substantial load directly from the analogue switch output.