MATRIXSYNTH: Tuesday, December 18, 2007


Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Machinedrum mp3

via electronicvibes on the Matrixsynth Forum

Machinedrum mp3

"Following mp3 is pure synthesis from Elektron Machinedrum, no sample and external effect. That's one ultra minimal pattern created on my legs while watching TV and recorded with crackling on my minidisc."

MISC Synth Brochures

click here for the full set.

Picutured: Akai S612 Sampler

"casa dell' orchestralle"

house of the orchestra?

Update: see the comments for some translations.

sheaves / don mennerich

Click here for the tracks

track 1: Korg MS-20
track 2: Ensoniq EPS (arp soloist and rmi waveforms)
track 3: electric bass and Wurlitzer MLM (4 track tape processed through a Nord G2)
track 4: Korg MS-20
track 5: Clarinet (into an akai headrush -> 8 track) + Hammond M3

Sonicbrat - W E A V I N G

"The W E A V I N G project builds on the ideology of minimalism and improvisation. The album is meant to be listened to from top till the end as a sole entity of sounds and melodies. The sub-harmonics, subliminal changes in timbres and the play of sub-frequencies and hyper-frequencies will leave your ears ringing at the end of the sonic experience."

100% Triton ST88.
Click here for the free download of WEAVING.

sfxr - sound effects for all!

"What I present here is, if you will, an MS Paint for sound effects… or something along those lines. It’s meant to make it dead easy for anyone to whip up a few simple sound effects and save them as .WAV files for playback using most game/media libraries like SDL or pygame.

Basic usage involves clicking the left-most buttons to automatically generate random sounds loosely targeted at certain categories. For more advanced users it’s possible to spend some additional time to manually create fairly varied and interesting sound effects.

The interface is based entirely around sliders for controlling sound parameters, along with a few buttons. Even if you don’t want to spend time learning about all the sliders you can still have some fun just hammering away at them and listening to the various sounds that come out."

Click here for more info including the download. via Analog Industries.

Jomox Xbase09 & Dj Puzzle - Red Acid


YouTube via DjPuzzle73.
"Live improve set by Jason Donnelly aka Dj Puzzle. Rare footage of the whizerd in action. Gear used Dr.Walker XBASE 09 Quasimidi Rave-O-Lution 309 Alesis Metavox Novation Xiosynth"

Robot Sleigh Ride


YouTube via robotmakers.
"Robotmaker's all analog modular holiday tune. Recorded in one live take, with some prerecorded tracks. The polysynth part uses Kontakt instruments created from modular samples (MOTM GX1 Filters)."

tabloid

Another Waldorf Blofeld demo from Stefan Trippler. This one showcases the wavetables.

tabloid.mp3

Note that with the Blofeld you can assign an independent wavetable to each oscillator while on the microwave/XT both oscillators share the same wavetable.

Nerd Party Program

flickr by Pablo Noel

full size

There's just something about this shot. The title, Pole Position, Converse, the mini cassette, and the mini skateboard.

A Red Head and A Blonde

Image via Derek on the Waldorf list. Be sure to click the image for the full size shot, also posted here.

Waldorf XT
Waldorf Q

The title is a little bit of an inside joke - there's some discussion on the Waldorf list regarding wive/partners and synths. Apparently the Q is Derek's German blond whom he only gets to visit on weekends. :) I wonder how much action the red head gets. da-dum! Oh, man, did I just say that?...

Technomage LIFE 2


"L2 will be available in several formats. It will follow the concept of the first incarnation of LIFE in the form of a hand held device. There have been several requests for a rack mount version (to be compatible with the modular synthesiser systems available from other manufacturers). We hope to make this version available as well. Versions of L2 (as pictured on the left) have been undergoing field trials. Feedback has been very positive and comments received are being used to finalise the design. Further details of the control surface on L2 are listed below. Please note that the control knobs and surface finish of the production version of L2 will differ to those shown in this image.

Rotary Controls:
Clock Speed - LFO Speed - LFO (positive or negative) to VCO - VCO Manual Frequency - LFO (positive or negative) to VCF - VCF Manual - Frequency - VCF Resonance 'Q'- EG (positive or negative) to VCF - EG Decay - EG to VCA - Combined Drone and Power Switch.

Touch Switches:
- LFO Speed (Lo/Hi - for ring-mod type effects) - LFO Waveshape (The appropriate LED will light indicating LFO speed and intensity) - LFO Sync on and off (toggle switch) with LED status - Oscillator Pulse Width with LED status - VCF Type (Low, High, Band and Phase) with associated LEDs - showing VCF selection (and also EG intensity) - Divided Clock (b) to EG (with LED indicator) - Divided Clock (a) to sync LFO (with LED indicator).

Interface Sockets:
LFO Select - LFO Sync In - VCO CV In - Signal In to VCF - VCF Select - VCF CV In - Clock (b) Out - Clock (main) Out - Clock (a) Out - Clock In - Signal (audio) Out."

click here for more info including the LIFE 1. Look familiar? Also check out the Chimera.

Omni-Suzanne Ciani


YouTube via crystalsculpture2. I remember playing this pinball machine, little did I know I was listening to Suzanne Ciani and a Buchla amongst other vintage synths. Crazy. Now I want one. :)
"Suzanne Ciani working on the music and sounds for the Xenon pinball game from the Omni televsion show. hypnotic in places"

Mr Duff does what he does best.


YouTube via Deelhs. "Making 'cool sounds'."

Roland JX-8P Analog Synthesizer


YouTube via retrosound72.
"synth demo by RetroSound

The Roland JX-8P is a classic analog Polysynth with a very soft nice sound.

more info: www.retrosound.de"

Kraftwerk


YouTube via AnnaHeidiBourne.
"Vates News

Radio-Activity (German version: Radioaktivität)

Kraftwerk (pronounced [ˈkʁaftvɛɐk], German for "power plant") is a Grammy Award-nominated, German musical group from Düsseldorf.

The Kraftwerk sound combines a driving rhythm section with catchy, synthesized melodies and harmony; mainly following a classical style of arrangement accompanied by simple lyrics which are sometimes sung through a vocoder or generated by computer speech software. The Moog synthesizer is heavily present in the majority of the group's works, adding to their signature sound creations. In the mid to late 1970s and the early 1980s, the Kraftwerk sound was revolutionary for its time, and it has had a lasting impact across nearly all genres of modern popular music.

R A D I O A C T I V I T YTschernobyl, Harrisburgh, Sellafield, Hiroshima
Tschernobyl, Harrisburgh, Sellafield, Hiroshima
Stop radioactivity
Is in the air for you and me
Stop radioactivity
Discovered by Madame Curie


Chain reaction and mutation, contaminated population
Stop radioactivity
Is in the air for you and me
Morse:
Radioactivity is in the air for you and me
Radioactivity discovered by madame Curie
Radioactivity is in
Stop radioactivity

R A D I O A C T I V I T Y
R A D I O A C T I V I T Y
Tschernobyl, Harrisburgh, Sellafield, Hiroshima
Tschernobyl, Harrisburgh, Sellafield, Hiroshima
Stop radioactivity
Is in the air for you and me
Stop radioactivity
Discovered by Madame Curie
Chain reaction and mutation, contaminated population
Stop radioactivity
Is in the air for you and me"

Kaossilator Solitaire 4(Xmas Special)


YouTube via denka51. "Happy Christmas!"

My Cat Listening to Acid


YouTube via matrix12x.
"So I decided to to a quick montage of my cat named Kicia (kitten in Polish). I did the music with my x0xb0x and a Electribe Er-1. Kicia is a great little cat."

Vermona MARS

images via this auction
"sound-generation: analog, subtractiv
oscillators: 2x VCO with sawtooth, square and pulse; 4x suboscillator; ringmodulator; sync; 2x glide; glissando
filter: VCF, 24dB lowpass; resonance
modulation: 2x LFO with 2x sine, square, triangle, random; variable ratio on each waveform;
LFO 1 with additional preceding Attack-Decay envelope generator
2x ADSR envelope generator
connections: footswitch, envelope out; mono output; MIDI IN, OUT/THRU
memory: 127 patches
housing: 19inch, 1U
optional: programmer with 56 controllers

The M.A.R.S. is a monophonic synthesizer which gives you real analog power in only one rackspace. VCOs, VCF and VCA are build-up discrete upon the classical structure - of course with some special functions - so everyone who know a little bit about analog synthesizers is able to program the M.A.R.S., although its user interface is menu-based.

Oscillators
The two identical oscillators of the M.A.R.S. are completely analog - no DSPs. One oscillator has a sawtooth, a square and a pulse (with fixed pulthwidth) waveform as well as two sub-oscillators which produces squarewaves one and two octaves below the main oscillator. The sub-oscillators can be activated / deactivated separately from each other.
VCO1 can be synchronized to VCO2 (hard-sync) and both VCOs can be multiplied via the ringmodulator. One special feature is, that each oscillator has its own Glide, so you can set individual Glide times which sounds more fat than using the same Glide time for both oscillators. Beside the Glide, both oscillators also have Glissando. Glide and Glissando can be used at the same time!
The oscillators can be modulated by LFO one and its Attack-Decay envelope.

Filter
The M.A.R.S. has a 24dB lowpass filter with resonance. Its CUTOFF frequency can be modulatied by one of the two envelope generators, velocity, keytrack and a LFO. The filters Resonance can be modulated by both envelope generators and LFO2. Additionally, the CUTOFF frequency and RESONANCE can be modulated by different controllers like modulaton wheel, aftertouch, etc.

Low Frequency Oscillators
The M.A.R.S. has two LFOs. Both LFOs have two sine waveforms, a pulse and a triangle wave. The specialty of the LFO shapes is, that their symmetry can be changed. I.e. you can change the pulsewidth of the square waveform or transform the triangle to a negative or positive sawtooth.
LFO1 has an additional preceding ATTACK-DECAY envelope generator that can also be used as Delay parameter.

Envelope Generators
The M.A.R.S. has two classical ADSR envelope generators which modulates the VCA and the VCF. The envelopes can be triggered by keyboard, LFO or both - that offers interesting possibilities for rythmical modulations.

Modulation
Pitchbender, Modulationwheel, Aftertouch and a connectable footswitch can control various functions like CUTOFF frequency, LFO speed and / or intensity, Fine Tune, Glide on/off, etc.
This allows very expressive playing of M.A.R.S. programms.

Memory
The M.A.R.S. offers memory for storing 127 programs."

Serge Modular System

images via this auction and this auction.
Auction 1:
QUANTIZER MODULE
ASR MODULE
ASR MODULE
DUAL TRANSIENT GENERATOR MODULE
RANDOM SOURCE MODULE
SMOOTH STEPPED GENERATOR
CV PRO MODULE
DUAL UNIVERSAL SLOPE GENERATOR
EXTENDED ADSR MODULE
SMOOTH FUNCTION GENERATOR
NOISE SOURCE MODULE
DUAL PROCESSOR MODULE
DUAL PROCESSOR SLOPE GENERATOR
PHASER MODULE
VOLT CONTROLLED STEREO MIXER
NEW TIMBRAL OSCILLATOR MODULE
PRECISION VCO (2 MODULES)
WAVE MULTIPLIER MODULE
VARIABLE QVCF MODULE
DUAL TRANSIENT GENERATOR
DUAL AUDIO MIXER MODULE
TOUCH ACTIVATED KEYBOARD SEQUENCER

Auction 2:
"PREAMP DETECTOR
FREQUENCY SHIFTER
C/M MODULE
WILSON ANALOG DELAY MODULE
MIXER MODULE
VARIABLE SLOPE VCF
RESONANT EQUILIZER MODULE
DUAL PHASER MODULE
DUAL CHANNEL STEREO MIXER MODULE

Serge gets its name from Serge Tcherepnin (pronounced "Cher - epp - nin"), a multitalented composer and electronic designer born of Russian-Chinese parents and raised in France. Self-taught in electronic design and circuit building, Serge enjoyed doing 'junk electronic' projects early on, making tape compositions using various electronic noisemakers cobbled together out of transistor radios and the like.

After studying music and physics at Harvard and Princeton, he taught music composition at the California Institute of the Arts. This was the early 70's, the heyday of Moog, ARP, and Buchla synthesizers. Calarts had a few Buchla-equipped studios. These were expensive, highly sought-after instruments, kept under lock and key. Getting studio time on one at Calarts meant being either a recognized staff composer or someone who maneuvered themselves into favor. The Buchla, ARP, and Moog synthesizers were interesting in their way, but could be improved upon. They were both expensive and bulky, a system with a decent number of functions could take up a whole wall in a small room. Serge and students Rich Gold and Randy Cohen wondered what they could do about this. After kicking around some ideas, they decided they were going to do their own synthesizer.

The first modules were designed, soldered, and built at Serge's home in what was essentially a kitchen tabletop operation. Before long, the word got out to other professors, students, and musicians about this new synthesizer. They wanted a piece of the action. Serge set up a strange sort of guerrilla manufacturing operation at Calarts on a second-story courtyard balcony. People paid $700 upfront for parts, worked on the 'assembly line' soldering and building modules, and eventually got themselves a six-panel system. Somehow, the Calarts administration either didn't find out or wasn't too bothered by this.

Another interesting player in this drama was composer Morton Subotnik, a professor at Calarts. He had a long association with instrument designer Don Buchla in the early 60's, the two of them collaborating on fundamental aspects of synthesizer design. When Mort spoke, Don listened. Serge caught on to this, and sought to woo Morton away from the Buchlas, but that was difficult. Eventually, Serge did build Mort some custom equipment.

In the 70's Serge collaborated on the design and construction of TONTO, a large polyphonic modular system. TONTO had the ancestry of many early Serge designs, some packaged behind faux-Moog front panels, including the NTO.

Serge eventually quit teaching and began to build synthesizers more seriously, using the first designs as a springboard. The Serge company was started in 1975, in the West Hollywood area, then headed north to San Francisco's Haight Street a few years later. It was always a humble bohemian concern, running more on enthusiasm and the love of making music than money and hardheaded business sense. Business tapered to a trickle in the middle 80's, and Serge, to support his family, started doing various outside electronic consulting projects. In 1992 Serge decided to move back to France. It was at this point that he sold the closely-guarded circuit designs to longtime associate Rex Probe, who then founded Sound Transform Systems. Production record keeping was pretty informal; it's estimated that "hundreds" of Serge systems were produced in the early years.

Today, Serge is again doing musical composition and is involved in helping Russian Jews move to Israel.
As Moog was a powerful East Coast influence that inspired ARP and Polyfusion, Buchla was the West Coast influence on Serge. Several Buchla designs, including the use of touch sensitive nontraditional keyboards, sequencers, random voltage generators, function generators, and matrix mixers found their way into Serge's repertoire. But that's not to say that Serge is merely a Buchla clone. Serge made many unique contributions, including the wave multiplier module, and some ideas were taken to new heights. Serge's oscillator designs have extraordinary accuracy and stability, especially considering their discrete nature. His philosophy of allowing the easy interplay of audio, control, and trigger signals, combined with the use of banana plugs, makes these systems wonderfully flexible.

There's no denying the amazing staying power of the Serge designs. Largely because of the development of convenient microprocessor-based keyboard synths, the 80's were a nasty time for analog synthesizer makers, practically all of them throwing in the towel. Serge's business slowed way down but never completely went out of production. With the recent clamoring for analog gear fueling successful production, Rex Probe and Sound Transform Systems look poised to carry the cream of analog modular music synthesis over the threshold of the 21st century, into their fourth decade of realization.

Sound Transform Systems has done a great job of continuing the analog modular lineage. Most of the traditional Serge modules are there, a few old ones were dropped, a few new ones added. The details are constantly being improved in many visible and invisible ways. They are still laboriously handmade, though the entire build process has been improved. Turnaround time has been improved from several months to 'just a couple'. All the components are top notch. The panel graphics and layout of many of the modules have been redesigned to make them more compact while keeping or improving the functionality. The circuit designs on many modules have been updated."

KORG MS10 in Wooden Case

images via this auction

JUNOST-21


images via this auction

"vintage Russian portable analog poly synthesizer JUNOST-21. It’s unique guitar-like instrument with warm and aggressive analog sound. It’s “soviet Moog Liberation”! Synth has 12 factory patches (each patch can be changed), excellent analog filters, modulator, chorus and ADSR control."

Waldorf Microwave Preliminary Manual

via this auction

Anyone know when this manual came out in relation to the Microwave?

Update via swissdoc in the comments:
"The "Waldorf Microwave Preliminary Manual" was shipped with the first units and later replaced with the final Manual, which you can download here: http://qwave.de/georg/mwmanual/

The manual was refering to V1.0 of th e firmware, addenda for V1.20, V1.25 and the final V2.0 are available under the link as well.

The preliminary manual had no graphics, only the text and there was just a very fragile glue binding. The final manual used a spiral binding."

Yamaha VL7


images via this auction

"Yamaha VL7 Physical Modeling synthesizer. This is an incredible synth and very rare. There were less than 2500 of the VL1, VL1m and VL7's made in total. This synth originally sold for $2,995.00 US. This has the Version 2.0 ROM's which are no longer available and are rarer than the VL7 itself. I have included a Breath controller that makes the performances even more expresive. Find out more about the VL7 at

Yamaha VL7 web page"
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