Brilliant. Title link takes you to the mp3 with some background by Chris Muir.Previous 200e posts
Friday, February 09, 2007
25 comments:
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MATRIXSYNTH - EVERYTHING SYNTH
© Matrixsynth - All posts are presented here for informative, historical and educative purposes as applicable within fair use.
MATRIXSYNTH is supported by affiliate links that use cookies to track clickthroughs and sales. See the privacy policy for details.
MATRIXSYNTH - EVERYTHING SYNTH
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well, I just hear something near a yamaha DX7
ReplyDeleteThats funny you mention that because one of the Japanese engineers who designed the DX7 spent a considerable amount of time studying th Buchla 200 at Cal Arts.
ReplyDeleteI'm one of the people in that thread who criticized the lack of melodic demos, thanks for proving me wrong. It's cool to hear it doing some melodic stuff!
ReplyDeleteBlackbird is actually one of my most favorite songs in the world. I would have probably chosen different sounds but I can definitely hear potential for interesting things in there, and I love the idea of using tools intended for one thing to do something else.
Now I just need to find that remote cabin, the stash of psychedlics, and beg borrow or steal $20k and I'll write some pretty Buchla pop songs for you all...
Again, thank you for taking the time to make it...
Dude , it DOES sound like a metal banjo crossed with an Indian Tambour drone...but I do like it...pretty bright timbre actually, 'though I tend to like darker moodier sounds, but hats off to Chris for puttin this one out ...I'm still trying to drag my ass into makin a metasonix "musical" demo tape...
ReplyDeleteThat's funny, because the Cal-Arts-era Buchla 200 sounds nothing like a DX7.
ReplyDeleteI did specifically try for a metal banjo-ish sound on the guitar part.
ReplyDeletei want a Buchla like all people, I just find it sounding too digital, and read recently an owner of the original 200 series had both and sold the 200e ( well most of it) he was much happier with the 200's sound...I have never played a Buchla nor seen one in the flesh, and I know they have updated the OSCillators to digital, analog....
ReplyDeleteAnd not being an ass ( because I do want a Buchla) but couldnt I do these sounds on most recent digital synths like Kurzweil 2500 etc? I havent played a digital synth since the K2500
I would be happy with a Buchla none the less, but want to learn more about its sound.
oh and thanks Chris for doing the track, I have no idea what the original sounds like but that dont matter.
ReplyDeleteHere you go link. Michael Jackson still owns the rights to the Beatles so it's hard to find full tracks online, but that will do.
ReplyDeleteFound a full version: link.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThe version I started from can be found here.
ReplyDeleteQuote: That's funny, because the Cal-Arts-era Buchla 200 sounds nothing like a DX7
ReplyDelete-----------
YOU, my good friend, have clearly not explored the FM capabilities of the original Buchla 259.
Paulson's right. Not only the original 259's FM capabilities but also certain waveshaping settings have caused my writing partner to refer to it as "the DX7 oscillator."
ReplyDeleteTo be fair & balanced (tm) to Mr. Anonymous, I always think of that system at CalArts from the Grenader/Schrader/Chang glory days that you see photographed on Subotnick records, the one dripping with 258's, which, even when you stack in all sorts of fm "algorhythms," don't sound as DXish as the 259's.
Perhaps when the Yamaha team was snooping around CalArts there were blue-knobbed 259's aplenty.
Regarding today's Buchlas, the 261e is very similar in sound & control to the original 259.
Incidentally, the only commercial recording I know of that features 259's instead of earlier oscillators is "Rosenboom & Buchla: Collaboration in Performance," from 1978. Does anyone know of other 259 recordings?
The 200e doesn't have to sound digital. Approaching the 200e with what one might call an "intuitive patching scheme" informed by experience with a primarily subtractive synthesis modular will certainly bring "digital" qualities right to the surface. Doing a little reading on some advanced synthesis technique coupled with thinking though what timbral characteristics typically distinguish "analog" from "digital" will help the syntesist see that the "digital" qualities in the 200e are merely arbitrary and and completely within the players control. A good place to start is this tutorial: http://www.cim.mcgill.ca/~clark/nordmodularbook/nm_oscillator.html
ReplyDeleteWhether a DX7 designer spent some time with a Buchla or not doesn't matter, as it still took Chowing peddling his patents to Yamaha for the DX7 to have been conceived.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.cim.mcgill.ca/~clark/nordmodularbook/nm_
ReplyDeletepage doesnt work
His link seemed to wrap but I think this:
ReplyDeletehttp://tinyurl.com/3xskmv
is what he was talking about
> Whether a DX7 designer spent some time with a Buchla or not doesn't matter
ReplyDeleteIt absolutely matters given the context of this discussion.
Fact 1: a Yamaha engineer (We'll call him Fortune) intentionally studied a Buchla 200 as research for the DX7
Fact 2: The original Buchla 259, which came before the DX7, is widely known to be capable of timbres very similar to the DX7
Fact 3: The first comment on this discussion pointed out the similarity in timbre between the 200e and DX7.
Fact 4: someone pointed out the irony in that statment because of facts 1 and 2.
Thems the facts. They do not lie. All of those facts matter when establishing that the first statement is ironic.
I'm not sure what the point of your argument is from the patent evidence. Are you saying the first statement is NOT ironic because of the patent?
>http://www.cim.mcgill.ca/~clark/no>rdmodularbook/nm_
ReplyDelete>page doesnt work
Just click my name for the correct link
I am just not sure that any of the FM stuff at Yamaha would have taken place had Chowning not gone company to company trying to sell his ideas.
ReplyDeleteChowing actually completes the mystery. He was at Stanford in 1967 when he invented the FM synthesis algorithm. Don Buchla, being a Bay area intellectual, was probably personally acquainted with Chowning and his research at Stanford. In 1973 when Chowing licensed his work to Yamaha, the Buchla 200 had been in production for 3 years. It wasn't until 1983 that the DX7 was introduced. Does anyone know when the 259 was introduced? Was it after or before the Easel?
ReplyDeleteIt's the waveshaping feature that gives the 259 a coincidentally DX-ish sound at certain settings, not the frequency modulation. FM in Buchla oscillators is nothing new... the 144 & 158 oscillators in the 1960's were built as dual oscillators with audio fm-in jacks to facilitate cross-modulation. The 259 showed up on the scene around 1977, methinks.
ReplyDeleteFurthermore, FM is only part of the 259's tool kit. Patchcord-free AM & waveshape modulation, voltage-controllable mod index & some other harmonic goodies round out the package.
RE: Analog vs. Digital
ReplyDeleteThe Analog vs. Digital argument is sort of lost on me. I think that "Analog vs. Digital" is often code for strict subtractive vs. FM & waveshaping. For example, analog synths have always been able to be used as FM devices. An example from the more tonal side of things is the amazing "Timesteps" by Wendy Carlos. This piece has some sounds that sound typically analog, I guess, but it also contains a bunch of stuff that people today might think are more digital sounding, utilizing a lot of FM/AM/RM. It was all done on the modular Moog, although there are many sounds in that piece that have a more "west coast" vibe.
For me, the depth & breadth of the palette, and the nature of the control structure is more important the method of sound generation in synthesis. The 261e has a very nice palette of sounds. If you want traditional subtractive, the modulation oscillator has all the traditional waveforms, and a nice crossfader that goes from sine on one end, through triangle to PWM at the top end. Very useful. The principal osc has a wonderful timbre mod section, with three interactive controls, that starts with a sine wave, but allows for many interesting dynamic timbres. Add a dynamic modulation of the principal osc by the mod osc, in any combination of three flavors, and you have a very powerful waveform generator.
This is a very good example of what a sustained banjo with delusions of grandeur might sound like.
ReplyDeleteOne to the Buchla 200e!
Yay!