"OCTOBER 22ND: Jean Michel Jarre's Management have provided JARRE UK, with their Official Press Release for Jean Michel Jarre's forthcoming 'OXYGENE', a NEW 30th Anniversary CD & DVD Box Set, featuring a NEW Master Recording from the Original 'OXYGENE' Score, and an Exclusive 'LIVE' performance of 'OXYGENE', filmed in both 2D & 3D High-Definition." via JarreUK, where you can find more info.
Have fun synth spotting this one. Click the image for the full size shot.
"This is what a virgin Uninstalled E! board for the Dx7IIFD looks like. Boxed, booked and stickered. No magic special components, just plain old 74HC/CMOS glue logic, EPROMs and some memory ICs. We could clone it if we wanted to, I guess, although, there are a lot of smart cookies out there who would be able to do the whole thing on one chip nowadays without too much drama. Original installation guide was on blue paper, but, I've made it a big more screen friendly black and white, 'cause I'm such a facist like that sometimes'."
YouTube via buchla300. "Once again, not musical really but just showing the S&H and Filter on my Polyfusion. I will do some musical stuff on it soon. Ex Moog employees built these to higher spec and although some might prefer the character of the Moog, I prefer this sonically and feature wise. The quality is absolutely incredible. 5 VCO, 3 LFO, 2 Lo Pass Filters, 2 Hi Pass Filters, 6 Envelopes (2 voltage controlled), dual ring mod, dual s&h, Voltage Controlled Reverb, Octave Divider, 6 Voltage Controlled Amplifiers, Voltage Controlled Phaser, Envelope Follower, Quadrature LFO, Parametric Equalizer, Variable Formant Filter, Quantizer, 7 Mixers, Various DC sources and Attenuators Plus a Velocity & Aftertouch sensitive Keyboard. This used to belong to Hans Zimmer btw A Sequencer rack would be nice, but hey, you can't have it all!"
"Not really an exciting musical video but just showing how accurate the Polyfusion's VCO's are. They have a 10 octave range and track incredibly well. At some point I patch one VCO to another to do some FM and even then, they remain totally in tune (except for when I put one VCO too low by mistake) Try this on most analogues and it just doesn't work! Also, they sound massive. Probably not via YouTube, but standing in front of it is quite an experience."
If you are considering this one, don't miss the note on MIDI below.
"Rare keyboardless version of the Chroma. (Less than 250 expanders produced) The Chroma was the last instrument produced by Arp before the company went bust in the mid 80's. Rhodes then took over Arp and rebadged the Chroma. The Chroma is a very flexible instrument, the architecture is almost modular like, very patchable plus with the benefits of having user memories. Fantastic sounding instrument, on tons of records from the 80s/ 90s. Famous users include Joe Zawinul and Herbie Hancock (Future Shock) amongst others.. Check out Herbie Hancock playing his Chroma in this Youtube video below:
Herbie Hancock jams with his Fairlight CMI
YouTube via froady.
"Herbie shows off while Quincy Jones looks on. 1983" Herbie plays the Chroma starting at 2:40 into the video. Gives you an idea of how great the synth sounds! Personally i think the Chroma is a much better sounding instrument than many of the other classic analogue polysynths, like the Prophet 5, Jupiter or Oberheim OB series. Here are some more details on the synths specifications: -2 VCO oscillators per voice, 8 note polyphonic synthesizer OR 1 VCO per voice and 16 note polyphonic. *Velocity and aftertouch sensitive* -Oscillators have sawtooth and square waveforms. -Ability to modulate the width of the sawtooth wave giving sine and triangle waveforms. -Filter modes include: 4 pole Low pass/4 pole High pass/ 2 pole Low pass/ 2 pole High pass/ 2 pole Band pass/ 2 pole Notch all with resonance. -Filter FM, ring modulation and Oscillator sync! -Four envelopes and glide generator PER voice. 16 LFO waveforms. -Arpeggiator with random mode. Also check out the excellent Rhodes Chroma website for more further information. Super instrument. Sonically its really versatile, great for percussive, cutting lead lines great for experimental and effects sounds (has a ring modulator, frequency modulation, tons of assignable LFOs and envelopes!) also very good for traditional synth sounds, smooth brass, string/ pad sounds etc. Really rich sounding.. It has a dual voice architecture like the CS80, where each oscillator has its own individual signal path and settings, so you can build some really impressive sounding patches. There is also a wide selection of decent patches to download from the Rhodes Chroma website. This unit has just been fully serviced (October 2007) and been given a full bill of health by Roy Paynter, an Arp trained Chroma repair expert in the UK. As well as being serviced the internal PSU has been also replaced with a modern switching unit improving long term reliability and also makes the instrument a lot lighter! The Expander is great if you are limited for space, its about a third of the size and weight of the Chroma keyboard! Also included in the auction is a JL Cooper Chromaface midi interface and manual and the Chroma user manual. I havent been able to get this midi interface working, im not sure i have it hooked up correctly, im sure the midi interface works ok, but thought it was worth mentioning. I was considering purchasing a CC+ midi kit for this unit, a great midi interface new on the market, which really brings the Chroma into 2007, gives it a great midi spec. Unfortunately i didnt get round to it and need need to sell this Chroma now to fund something else. But i highly recommend the buyer to check out the CC+ midi kit"
"There is a new CD out from Symbion project (aka kasson crooker of freezepop & splashdown) and the CD is 100% A6. If you're into Vangelis & Wendy Carlos or just want to hear a raw A6 in action, check it out. Here are a couple of links.
"Visiting the caverns at Luray, Virginia. The organ is played with hammers striking the stalactites." YouTube via lostcheerio. via the Top 10 Bizarre Musical Instruments on The List Universe. The Ondes Martenot and theremin make an appearance on the list as well.
BTW, I created a new tag, Nature, for stuff like this. Check it out. If you find any posts that I missed let me know and as usual I will tag them.
Novation Bass Station (TB-303 emulation) Techno Bassline
"me playing a simple bassline on my novation bass-station which is a real analog synth. the knobs i'm turning: filter section: frequency and resonance, i'm using first 12db then 24db filter"
Novation Bass Station - Trans Europe Express
"me playing parts of kraftwerk's trans-europe-express on my novation bass-station. i'm using both oszillators and the triangle LFO" YouTube via kiezi.
YouTube via practicalsampling. "A brief look at the tools sitting in my basement studio. Several pieces of the gear belong to Gregory Walker and Pete Coggan. On loan for specific sampling projects."
YouTube via 123synthland. "We are pro vintage synth dealers, but you all know that by now. :) Here's the Oberheim Xpander we just put up for sale being controlled by the ARP Sequencer we also just put on the market. Playing the Xpander from an analog sequencer's a lot of fun and makes me wonder why I control mine via MIDI. Hmmm. Email us anytime at minime123@onebox.com"
"OCTOBER 22ND: Jean Michel Jarre's Management have provided JARRE UK, with their Official Press Release for Jean Michel Jarre's forthcoming 'OXYGENE', a NEW 30th Anniversary CD & DVD Box Set, featuring a NEW Master Recording from the Original 'OXYGENE' Score, and an Exclusive 'LIVE' performance of 'OXYGENE', filmed in both 2D & 3D High-Definition."
