Making the Serge Paperface Synth - 1 - The Panel

Published on May 31, 2013 DJjondent·199 videos

"The time was 1973.

Moogs, ARPs & Buchlas ruled the day .... all were very expensive and beyond the reach of most electronic musicians. Only rock stars or those with access to a well heeled university could use synthesizers.

Then along came Serge Tcherepnin (at CalArts) who had the vision to make synthesizers available to everyone. His first ones were handbuilt d.i.y. kits.

The first 1973 machine was used by William Jackson on a Greenpeace anti-whaling vessel (1975) .... to make whale sounds. It was taken on a boat to the Pacific Ocean and used to warn the whales (about humans ???). They were more idealistic & innocent times.

It's this beautiful vision of a time long past which I'm trying to recreate,.... keeping this as low tech as possible & using everyday materials.
The early Serge Synths were designed for the common man to be the "People's Synth".
I hope Serge Tcherepnin would have approved.

This first video shows how I'll make the face plate/panel.
Its just a metal sheet with 1/4 inch holes cut into it in a fixed grid.
A lovely simple design.

Onto this is attached a paper template with glue.
This is covered with transparent adhesive film.
It the old days they used mylar.

Future videos will cover installation of the PCBs,trouble shooting & final tests.

The planned Serge modules for this panel are:
Peak/Trough
Dual processor
Triple wave shaper
'73 Filters
Gate/VCA
Mixer

I'm trying to keep the modules as close to the early 1970's designs as I can.
.... using mostly Ken stone PCBs.

Thanks to Ken Stone for the PCB's
http://www.cgs.synth.net/

& Dmitri of COA for his help.

http://www.youtube.com/user/DmitriSFC
http://www.coa-modular.com/2012/06/03..."