EXPLORING THE ELGAM CAROUSEL

video upload by Vintage Audio Institute Italia

"The mythical Elgam Carousel from 1976 - is it a toy or a songwriting tool?
It's at least safe to say it's an analog drum machine and arpeggiator, with 3 chord sounds and a bass line generator that swings real good - here recorded completely dry without effects.

The Groove box that sparked todays hype of the genre - a stunningly well-designed piece of gear with a great analog vibe that stays relevant. Originally, this was the Crazy Hands section from the Elgam Broadway organ.

The Carousel is comprised of 4 sections :
1. Drum Machine
2. Bass Section - generating a choice of two bass-lines
3. Chord section - three sounds (Harpsichord, Honki tonk and Piano)
4. Arpeggio section - one sound with adjustable decay and 2 stackable harmonies.

The melodic sections change depending on the rhythm engaged and follow the tonality of the keyboard. Sonically the sounds gel really nicely, this machine is the sum of all its parts, the rhythms and bass lines are well-programmed, the bass has great lines and the arpeggiator adds that magic.
The drum section offers 15 fixed rhythms of great analog drum sounds. No individual drum sound mute options, but hey - at least you can add maracas.

You have the option to select the tonality with one finger for simple root chords and selecting minor, 7th or diminished with the foot pedal. Or you can choose to operate it in manual mode and potentially play more complicated chords.

In manual mode the bass and arpeggiator only makes sense of chords of three notes while the chord section reads all the notes at the same time. On the back we usually have a single audio output and a pedal switch connector for stop/start and minor and 7th but this one had some other mods added that were disconnected.

This unit was just serviced and will go up for sale next week so holler if you're interested - it's in good condition"