Vako Orchestron, Model C

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"Designed as a superior alternative to the Mellotron, the Orchestron is fully polyphonic and operates on principle of modulated light measured by photoelectric cells... The Vako Orchestron elevated the concept of the Optigan into the professional musical instrument market with higher quality, more reliable parts and construction. Similarly, the Orchestron uses optical disks loaded with waveforms that are read by a light bar reader and turned into sound. The result of higher-quality parts and better build is a unique mix of really nice lo-fi sounding orchestral strings, chorus, brass, and other sonic possibilities with much better playability. It can be heard on the Yes album "Relayer" and the Foreigner hit song "Cold As Ice"... and has also been used by Kraftwerk, Tangerine Dream, Richie Blackmore's Rainbow, Michael Penn, Semisonic and other recording artists over the years. Less than 100 Orchestrons were produced and it is estimated that less than forty remain in existence today. The Orchestron is revered and very sought after by vintage keyboard enthusiasts for the murky atmospheric sounds it produces and is very inspiring to play and improvise on.

It comes with 6 valuable, original disks easily worth $100-200 each: Vocal Choir (2 discs), Flute, Violin, Cello and Pipe Organ [note: most of the pictures shows only five of the discs, but the gallery photo shows all six discs]. This vintage Orchestron is currently UNTESTED, DOES NOT TURN ON, AND IS SOLD AS-IS WITH NO RETURNS NOR WARRANTEE. It might have incurred water damage in the past, as I see mildew on the back of the case, so that's likely related to why it doesn't turn on, and so it is probably a parts machine."

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VAKO Orchestron Model Double D

via this auction

"This unit was most likely the last unit built by the company which was called Technical Research Institute, Inc at the time it was manufactured. Orchestrons were formerly built by a company called Viking, and prior to that, they were called VAKO. The extremely brilliant and talented former Moog sales rep David Van Koevering started and operated the three companies, all of which existed within three-four years of one another and were basically the same company with different investors.

There were two or three odd one-off prototype models (model X for example) that were never fully realized or fully functioning, however this super rare Model Double D was actually a Standard Model and fully realized. It is also perhaps the most usable and reliable model, and only two are known to exist that were made under the Technical Research Institute Inc label. There was one (not as nice) made and labeled VAKO (built for the band America).

This particular example I am offering was never sold by the factory as the company dissolved soon after its completion and this unit remained in limbo while the company was dissolved. It has also never been played or used by anyone. Its retail price in 1976 was $7,000. I own and have owned many Orchestron instruments. The Model D versions are the best designs and any double drive / double keyboard Orchestron is especially useful. This unit is the most desirable and rare of all Orchestrons built and it is literally new old stock. The unit has sat unplayed its entire life and may require some tweaking and general servicing. It is being sold without warranty or statement of operating condition. Sold in “AS IS” condition only with NO RETURNS BEING OFFERED.

Fortunately the wonderful Pea Hicks at optigan.com offers remastered, remanufactured disks of all original 8 Orchestron sounds plus 6 additional sounds (14 total). Unfortunately some of the remastered disks are already out of production, however for $100 each I will agree to sell one new copy from my collection of any or all of the 14 remastered disks to the buyer of this unit. I have already had a crate made professionally (see pics) which may be useful for transportation. Anyone wishing to have the unit freight shipped will be offered the unused crate for $375 in addition to the purchase price..."

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New 2011 Remastered Vako Orchestron Discs - CELLO, FLUTE & VIBES

YouTube Uploaded by optigandotcom on Sep 26, 2011

"Now available at http://www.optigan.com/shoptigan

Now available for pre-order! A new release in our line of remastered Vako Orchestron discs, CELLO. It's unlikely that there will be sufficient demand to do a second run of 25 of these discs, so your best bet is to buy as many of these as you need while you can! Any future additional copies will most likely be done as one-offs, which are twice as expensive to produce, and thus will cost twice as much.

CELLO is remastered from the original Orchestron master tapes. Please excuse my awful playing here, which is just a quick noodle to demonstrate the sound!

PLEASE NOTE: This disc WILL NOT play properly in an Optigan! They WILL play, but the sounds will NOT be mapped correctly to the keyboard- they will be mapped mostly haphazardly across the chord buttons. Please don't order this disc expecting to easily use it in an Optigan. In the future we will be porting the Orchestron sounds to the Optigan- please be patient! :)

Stay tuned for more Orchestron discs, both new and remastered titles!"

New 2011 Remastered Vako Orchestron Disc - FLUTE

Uploaded by optigandotcom on Sep 26, 2011

"Now available at http://www.optigan.com/shoptigan

Now available for pre-order! A new release in our line of remastered Vako Orchestron discs, FLUTE. It's unlikely that there will be sufficient demand to do a second run of 25 of these discs, so your best bet is to buy as many of these as you need while you can! Any future additional copies will most likely be done as one-offs, which are twice as expensive to produce, and thus will cost twice as much.

FLUTE is remastered from the original Orchestron master tapes. Please excuse my awful playing here, which is just a quick noodle to demonstrate the sound!

PLEASE NOTE: This disc WILL NOT play properly in an Optigan! They WILL play, but the sounds will NOT be mapped correctly to the keyboard- they will be mapped mostly haphazardly across the chord buttons. Please don't order this disc expecting to easily use it in an Optigan. In the future we will be porting the Orchestron sounds to the Optigan- please be patient! :)

Stay tuned for more Orchestron discs, both new and remastered titles!"

vibes rev b demo


Update:

New 2011 Vako Orchestron Disc - VIBRAPHONE

Vintage VAKO ORCHESTRON Model C

via this auction
"Vintage 1975 VAKO ORCHESTRON Model C with 5 different sound discs (VIOLIN, CELLO, FLUTE, VOCAL CHOIR and PIPE ORGAN) and original lens cleaning wand. Designed as a superior alternative to the Mellotron, the Orchestron is fully polyphonic and operates on a principle of modulated light measured by photoelectric cells... and can be heard on the Yes album "Relayer" and the Foreigner hit song "Cold As Ice"... and has also been used by Kraftwerk, Tangerine Dream, Richie Blackmore's Rainbow, Michael Penn, Semisonic and other recording artists over the years. Less than 100 Orchestrons were produced and it is estimated that less than forty remain in existence today. The Orchestron is revered and very sought after by vintage keyboard enthusiasts for the murky atmospheric sounds it produces and is very inspiring to play and improvise on..." This one spotted and in via Dieter.

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VAKO ORCHESTRON Videos

YouTube Uploaded by dietervanmarcke on Jun 13, 2011

Playlist:
01 vocal choir 2
02 piano 2
03 violin 2
04 solo French horns 2
05 saxophone 2
06 marimba 2
07 pipe organ 2
08 tremelo elek guitar 2
09 solo female voice 2
10 organ 2
11 string ensemble 2
12 celo 2
13 flute 2
15 radiovox 2

RARE FARRELL MUSIC- ORCHESTRON SYNTH PHOTO

via this auction

"RARE VOLUME 1, NUMBER 1 ISSUE OF FARRELL MUSIC. FEATURING VERY RARE SYNTH VAKO POLYPHONIC ORCHESTRON. 12 A4 SIZE PAGES OF MUSIC PRODUCTS."

Vako Orchestron - Kraftwerk - Trans-Europe Express & Radioactivity

YouTube via dietervanmarcke | March 02, 2010 |
via Pea Hicks of http://www.optigan.com/
"Playing some snippets of "Trans-Europe Express" by Kraftwerk letting you hear the Orchestron's "Violins" sound.
The sound you hear is the actual sound used by Kraftwerk."

Vako Orchestron and Eminent 1600 Orchestra - Radioactivity (Kraftwerk)

YouTube via dietervanmarcke | February 25, 2010 |

"Playing some snippets of Radioactivity (Kraftwerk) demonstrating the "Vocal Choir" sound of the Orchestron.
This sound is the exact sound (not a replica, it IS this sound) Kraftwerk used on Radioactivity and a small number of other songs.
As you can hear, I've got some problems with pitch stability. This is due to a worn out belt that connects the motor and the wheel that actually spins the record.
More info about the Orchestron: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchestron

The thing underneath the Orchestron is the Eminent 1600 Orchestra. This is not the intrument used by Jean-Michel Jarre (that's the 310U) thought it features the same sounds, and has a built in String Ensemble which is more or less the same than the Arp Solina String Ensemble. As you can see, I've got some problems with the contacts of the bass pedals.
It's also a pity that you can only hardly hear the sound of the bass pedals. That's because I captured this with my Nokia N900, the audio and the video...

And, sorry for the bad playing. :-)"

Vako Orchestron Inside

dietervanmarcke | March 02, 2010 |

"The inside of a Vako Orchestron Model C."

orch marimba

YouTube via peahix
"From Optigan.com! This is a quick audio demo of the first NEW Vako Orchestron disc since 1975 - MARIMBA. This is a recording of an acoustic marimba from the original Optigan/Orchestron master tapes. This particular sound never made it onto any Optigan or Orchestron disc... until now! Please note that my Orchestron is not in the greatest health, and I also live close to some radio towers that cause some pretty bad interference. Hum, buzz, radio intereference and the occasional scratchy key contact should be disregarded in your evaluation of the quality of the marimba sound.

We are now taking pre-orders for this disc at http://www.optigan.com/shoptigan/. The initial run will be limited to 25 copies, and we will require 15 pre-orders before we go to press."

Update: the official release:

"Now available for pre-order at:

http://www.optigan.com/shoptigan/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=2&products_id=39

New 2009 Vako Orchestron Disc - MARIMBA

MARIMBA is an entirely NEW sound for the Orchestron. The source is an acoustic marimba recording from the original Optigan/Orchestron master tapes. This marimba scale was never used for any Optigan or Orchestron disc... until now!

As soon as we have 15 pre-orders, we'll go to press and start shipping. It's unlikely that there will be sufficient demand to do a second run of 25 of these discs, so your best bet is to buy as many of these as you need while you can! Any future additional copies will most likely be done as one-offs, which are twice as expensive to produce, and thus will cost twice as much.

PLEASE NOTE: This disc WILL NOT play properly in an Optigan! They WILL play, but the sounds will NOT be mapped correctly to the keyboard- they will be mapped mostly haphazardly across the chord buttons. Please don't order this disc expecting to easily use it in an Optigan. In the future we will be porting the Orchestron sounds to the Optigan- please be patient! :)

Stay tuned for more Orchestron discs, both new and remastered titles!

Also, for those who missed it the first time around, we're also now taking pre-orders for a second pressing of our Optigan disc RADIOAKTIVOX!

http://www.optigan.com/shoptigan/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=2&products_id=38"

2009 Remastered Vako Orchestron Disc - SOLO FRENCH HORN

YouTube via peahix
"Now available for PRE-ORDER! The second of our newly remastered Orchestron discs, SOLO FRENCH HORN. As soon as we have 15 pre-orders, we'll go to press and start shipping. It's unlikely that there will be sufficient demand to do a second run of 25 of these discs, so your best bet is to buy as many of these as you need while you can! Any future additional copies will most likely be done as one-offs, which are twice as expensive to produce, and thus will cost twice as much.

PLEASE NOTE: This disc WILL NOT play properly in an Optigan! They WILL play, but the sounds will NOT be mapped correctly to the keyboard- they will be mapped mostly haphazardly across the chord buttons. Please don't order this disc expecting to easily use it in an Optigan. In the future we will be porting the Orchestron sounds to the Optigan- please be patient! :)

This is not a simple photocopy of an original vintage Orchestron disc, it's completely re-mastered and re-created from scratch, using the original sounds from
the Orchestron master tapes. In other words, this disc won't sound 100% exactly like the original discs in every tiny detail. Specifically:

* Since there's usually no way to precisely identify the exact 2-second excerpt that was originally used from each sustained note on the master tapes (some of which can be 8-10 seconds long), we've simply chosen 2-second excerpts that sounded good in our editing situation.
* Our French Horn disc has a little more low-end and a bit less upper-mids than the original. These can both be adjusted with EQ if you're trying to precisely duplicate the overall tonality of the original discs.
* Our disc has a bit more white noise than the original, apparently an unavoidable result of the mastering process.
* The loop joints on our disc are very smooth and for the most part don't pop/thud the way the originals do.
* We've staggered the loop joints evenly across the disc (instead of placing them all at 12 o'clock), so that no two notes hit their loop joint at the same time.
* Some of our discs may have very slight periodic crosstalk on some notes (mostly noticeable on higher notes), owing to miniscule variations in the center hole punching tolerance. Said crosstalk should be well within the acceptable limits that Orchestron users are accustomed to.

So, will our disc satisfy the absolute purist? Probably not, and we won't attempt to argue otherwise. But despite the differences, to the more casual player our disc sounds very much like the original. We're confident that you'll love the sound and quality of this disc, but if you're not totally satisfied, we're happy to offer a 100% money-back guarantee. This is a labor of love for us, and we want to make sure you feel the love too!

Since the original discs came in plain white jackets, so will ours. We will be replicating the original printed paper sleeves- spelling/grammar errors and all.

Soon we will have all eight of the original Orchestron discs remastered, as well as a few brand new titles. Stay tuned!

To order, please visit http://www.optigan.com/shoptigan"

Newly Remastered Vako Orchestron Disc - SAXOPHONE

"Newly Remastered Vako Orchestron Disc - SAXOPHONE

As soon as we have 15 pre-orders, we'll go to press and start shipping. It's unlikely that there will be sufficient demand to do a second run of 25 of these discs, so your best bet is to buy as many of these as you need while you can! Any future additional copies will most likely be done as one-offs, which are twice as expensive to produce, and thus will cost twice as much.

PLEASE NOTE: This disc WILL NOT play properly in an Optigan! They WILL play, but the sounds will NOT be mapped correctly to the keyboard- they will be mapped mostly haphazardly across the chord buttons. Please don't order this disc expecting to easily use it in an Optigan. In the future we will be porting the Orchestron sounds to the Optigan- please be patient! :)

This is not a simple photocopy of an original vintage Orchestron disc, it's completely re-mastered and re-created from scratch, using the original sounds from the Orchestron master tapes. In other words, this disc won't sound 100% exactly like the original discs in every tiny detail. Specifically:

-Since there's usually no way to precisely identify the exact 2-second excerpt that was originally used from each sustained note on the master tapes (some of which can be 8-10 seconds long), we've simply chosen 2-second excerpts that sounded good in our editing situation.

-Our Saxophone disc has a little less low-end and a bit more high-end than the original. These can both be easily adjusted with EQ if you're trying to precisely duplicate the overall tonality of the original discs.

-The loop joints on our disc are very smooth and for the most part don't pop/thud the way the originals do.

-We've staggered the loop joints evenly across the disc (instead of placing them all at 12 o'clock), so that no two notes hit their loop joint at the same time.

-Some of our discs may have very slight periodic crosstalk on some notes (mostly noticeable on higher notes), owing to miniscule variations in the center hole punching tolerance. Said crosstalk should be well within the acceptable limits that Orchestron users are accustomed to.

So, will our disc satisfy the absolute purist? Probably not, and we won't attempt to argue otherwise. But despite the differences, to the more casual player our disc sounds very much like the original. We're confident that you'll love the sound and quality of this disc, but if you're not totally satisfied, we're happy to offer a 100% money-back guarantee. This is a labor of love for us, and we want to make sure you feel the love too!

Since the original discs came in plain white jackets, so will ours. We will be replicating the original printed paper sleeves- spelling/grammar errors and all.

Soon we will have all eight of the original Orchestron discs remastered, as well as a few brand new titles. Stay tuned!

Also, don't miss our new Optigan disc - MOD ROCK!
http://shoptigan.ecrater.com/product.php?pid=3876420

For more information, please visit http://www.blogtigan.wordpress.com or http://www.optigan.com"

Update:

2009 Remastered Vako Orchestron Disc - SAXOPHONE

2009 Remastered Vako Orchestron Disc - SAXOPHONE from Pea Hicks on Vimeo.

VAKO ORCHESTRON DOUBLE "C"

via this auction
"Vako double "c" model orchestron!!!!! Exceedingly rare, exceptional, dual manual version of the legendary orchestron, only a handful of these dual manual versions remain in existence, only fifty units, including all models, were ever made!!! I unearthed this beauty in a forgotten, hidden back room, in a basement of an ancient music store and recording studio in butte, montana! Of all places!! It literally sat, in a room, for 28 years in a flight case, forgotten. Can you just believe it???? Well, it's all true, kiddies. So now, you got a shot at owning a piece of progressive rock history, and i don't think it will pass by this way again. You can google up all the info you desire on this unique and wonderful contraption, of course, it's the much more developed big brother, to that upstart snotty optigan, and it's other bratty sibling, the chilton talentmaker. They all read optical light discs, and, i have it on pretty good authority that these optical light discs are all about to return to production, with custom versions available to god's special people. That means expanded beyond the original master tape libraries. So, on the double "c", you get to play two different discs at the same time!!! What more could you ever want? Anyway, it comes with the aforementioned heavy duty flight case, but, and i want to shed a tear here, (sic) the original (8) optical light discs are corrupted from exposure. But, i do have them, and the special custom original partitioned case that they originally came in! So, there it is. What are ya gonna do? Take out 2nd mortgage on the house, or, rob the kid's college fund? I know, beg the folks for an advance on your inheritance!! >>>>>>>>>>>>> vako dual manual double "c" orchestron!!!" via Ivan

The Utopia synth bass in context

YouTube via RothHandle
"I had some spare time today so I started messing with a little track using the utopia synth as the bass...

This little film was shot with my Nokia mobile phone at my studio Roth Händle. This is where I spend my days working with bands, recording albums and tuning Orchestrons. If you are curious about the studio please take a stroll by www.roth-handle.nu It hasnt been updated for a while but you might find some of the stuff slightly interesting."

Recording a Utopia Synth/modular synth bass

"I had some spare time today so I started messing with a little track using the utopia synth as the bass..."

Orchestron, Optigan & Talentmaker fest.

YouTube via RothHandle
"Yesterday I decided to record a little line on the Vako Orchestron. While I was recording it I decided to walk you through the Optical organs at the Roth Händle studio. For more info, bookings and blogness please visit www.roth-handle.nu"