Red Acid

Published on Apr 16, 2017 Zachary Berry

"Avalon Bassline, TR-707 and a TC Flashback pedal"

X1L3 - Circuit bent casio PT30 + CBUK CB55 drum module - darkwave synth jam

Published on Apr 16, 2017 manufacturedZ3R0

"Live key jam focussed on subtle use of the delay and ruiner mods. Under pinned by a CB55 drum module built using the board available at: https://www.circuitbenders.co.uk/

Not an overly bent or warped session, but a slick example of what a bent casio can sound like when modified with some finesse.

The CB55 has some mods applied which i've documented and made available through a few avenues such as the synth diy page and my own page on facebook.

Incoming midi to the midi to gate in the eurorack is used to trigger the CB55 along with an AR generator routed to a filter which the drums are passed through. An AR generator is also routed to the filter in the PT30 to gate its filter via the cv input. The filter is gated by the AR generator through the first half and then the cutoff opened up for the melody for the latter section.

The ruiner mod is used subtly through the whole session to shift the wave form of the PT30 for an animated waveshaping/PWM type effect. In a different arena, as with the delay, it can be used to totally screw up the output of the keyboard. Which i'll show in another more extreme upload.

13 raw circuit bends - extreme pitch control - drum/chord/bass boost/mute etc etc.
Ruiner - ringmod/distortion.
Digital delay untethered to behave as a bent delay pedal would.
Sallen key resonant low pass filter.

Lacking the midi of my PT80 configuration but compensating for it with far more mods and a much wider scope on the fucked up spectrum."

Buchla Sketch

Published on Apr 16, 2017 Oren Levy

"After months and months of waiting for parts and building a Buchla 208 Rev 2, it is finally complete."

RIP David Alan Luce - Former President of Moog Music & Creator of the Polymoog

News is in that Dave Luce passed away yesterday, April 15, at the age of 80.  That's him working on the Polymoog back in the day.   I spotted the image and news in this tweet by @casadistortion.

"RIP David Luce, designer of the groundbreaking Polymoog."

You can find a video interview with Dave Luce in NAMM's Oral Histories site here.

See here for a polymoog promotional film featuring David Luce.

via The Buffalo News:

"After a brief stint at Sperry Rand, where he worked on high-speed digital circuitry, Mr. Luce joined Moog Music in 1972 and invented the first commercial polyphonic synthesizer, the Polymoog.

He became head of engineering, was promoted to president of Moog in 1981, and became a co-owner in 1984. He oversaw and contributed directly to the development of Moog synthesizers and other products.

In developing those instruments, he worked with Keith Emerson of Emerson Lake & Palmer and many other artists on whose music his innovations had a significant impact.

After Moog closed in 1987, Mr. Luce embarked on a new career, helping to develop and refine ophthalmic diagnostic instruments at Reichert Technologies. In 2000 he made an important discovery relating to properties of the cornea, and in 2005 he published a now widely cited paper that earned him recognition as the 'Father of Corneal Biomechanics.'"

And via Marc Doty, aka Automatic Gainsay:

"Dave Luce has passed away.

Bill Waytena, the guy who bought R.A. Moog and turned it into Moog Music in the early part of the 70s, hired Dave to create a polyphonic synthesizer. The synthesizer he created was the Polymoog.

The Polymoog was a complicated design that tried to cope with the issues involved in creating an articulated polyphonic design. Polyphonic electronic keyboards had been created for years, going back to 1937, when Harald Bode created the Warbo Formant Organ. But the problem with applying Bob Moog's synthesis concept to polyphony was that the user was probably going to want each voice to be fully articulated... and that was complex and expensive.

Dave's design essentially addressed the challenge by creating an IC chip for each key that gave each key a synthesizer.

The Polymoog was riddled with challenges and failings, but overall, it was a huge success... being the first, and most effective, application of voltage control to polyphony.

Of course, it couldn't have a ladder filter per key, which meant that the Polymoog had great presets, but fell short when it came to polyphonic synthesis.

Bob described Dave as pursuing overly-complicated designs. Anyone who has ever owned or repaired a Polymoog, should probably agree.

But still... the Polymoog got us started in the modern age, and it was a popular and useful design. Dave Luce worked hard for Moog Music, and is responsible for a lot in regard to that which was created by that company in the 1970s.

Thank you, Dave, for all of your great work.

http://buffalonews.com/…/david-alan-luce-moog-president-pi…/

P.S. We should also thank Keith Emerson... because his input on the Apollo design led to the improved Polymoog."

You can check out the Moog Apollo in the Bob Moog Foundation Archives videos posted here.

Update via Ben Luce in the comments:

"This is Ben Luce, Dave Luce's son. I appreciate the commentary above very much.
Thank you for posting it. I would like to comment though that I have never agreed
with Bob Moog's characterization of my father as pursuing overly-complicated designs.
As your good commentary above notes, my Dad was struggling with very complicated design issues
with the polymoog, and was doing so in era where integrated circuits and instruments of the complexity
of the polymoog were quite new and unexplored.

But perhaps more to the point, to my understanding the primary failing of the poly was that the individual
circuit cards for each key were not soldered down: They were intentionally left removable because
there was some well grounded concern that voltage spikes from bad power on the grid
could cause the special chips that each carried to fail occasionally, necessitating
occasional replacements. As it turned out, these chips almost never failed, which I think is a testament to
the careful design of the chips in terms of component tolerances and such, and of the circuitry
that supported them. So in fact, the failure was really an engineering problem, not
a failure of my Dad's design work per se. Moreover, my Dad worked on all sorts of synthesizers for
Moog Music after that, and created some before that, and in no way were these generally plagued by some
tendency towards over complicated design. The same holds for his subsequent work on
ophthalmic instruments, which led to him finally to be recognized widely as "The Father
of Corneal Biomechanics".

In truth, my father actually loved and sought simplicity in
his work wherever it could be found. He was a true physicist, and physicists are steeped in the
virtues of simplicity and symmetry and mathematical beauty from the get-go.

Finally, it should be mentioned in this context that Bog Moog only worked directly with my
father for a few years, and I don't believe he worked very directly with him on
detailed circuit design issues, except perhaps when my Dad was first involved with improving
some of Bob's older designs. Bog also made those comments long after having left the company for
reasons that had little to do with my father, and that these may reflect some overall bitterness
about that not related to my Dad. For my Dad's part, I never heard him say an ill word about Bog.
He greatly admired Bob's work, and was proud to worked for him and for Moog Music in general."

Update: see this post for a recent restoration of David Alan Laces Polymoog.

a standing still stunt 2017 04 16

Published on Apr 16, 2017 NomNomChomsky

"Using the classic ipad app Samplr, through the Moog MF104z analog delay, together with a Phaser beat and Cluster Flux hihats played on the MPC1000... and Moog RME handling the bass duties.
#soundsketch #moog #ipad #samplr #analogdelay #clusterflux #moogerfooger #phaser #mpc #rme"

Pin Electronics & Ramcur Portabella preview RingMod and FilterMod.

Published on Apr 16, 2017 Pin Electronics & Ramcur

Vintage Oberheim SEM SN 0191

Note: Auction links are affiliate links for which the site may be compensated.

via this auction

"For sale is a vintage oberheim SEM module. It is factory powered. It is 40 years old this year! The date and serial where probably hand written by Tom way back when..

It is fully working with one minor issue. The lp/hp/bp knob is scratchy when you turn it but only when you turn it. No noise when it is stationary. The synth was serviced by switched on in Austin two years ago.

See my other auctions. Spring cleaning in the studio."

CLICK FOR MORE »

Roland SH-1

Published on Apr 16, 2017 SSM Curtis

"Roland SH-1, 1978, 1 VCO, Sub OSC, four OTA-stages with CA3080"

Update:

CLICK FOR MORE »

Nodes - Special eMotion

Published on Apr 16, 2017 Alba Ecstasy

"I hope, my friends, you all had a beautiful day! Sending my love to you!
atmo: Korg microKorg XL,
pads: Roland JU-06,
drums: Roland JD-Xi,
sequence: Virus Ti2,
lead: Promars System-1,
Delay: Roland Demora.
Both microKorg XL and JU-06 are sequenced by Ableton.

ae http://www.albaecstasy.ro"

Generative Music by Gibran Curtiss

Published on Apr 16, 2017 Gibran Curtiss

Playlist:

1. Generative music - part I

"Still an embryonic project of Generative Music in Arduino plataform and Midi protocol using simple biological algorithms to birth , growth, reproduction and death , together with locomotion and collision . This video was the result of one day of coding, so.... The 4 tempo was reduced to 1 to make a little short video. Long journey yet to come."

2. Generative Music - part II

"Second video of generative music project.
Arduino Uno replaced by Arduino Mega.
Arduino goes to USB MIDI interface, that goes to laptop running ableton driving 3 Midi channels.
The original algorithm was improved a lot and were added some controls to make intentional transitions.

Credits: Adam Kumpf for the core algorithm."

3. Generative music - part III

"Another sample with a generative music Arduino prototype."

4. Generative Music - part IV

"Another great step forward to my generetive music project.
These are the 2 major changes in project:
a)the first 3 videos I've made, the Arduino was connected to a laptop by MIDI. Now 2 full 5V CV OUTs available (3 at the moment I'm writing this) :-) provided by a DAC MCP4725
b)improvement into evolution algorithm allowing to choose to evolute or not each parameter individually. This way we can let the machine evolute by itself and then step in anytime to control the evolution.
Finally the unit is connected to a real modular synth!!! I'm very very really happy!!!!!!!!.
This video is a very simple path:
-one CV to a Qu-Bit Chord
-another CV to 4MS Spectral Multiband Resonator."

5. Generative Music V

"This is the 5th video of an Arduino Generative Music project. Finally a reasonable result. 4 midi channel / 4 CV outputs (0-5V). In this video only 2 channels used."

6. Generative Music Part VI

"This is the Part VI of the Generative Music project. A friend asked me to explore all 4 channels. So here it is. A lot better that last one video. But still a lot to improve on the next. Remember that this project is a SUPPORT tool to provide some melody, not make an entire song. Now the next goal is to attach a solar panel and some sensors : temperature , pressure, light, air humidity, soil humidity, wind velocity. All together and a little math will be able to make music according to weather variations including wake up and go to sleep. It will be an self sufficient being. Like a mini Frankenstein that makes music."

7. Generative Music part VII

"This time the fully functional prototype of the generative music module patched to the 4MS SMR passing thru a custom Spring Reverb.
One square wave oscillator with a fixed frequency feeding the 4MS input.
The final configuration of the module is :
-4 (0V to +5V) CV outs with buffered MCP4725 DACs.
-1 Trigger out with led indicator;
-parameter / value knobs to control the internal variables;

Again, some code improvements to do a better control over the note distribution to CVs.
The evolution of the generative module was locked this time just to play around with 4MS, basically, the same melody all the time but exploring the internal variations of the CVs.
Remember that the whole sound was played ONLY by the 4MS. No drum machines, no other modules."

8. Generative Music part VIII

"This time added a control to interval or cycle a group of 2,4,8,16,32 notes.
Unfortunately this project will be suspended for a while.
The effort now is to develop better melodies but I dont have much time exclusively to it.
Thank you!"