The GREATEST Custom Studio Keyboard Stand!

via this auction

Some great synth spotting below as well. Note the Con Brio, Conn Electric, 360 Systems, and OB-Mx amongst others..

"Perfect for someone with a large keyboard/synth collection and want to keep it close without a lotta space. It is a 6 tier keyboard stand for wall mounting. It's VERY strong, and mounts to the wall (please find studs to screw into!) securely with long screws/bolts. It's welded iron, with some foam pads added to each tier. Over the years, I've had many people approach me about making another, but I never did. It will be a bear to ship, but it's possible. I'll leave it at "local pickup" for the auction, and IF you want to ship it, we'll deal with the cost them."

CON BRIO ADS DIGITAL SYNTHESIZER BROCHURE

via this auction

"vintage CON BRIO 'ADVANCED DIGITAL SYNTHESIZER' brochure from 1980 AES show 2 page foldout on the ADS 100 and an insert of the 2nd generation ADS200"

If you aren't familiar with the Con Brio ADS, see the Con Brio label below.

Matlab Synthesizer - Beethoven: "Waldstein" Sonata

YouTube Uploaded by ScrollingMusic on Mar 3, 2011

"Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827): Piano Sonata No. 21 in C major, Op. 53. I. Allegro con brio

This sonata is considered to be one of Beethoven's greatest and most recognized, and one of the three particularly notable ones of his middle period. Beethoven completed this sonata, one of his most technically challenging works, in the summer of 1804. During this time, Beethoven had begun to develop hearing problems that would lead to his deafness in later life. The "Waldstein" name comes from the sonata's dedication, to Count Ferdinand Ernst Gabriel von Waldstein of Vienna, a close personal friend of Beethoven's.

This synthesized rendition was generated by our Matlab synthesizer. For this piece, we programmed a very velocity-sensitive sound whose harmonics change with changing dynamic levels. Volume levels alone are not enough to convey the vast scope and grandiosity of this work. The colors in the scrolling visualization correspond to dynamic levels as well, with red being the loudest notes in the piece."

CLICK FOR MORE »

Motorola Virtual ARP 2500

via timeloard

Motorola TV with ARP 2500

"Only 2 simple controls..."

Con Brio meets PPG Realizer?

Whoa...

Con Brio Update

See the second update in this post.

Con Brio Update

see the update in this post.
Remember to check all of the current day's posts for red Updates throughout the day, or search for Update: with the top left search box on this site. As the saying goes, if you snooze you lose.

FUTURESPACE ORCHESTRA

flickr by Kiel Bryant

full size

"VintageTech electric organ/synthesizer looks to be on loan from a Tatooine Cantina -- or Captain Kirk's garage band."

That would be the Con Brio ADS200. Click on the Con Brio label below for more.

Update via Kiel in the comments: "Here's what Sellam (VintageTech president) gave me about it: 'That's the famous Con Brio ADS-200, a way-ahead-of-its-time synthesizer produced in the late 1970s/early 1980s. It was a project by 4 gard students at CalTech. They turned it into a company but since they were all engineers it failed pretty quickly, and only a couple of these were made. This is one of only two known to exist.

It was exhibited at the last VCF, along with the ADS-200R (the portable version). We got the ADS-200R working again recently, thanks in part to one of the original designers who lives in San Jose.

Both belong to Brian Kehew, and this one has been in my warehouse for a while as I'm trying to restore it for him (needs a new disk drive and a few electronic connectors fixed).' "

Update via Sellam in the comments: "I'm not sure what Brian has done to document our restoration progress online, but I'm sure at some point there will be ample web space devoted to these synths.

This is what I currently know (some details might be a little off):

1) Details about the ADS-200 in Kiel's photo can be found on the Con Brio Wikipedia page1b) According to the above link, it was THREE CalTech grad students, not four ;)

2) The 200R model is a portable version of the 200 pictured above. Brian Kehew scored it from Don Lieberman a couple years back. Don (one of the original of the three CalTech grads) had it in his workshop and was just about to throw it out when Brian made contact. Brian brought it up from San Jose to my warehouse, we plugged it in, and it came right up. It was actually in nearly flawless condition. We were able to get it mostly functional using the system disks from the 200 model above.

2b) We finally got it totally functional (well, 98%...) earlier this year. Don and Brian came up and we worked on it for half an afternoon and got the last problem solved (the keyboards). We played old samples stored on dusty old 8" floppy disks. The 2% that still needs to get functional is the video. The system disks we're using were coded for the 200, which uses a different video driver chip or something. We can boot the 200R using the same disks but the video is horizontally shifted and rolling. We can alleviate it by manipulating the video controls, but we don't get to see the whole screen. We get to see enough to load/edit/play samples, etc. Fixing this will be a matter of software, and that will take lots more work and hacking. Unless we can find an original system disk for the 200R.

3) The 200 model needs a new 8" floppy drive. Oddly, the one that it used is some rare CDC (Control Data Corporation) model for which I cannot find documentation. If anyone knows where to get documentation and a schematic for a CDC BR8A8 8" floppy disk then that would be fab. I tried substituting different 8" drives but none will work. Hmm...I just had a thought: maybe it's NOT the disk drive but rather the controller, or a cable. But anyway, can't say for sure until I know what the BR8A8 is equivalent to, or what's special about it, if anything.

4) As soon as the 200 is restored it will go back to Brian and he will do some magick with it. We (or at least I) hope to reprise the demo at the next VCF.

5) I video'd our restoration session as I thought it might be historically significant. It includes audio from the 200R. I'll get that digitized and up on YouTube as soon as someone invents a time machine so I can get more hours in the day. If someone wants to volunteer to do this then I'll be happy to get you a copy of the tape (Kiel?)

http://www.vintage.org
http://www.vintagetech.com"

Tara Busch and the Con Brio 200

analogsuicide.com

via https://twitter.com/TaraBusch

click on the Con Brio link below for more posts on this super rare synth.

More Con Brio Pics

more pics here via synthwood. Be sure to check these out full size.
Others here.

follow up to this post where you'll find samples.

Top: Con Brio ADS100
Bottom: Con Brio ADS200

Con Brio Samples

I just updated this post with samples of this unique and rare digital synthesizer, via Brian Kehew of The Moog Cookbook.

Con Brio

via Dave

"Beautiful shots of old computers in a Wired gallery today... Brain was
there with one of his two Con Brio systems"

"Behold, the Con Brio Digital Synthesizer! Only four of these babies were ever made, explained Brian Kehew, who is now the proud owner of two of them. Despite their unique design and formidable musical abilities, the units never attained commercial success.

Con Brio synthesizers were originally designed during the late 1970s and housed five 6502 microprocessors. The innovate interface provide a CRT display with both graphics and text to allow composing and editing down to the waveform."

The Con Brio Rises! - Update

I just updated this post with some interesting info from Brian in the comments. Be sure to check it out. Scroll down to the red Update at the bottom.

Brian Kehew of The MOOG Cookbook Looking for a Website Designer

Via Brian Kehew of The MOOG Cookbook.

"I have some good info collected on old Minimoog, lots of details of the variations/changes over the years. It was intended for a website that never happened. Also have good info on the 360 Systems keyboard - which is a constant mystery to people who own one. I have spent some years doing research on it. Finally, the Con Brio restoration/documentation is going on - and also need a good website. I want simple stuff, nothing tricky, but would like it to look good. This is nothing "for pay" as these sites would be just to disseminate good information to people who need it. I want help from someone who is quick at website work. Just text and photos, maybe hosting and playing a few soundfiles?"

You can reach Brian at briankehew at gmail.com

Vintage Computer Festival: The rare, historic, and bizarre

Click here for a video on CNet covering this year's Vintage Computer Festival. The Con Brio makes an appearance at about 2:09 left.

via James Grahame of the excellent Retro Thing.

Con Brio ADS 200R Vintage Synthesizer

YouTube via therealretrosynth.

"Brian Kehew demoing the only Con Brio ADS 200R in existence at the Vintage Computer Festival at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View California."

Update: if you remember in this prior post I noted that someone mentioned the Con Brio was not producing sounds on its own. Devo just left the following comment:
"Just wanted to clarify... The sound that was heard of the Con Brio at the VCFX this weekend WAS indeed coming from the synth itself. It is true that the synth isn't 100% functional (yet), but the parts that need to be made "whole" still, are the connection from the keyboards to the "brain" (mostly), which will be sorted out soon, hopefully. The sounds that were heard consisted of existing sequences on the original 8" floppys, coupled with existing sound-patches from the same orig. disks (of which, the OS is derived). BTW: the Con Brio sounds as good (or, dare I say, BETTER) than it looks. Awesome! I hope this info helps. Much kudos to all (past and present) involved! "

ConBrio ADS200 lightshow

ConBrio ADS200 lightshow II

YouTubes via bdufdiskc. via Brandon Daniel in the comments of this post.

"Control panel lightshow on a ConBrio ADS200 digital FM/Additive synthesizer, taken at the 10th Vintage Computer Festival" Listen closely and you will hear that it has 64 notes of polyphony with 16 oscillators per note. This means you could have up to 1024 oscillators at once back in 1978 or shortly after. :)

For those that want real audio, word from an anonymous reader is that it is not 100% yet, so there was no audio actually coming from the synth - just recordings playing in the background.

Update via Devo in the comments:
"Just wanted to clarify... The sound that was heard of the Con Brio at the VCFX this weekend WAS indeed coming from the synth itself. It is true that the synth isn't 100% functional (yet), but the parts that need to be made "whole" still, are the connection from the keyboards to the "brain" (mostly), which will be sorted out soon, hopefully. The sounds that were heard consisted of existing sequences on the original 8" floppys, coupled with existing sound-patches from the same orig. disks (of which, the OS is derived). BTW: the Con Brio sounds as good (or, dare I say, BETTER) than it looks. Awesome! I hope this info helps. Much kudos to all (past and present) involved! "

Con Brio Desktop

Nice wallpaper created from the shot of the previous post. It was posted in the comments via Dave. I just liked the way it looks with Roland's The Synthesizer next to it.

Con Brio Pics

click here for more pics via Stephen Jones. Follow up to this post.

Con Brio ADS200... in a van... down by the river...

A little humor in the title for any fans of Chris Farley and his classic Van Down by The River skit on SNL (Saturday Night Live).

Humor aside, Brian Kehew of The Moog Cookbook sent me some exclusive shots of his Con Brio ADS200. You can check them out here. More will follow after the show mentioned below. If you remember from this previous post, only two of these were made and this one has just been resuscitated. If you are in the area you can see and hear it at "The FAIR and the MUSEUM: Sat/Sun 10-6 pm!! Exhibits from 2-6pm!"

More info on this shots from Brian:
You will see -
1) Con Brio ADS200 - the one I've had for over almost 15 years. This was me driving it up to a "vintage computer warehouse" in Silicon Valley - hoping we could get it running again.
2) Con Brio ADS200-R, which was picked up on the way, where it had been stored in a garage! Or the main part of it - minus the keyboards, which are already taken out. It hadn't worked when it was put away either - and no discs or manual, alas...
3) One of the main boards inside (forget which one), there are about 10 inside, various functions.
4) The wiring BEHIND that very board - now you can see why this stuff was so expensive to make - this is called "wire wrap" construction, and VERY time intensive - and you can't make a mistake!"

The Con Brio Rises!

via Brian Kehew of The MOOG Cookbook. Only two Conbrio ADS 200s were ever made. See the links in Brian's message below for more info on this rare digital synth from the past.

"Hi guys - this is a quickie announcement - we're rushing to prepare an exhibit for this year's annual (and final) "VINTAGE COMPUTER FAIR"!

Why? This Con Brio synthesizer I've had for a decade is finally going to make noise in public again. Just this week we heard it for the first time - maybe the first one of these has been used in 20+ years...

http://www.synthmuseum.com/conbrio/conads20001.html

http://matrixsynth.blogspot.com/2005/10/my-favorite-retro-synth-conbrio-ads.html

It's been a legendary beast - mostly because of how it looks (of course). But until this week, we didn't know it was really GOOD. As a slightly outside observer, it was truly amazing - the design and interface are superb - you can fly on this thing and work very quickly. They implemented the synthesis with some REALLY tricky methods, as well as writing their own disc drive code, things like that. It sounds like other digital synths of the era - but with much better fidelity, its basic tone is pretty great. I am now gonna try and reunite the designers (one of them is coming along for the show and may give a talk). I will probably soon do a detailed web page showing some of the clever ideas and history. ANd my goal is to lend it out to some people, who can take it for a month and do ONE piece on it - so I can make some kind of "ALL Con Brio" CD so people can finally hear it. I don't think it's ever been on a commercial record release...

The FAIR and the MUSEUM: Sat/Sun 10-6 pm!! Exhibits from 2-6pm!

http://www.vintage.org/2007/main/

So - if you're interested in coming by (Mountain View, CA) I'll be there with it. PLEASE pass on the info to your techie-geek friends who may also appreciate this or a roomfull (museum nearby) of vintage computers; Altair, Digital Equipment Corp., Timex, Commodore, early Apple, etc."

Update via Brian in the comments:
"Well, I would think so too, but that's not true exactly. The three guys who did the Con Brio are serious computer experts; the one seen at the show makes his living manufacturing THE fastest RAM you can buy today. He says the way the Con Brio works (which is not a microprocessor counting to create "oscillators") would still be hard on a typical modern computer. If it were done by a microprocessor running numbers, yes, a modern computer would have it beat, but the speed of the Com Brio lies in the "dumb logic" way the waveforms are done, which allows it to be driven a light-speed type rates - "doing the math" with a microprocessor is harder and takes more power. They were far ahead of their time and finding unique solutions to the problems they had.

You mention the comparison between the 16 oscillators and Bill's 136 - actually the Con Brio does run 16 oscillators on each voice/key; TIMES its sixteen voices, so this is actually 256 simultaneous "oscillators" running.

On the 6 different configurations on a DX7 being adequate for what sounds are needed; to do the simple Hammond organ patch with "all drawbars out" is impossible with that limited set - and that's just 8 sine waves, no overtones per harmonic: the 6-operator setup won't do it. There is capability there with so many configurations - and how it's used is up to the user. Same for the Minimoog - Moog engineers felt that more than 3 oscillators made very little difference in the sound. Serious modular synthesists would disagree.

Not to mention - analog hardware. ALL digi synths have it for output - and the choices made there by designers can drastically affect the tone of the output - otherwise all CD players would sound the same playing the same Pink Floyd record, and we know they don't! Yet another reason a Nord Modular doesn't sound like a Doepfer or Buchla... You "can do it" in software, but it will not sound the same."