John Bowen Solaris Demos by insanic4

John Bowen Solaris Demo 1 Published on Jun 9, 2013

"Here is a demo of the Solaris synth by John Bowen (www.johnbowen.com). I have this fantastic synt for a week now and worked with it for 6 evenings. I started building my own sounds right away and in this demo you can hear a sound that uses vector and wavetable synthesis. Everything is played live using the keyboard, the joystick, the 4 part switch buttons and the pitch and modulation wheel. This synth is the king of evolving sounds!

For better audio quality go to SoundCloud:
http://soundcloud.com/insanic4/solari..."



John Bowen Solaris Demo 2
Published on Jun 29, 2013 insanic4·15 videos

"For better audio quality go to SoundCloud: http://soundcloud.com/insanic4/solari...

Here is the second demo of the Solaris synth by John Bowen (www.johnbowen.com). Everything is played live using the keyboard, mod wheel, pitchbend and joystick."



John Bowen Solaris Demo 3
Published on Nov 10, 2013 insanic4·16 videos

"High quality version on SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/insanic4/john-...

Another demo of the Solaris synthesizer by John Bowen. Everything is played live using the keyboard, joystick, ribbon controller, modulation wheel and assign buttons. Lots of real-time performance controls on this synth :)"

Musikmesse: John Bowen Solaris Videos

YouTube via delamartv — March 29, 2010 —

"The Synthesizer Solaris from John Bowen is an exceptional piece of hardware. We could interview John Bowen during the Musikmesse 2010 in Frankfurt and ask him about the new features in Solaris.

John Bowen shows us all the good stuff about Solaris and even a new filter he finished few days before the show.

If you like more information on John Bowen and Solaris, watch the second part of this video either on our YouTube Channel or on www.delamar.de"

Solaris John Bowen Synthesizer Part 2 Musikmesse 2010 Video


Also see this thread on the John Bowen Synth Design forum.

http://www.johnbowen.com/

John Bowen Teams with SonicCore to produce Solaris

"March 28, 2007 - John Bowen Synth Design today is introducing the Solaris keyboard synthesizer. John's many years of sound design and user interface work have culminated in a synthesizer that is unparalleled for its ease of use and sonic quality. "While I certainly enjoyed many good years at Sequential Circuits (re:all products) and Korg (Wavestation, OASYS), working as an independent plug-in developer for the Scope platform over the last 7 years has allowed me the freedom to explore concepts and designs that I would have been unable to do elsewhere. Solaris represents the pinnacle of this development, and for several years I've had plans to turn it into a hardware version. Finally I can say, it is here."

Drawing on years of experience, John Bowen has crafted a new masterpiece - Solaris is a synthesizer that truly lives up to the idea of 'no compromises':
• Flexible as a modular system, but easier to use - with five 2 x 40 character display sections, one 240 x 64 graphic display, and 40 knobs, the Solaris is capable of great depth in sound manipulation, but designed to be as easy to use as the vintage synths of the past for which John Bowen is known.
• Sound quality is paramount - newly created synthesis algorithms provide unparalleled quality; signal processing handled by SHARC floating-point processors. Internal processing is done at 96 kHz; audio rate modulation provided with sample-accurate precision.
• The Solaris is a purchase which will last for years, through new algorithm "expansion packs" and OS updates.
John has teamed up with Holger Drenkelfort and Juergen Kindermann (SonicCore GmbH) to produce the Solaris synthesizer. "We had all worked together in the development of the Creamware Scope system, which as a development tool I found to be sonically superior to any other available native 'synth construction' programs on the market. However, I needed a new and more powerful system to produce the Solaris properly. Using their expertise, SonicCore has created brand-new hardware and operating system software – there is nothing inside based on the Scope system. Also, we brought in a talented dsp programmer to write completely new algorithm code specifically for the Solaris. However, now that SonicCore has acquired rights to the Creamware dsp library, I will be able to incorporate their special modules as well in Solaris. I'm also discussing licensing other algorithm work for future dsp expansion packs. It's my plan to have the Solaris act as a capable 'host system' for a wide variety of synthesis types, while still providing an ease-of-use factor."

Notes Hans Zimmer, "If anyone out there can take what we love about the elusive quality of analogue synthesizers and add the inventiveness and versatility that we get from digital, it'll be John. There is no question in my mind he understands that fundamentally the sound has to be true and uncompromised for a bunch of circuits to turn into a musical instrument. There are many synths out there that are fun and even inspiring. But it takes a certain magic and voodoo, a certain set of ears and sonic heart to build something lasting, something timeless."

More information will be available at www.johnbowen.com or info@johnbowen.com.

John Bowen started as Moog Music's first official clinician in 1973. Following that, he collaborated with Dave Smith on the Prophet 5 design, and went on to create 99% of all Sequential Circuits products' factory presets, demo and drum sequences, providing user interface (UI) design for many of the products as well. When the core Sequential team was acquired by Korg, John became Product Manager for the Wavestation, handing all UI design, sample ROM processing, and overall product development. He then worked on the initial OASYS keyboard UI design, but left Korg in 1998 to work for Creamware, where he developed their first Modular system, and assisted in the early work of their Prophet and Pro One emulations. His Zarg Music company is known for some of the finest plugins available for the Scope platform.

All specifications subject to change without notice. Copyright ©2007 John Bowen Synth Design."

And there you have it. ; )

John Bowen SOLARIS Demos by Christopher Simmons

John Bowen SOLARIS Demo by Christopher Simmons - PART ONE

YouTube Published on Jul 14, 2012 by NeotropeMusic

http://johnbowen.com/
"John Bowen SOLARIS Demo by Christopher Simmons - PART ONE. An audio walk through of some of the bank one patches in the SOLARIS limited edition keyboard synthesizer. Content, performance and audio contained in this video is Copr. © 2012 by Christopher Laird Simmons and Neotrope® Entertainment; all commercial and derivative rights reserved. HD, stereo, 20min. Note; audio is recorded from Event 20/20 speakers in studio. Turn up speakers to hear sound fully. View the text for this video review, here: http://musicindustrynewswire.com/2012/07/14/min5681_175032.php .

*correction to audio on video one: John B informed me that, "Presets are automatically selected when you use the Inc/Dec buttons - you don't need to press Enter for those! Only if you use the dial or keypad to select do you need to press Enter." (doh)

This video shows some of the sounds from bank one (aka 'Bank Zero"). The second follow up video will have direct audio from the Solaris outputs, and have examples of banks 2, 3 and 4 (aka banks 1,2,3). There is a bank "5" (aka bank 4) but I won't have time to demo that, unfortunately.

VIDEO TWO with direct audio:"

John Bowen SOLARIS Demo 2B (HUM REDUCED) - HQ Audio - by Christopher Simmons

YouTube Published on Jul 17, 2012 by NeotropeMusic

"UPDATED VERSION: John Bowen SOLARIS Demo 2 (*HUM REDUCED) - HQ* Audio - by Christopher Simmons

John Bowen SOLARIS Demo - PART 2 - with HQ* direct audio (*NEW VERSION WITH HUM/NOISE REDUCTION*), by Christopher Simmons. An audio walk through of some of the bank 2,3,4 patches in the SOLARIS limited edition keyboard synthesizer. Content, performance and audio contained in this video is Copr. © 2012 by Christopher Laird Simmons and Neotrope® Entertainment; all commercial and derivative rights reserved. HD, stereo, 20min.

NOTE: since I had very limited time, I just played a bunch of keys and didn't spend a lot of time modifying patches with the knobs as I did a bit of in the first video, and went through the patches very quickly; so don't expect any free 'riffs' you can snatch, or any brilliant keyboard chops (I do play very well). This is all I had time to do, and hopefully somebody finds it of value. Considering less than 100 people on the planet have a SOLARIS, this is going to be a unique video until other owners upload something similar. AGAIN: I'm not auditioning for best performance here, just hitting some keys to make noise to demo the patches since there are very few demos online of entire banks, and almost no videos like this. It is what it is, folks. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: YES! I know these SOLARIS demo videos are not perfect. I had only a couple of hours to shoot "something" or "nothing" and went for something. I would find these useful in shopping for a Solaris keyboard; but your mileage may vary. I sold mine to help finance new house, so I shot these AFTER I had sold it before boxing it up, as a "what the heck" kind of thing. Not planned, not perfect, but they don't entirely suck. :-)"

JOHN BOWEN SOLARIS SYNTHESIZER PROTOTYPE DEMO NUMBER THREE

JOHN BOWEN SOLARIS SYNTHESIZER PROTOTYPE DEMO NUMBER THREE from RED MARTIAN on Vimeo.

"This features percussion sampled off of the Solaris using an MPC-1000. I did not alter those sounds to try to leave them as pure as possible. The flanging/phase shifting is actually the excellent Comb filter on the Solaris itself."

JOHN BOWEN SOLARIS SYNTHESIZER PROTOTYPE DEMO NUMBER FOUR

JOHN BOWEN SOLARIS SYNTHESIZER PROTOTYPE DEMO NUMBER FOUR from RED MARTIAN on Vimeo.

"The opening of this demo is John's own original demo that he did for the Prophet-5 in 1978. This tune uses the same Solaris generated drum kit from number three as well as more use of that excellent Comb Filter as well as Vector Synthesis using a realization of one of the Prophet VS factory patches."

Previously posted...

JOHN BOWEN SOLARIS SYNTHESIZER PROTOTYPE DEMO NUMBER TWO

JOHN BOWEN SOLARIS SYNTHESIZER PROTOTYPE DEMO NUMBER TWO from RED MARTIAN on Vimeo.

"This is the second 'All Solaris' demonstration made up of 5 separate tracks sequenced and played manually. The pseudo Deep Note was done using two virtual CEM VCOs with about 5-6 seconds of exponential glide and a virtual SSM filter. The long resonant filter sweeping is done on the SSM model."

Demo 1

The SynthSummitShow episode 18: John Bowen synth designs

Streamed live 5 hours ago Flux302 of Fluxwithit.com

Fascinating bit of synth history with John Bowen who started his career with synths during the early days of Moog Music, followed by Sequential Circuits. Dave Rossum in the early days of E-mu is mentioned as well. John now of course runs John Bowen Synth Design, and is the creator of the Solaris. You can find previous interviews with John at various synth events in the archives here.

Interesting little bit of trivia at 41:55 regarding John drawing some of the Prophet-VS waveforms as estimations of the waveforms on the front panel of I'm guessing either the KORG DW-8000 or DW-6000. It's interesting to know they are in there. It's worth noting all of the Prophet-VS waveforms and Waldorf, and therefor PPG waveforms, are in his new Solaris x 4, meaning four independent oscillators capable of having separate waveforms or wavetables from each. The Prophet-VS vector synthesis of course made its way to Yamaha's SY-22/TG-33, followed by Korg and the Wavestation where it morphed into vector sequencing. He also worked on the original version of the KORG OASYS which turned into the PCI card version. He then left to work with Creamware on Scope, on some of the first software models of vintage synthesizers. It's pretty incredible when you think of all the connections between synths John has not only influenced, but created over the years.

Note the Solaris 1U rackmount at 1:11:48. Two were made a couple of years ago but the idea was scrapped. John spoke with Axel Hartmann on it and they agreed that the lack of UI made it not worth it. The Solaris has over 1200 editable parameters and part of the magic behind the Solaris keyboard is the UI which makes it all easily accessible.

Funny note regarding the Yamaha DX7 at 1:23:00. John is referring to the Jellinghuas controller for the DX7 after that, and Flux is referring to the DTronics DT7 based on it.

Video description:

"The SynthSummitShow is a live streamed show dedicated to Synths, music technology and the people who make the gear we use possible.

Todays guest is John Bowen. http://www.johnbowen.com/about.html

John was instrumental in many of the products we all know and love, from the prophet 5 to the solaris John has been a staple in the music industry.

Host: Ken Flux Pierce is a sound designer, Music technology consultant and blogger you can find me at Fluxwithit.com"

MATRIXSYNTH NAMM 2013: John Bowen Solaris Booth Pics & New Editor

Some pics of the Solaris at the John Bowen Synth Design booth.  See a screenshot of the upcoming software editor below.  This is one powerful synth, and you could argue the most powerful and flexible digital synthesizer to date.   It has a number of unique features not found on other synths including "Rotors" which are special 4-step waveshape sequences which act as oscillators. You can select any four sound sources, cycle through them in a Rotar and create a new complex sound source. Via the John Bowen website: "We all know that an oscillator basically takes a waveshape and cycles it continuously. The more complex the waveshape used, the more interesting the resulting cycles will sound. Now select four sound sources (including the external inputs and all the oscillator types mentioned previously) and play these repeatedly in a looped sequence one after the other. This is what a rotor is and Solaris has two of these as additional sound sources that can then be further mixed, filtered and modulated. Still can't imagine what a rotor sounds like? Check out this example: WeirdRotor1Poly"

The Solaris has four oscillators per voice. Along with standard waveforms, you have the Prophet VS waveforms, and wavetables from Waldorf available. There really is too much to cover in this post. If you haven't already I encourage you to check out John Bowen Synth Design for the full feature set, demos and testimonials.  And of course also see the John Bowen label below.

John gave me a sneak peak at a software editor for the Solaris.  You'll see a screenshot of the Arpeggiator editor below.

CLICK FOR MORE »

John Bowen Solaris Demo No talking

Published on May 1, 2020 Pure Ambient Drone

https://johnbowen.com

Lot's of bass in this one. Follow-up to this demo.

"John Bowen Solaris Synthesizer Demo. Hear the sounds of the Solaris Synth. No talking sound demo of the John Bowen Solaris."

Update:

John Bowen Solaris Demo 2

Published on May 2, 2020 Pure Ambient Drone

"Solaris Synthesizer Demo. Part two John Bowen Solaris Sound Demo. Here I am going through the presets of the synthesizer with no external effects. All you hear is the Solaris."

Dave Smith Instruments Includes Legendary Prophet-5 Sound Set with New Prophet-6 Synth

"Original Sound Designer John Bowen Enlisted to Recreate Presets for Prophet-6 Factory Set

San Francisco, CA—June 5, 2015—Dave Smith Instruments is pleased to announce that its new Prophet-6 six-voice analog synthesizer features faithful recreations of the original factory sounds from its legendary 1970’s predecessor, the Prophet-5. To program the sounds, the company enlisted the talents of the original sound designer, John Bowen. Presets 411-458 on the new instrument correspond to presets 1-1 to 5-8 on the Prophet-5.

The Prophet-6 takes the best qualities of the Prophet-5 — true voltage-controlled oscillators, filters, and amplifiers — and adds enhancements the older instrument never had, such as stereo outputs, velocity and aftertouch sensitivity, dual digital effects, a high-pass filter, a polyphonic step sequencer, an arpeggiator, and of course, MIDI. It is targeted at musicians looking for authentic, vintage analog tone with the reliability and convenience of modern technology.

John Bowen was Sequential Circuits’ original Product Specialist. He created the majority of factory sounds and sequences shipped with the Prophet 5, Prophet 10, Prophet T-8, Prophet VS, and other Sequential products. An acclaimed synth designer in his own right, Bowen’s pedigree includes instruments for Moog, Sequential Circuits, Yamaha, Korg, Creamware, and his own company, Zarg Music.

Describing the genesis of the project, Bowen said, “When Dave first revealed the Prophet-6, I was curious to see if I could recreate the original factory presets I did for the Prophet-5, and asked if he’d like me to try. When I received the synth, I was impressed with the additional functions available. Dave’s enhancement to my original Poly Mod design adds bi-polar control signals and allows for even more flexibility. And having a high-pass filter allows you to create sounds unattainable on the original Prophet-5. I was happy to find that I was able to accurately recreate the bulk of my presets.” Added Bowen: “In fact, it was great to be able to spice up some of them a bit with the new FX section — which I think is an essential feature in today’s market. I congratulate Dave on creating a very impressive synth!”

As Dave Smith put it, “Bringing the classic Prophet-5 presets back to life on the Prophet-6 was a great way to connect our past with our present. The fact that John was able to duplicate his old sounds so well is a testament to the sonic integrity of the new instrument.” Added Smith: “It’s not often that you get an opportunity to improve on a past achievement — especially one as influential as the Prophet-5, which totally changed the musical landscape of the time. Creating the Prophet-6 has been every bit as satisfying. ”

The Prophet-6 is available now with a MAP of $2799."

John Bowen Solaris & Oberheim Matrix-12

Two pics via El Estereo on The MATRIXSYNTH Lounge: "Like father, like son...."

Two massive synths with similar editing displays. Both coveted and both revered as pinnacles in the synthesizer world. John Bowen started his career with synths as a Moog technician back in 1973. In 1976 he met Dave Smith of Sequential Circuits and began work with him. You can read up on some of John Bowen's history on the John Bowen Synth Design website here.  See this post for video of John talking about the Solaris and his history at a PNW MMTA SynthFest in 2011, and this post for a video of John discussing his days at Sequential Circuits back in 2006.

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John Bowen Synth Design & Zarg Music

I was just checking out John Bowen's Zargmusic site and I thought I'd put up a post on it. I remembered reading about John Bowen being part of Sequential Circuits, but I had no idea how large the scope of his contributions to the synth world were.

He started as the first official Moog clinician in 1973 and later joined Dave Smith and Sequential Circuits in 1976. He is the man behind the original 40 Prophet 5 presets and he was SCI's Product Specialist creating 99% of factory sounds for nearly all of the SCI product line. He contributed to the design of SCI instruments. After SCI was bought out by Yamaha, he moved on to Korg where he became the Product Manager for the Wavestation synths, followed by the OASYS project the Z1, and the OASYS PCI. After Korg he joined Creamware and worked on a number of projects including Pulsar/SCOPE and the Pro One and Prophet 5 emulations. Via Zarg Music John has released number of synths including the acclaimed Solaris and the Red Dwarf synths.

An interesting tidbit of trivia according to the history page on Zarg Music is that John Bowen coined both the terms "wave sequencing" and "multitimbre." The basic concepts behind wave sequencing also come from John. Fascinating bit of synth history.

Title link takes you to the Zargmusic site with more. Be sure to check out the history page and samples of each synth. If you haven't checked out the Red Dwarf, make sure to do so. It's a semi-modular with a number of interesting modules including a CEM Oscs-Pair, Waldorf OSC, WaveTable Osc-Modular, CEM LP 24 dB Filter and much, much more.

Solaris Interview at the Messe with Samples

Title link takes you to a podcast on delamar.de. Scroll to get to the player when you get there. Midway John plays a few sounds followed by talking about the synthesis engine.

Via fat eric in the comments of this post. fat eric babblefished the following off of delemar.de. Thanks fat eric! These are the first samples of the Solaris I'm aware of.

"One of the few highlights on the music fair 2007 for me is surely the Solaris, a Synthesizer, which was developed of nobody smaller than John Bowen. The Solaris began as semimodular software Synth for the Scope DSP maps of CreamWare, where it gained fast a good reputation as versatile applicable Synth. Marc and I had the large pleasure the symphatischen and still inspired Synth veterans to interviewen - the result can hear you as Podcast at the end of the article. With the Solaris it acts around a Synthesizer based on SHARC DSPs with 5 oktaven a keyboard, which with a 96kHz audio engine works. Under that about 40 buttons are 5 LCDs, which represent the button parameters. Additionally there is a graphic display, whose use us is not yet completely clear. The algorithms used in the Solaris are to be waited and improved occasionally over software updates. Also extensions are technically feasible and planned according to John Bowen. Perhaps it will also give at a later time some the Scope algorithms for the Solaris. However - John Bowen recommends to switch on and straight on play the equipment simply. The secrets reveal themselves then allegedly automatically. Who cannot allude the hippen Synth with a music shop, should absolutely clean-hear in the Podcast, because it enters or other hearing sample of the master there himself. An inspiring Synth, which by play joy and great sounds from the mass out-stings. The price will lie around the EUR3000. -. Thank you at John Bowen for the interview!"

The John Bowen Interview | Legendary Synth and Sound Specialist, New Solaris OS, Demos, & Prototype

video upload by Espen Kraft

"John Bowen is the man behind those Sequential factory synth preset sounds heard on so many classic tracks. The Prophet 5, Prophet VS, Six-Trak etc.
He later worked on the Korg Wavestation, Korg Oasys, the Creamware DSP plugin synths and finally his own hardware synth, the Solaris.
You've heard his sounds more times than you know.

In this interview you can hear how it all started, all the funny stories, and what happened in California in the 70s, at Sequential Circuits in the 80s and at Korg in the 90s. And more."

You can find v2.0.3 update details here: https://forums.johnbowen.com/viewtopic.php?t=17189.

The following are a couple of videos featuring the Solaris, the first featuring on the John Bowen site.
video upload by synthhaft

"Improvisation with a 'Noodle'-Sound, done with the SOLARIS.
One Sound, one take, no external fx."

And one more with a Nonlinear Labs C15 and Waldorf Quantum:
"Heizfläche"

video upload by

And last but definitely not least, some pics of the Solaris prototype via the John Bowen Synth Design forum where you'll find additional pics:

"I came across some of the old Solaris prototype photos, and I thought people might enjoy seeing them!

We introduced the Solaris at the Frankfurt Musik Messe at the end of March 2007. The original design features 2 rows of knobs below the Envelope section, so that you could easily adjust filter and amp envelopes without having to select them individually. (Note there are only 3 EG select buttons, as the idea was to select them in pairs.)

The wood sides were more rounded, as you can see these were quite nice, but a bit too expensive for production. The graphics of the front panel featured a design from my childhood friend, John Heisch (viewable on the left side). Also, the original silk screen for the front panel was not to my liking, so I requested an 'emergency' job from Axel Hartmann to revise the graphics look for the show (which he did just 2 weeks prior to the show!).

We went through 5 prototype stages, arriving at the production version you know now. It was quite the journey!"

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John Bowen Solaris V2.0 Update Released

John Bowen

Above is a quick video from John Bowen on the new Phase Mod Oscillator posted back in March. You might remember mention of it in this post from February. The update is now available. Some details via the John Bowen Synth Design forum (pic via this previous post):


"I am very happy to announce the release of v2.0 Operating System for the Solaris!

I wanted to post a huge 'Thank You' to Jim Hewes, who has been laboring for almost 4 years on the Solaris OS. Jim has fixed more than 80 bugs, and added at least a dozen of features that I have requested. During this last year, not only did he completely re-work the entire SysEx code (replacing a bare-bones NRPN system) to allow for MIDI access to all of the now over 7300+ parameters (!), but has been working overtime to get a reasonable 4-part Multimode structure working. I think you will all agree what he has done is managed to save the Solaris from early abandonment to bring it forward as a still viable current instrument. What other hardware synth has been able to do that which came out 10 years ago?

I would also like to thank Hrast for coding the new Phase Mod oscillator type, and Sonic Core for providing the code for the CZ waveshape set. You can view Hrast's work under the name Hrastprogrammer and his wonderful software synth Transiztow: http://www.hrastprogrammer.com/hrastwerk/index.htm...

The biggest structural change is that each Multi Preset now is actually 4 layers deep, making it four times the size of a previous preset. All older presets will load as 4-part Multi Presets. Loading an older preset file automatically converts it into the new Multi Preset format. The new Multi Preset will populate Part 1 with all the parameters, including the Master FX, Output settings, Performance knob assignments, stored joystick position, SamplePool, arpeggiator settings, Assign switches, and BPM. As before, when the Preset LED is on, you are in Preset Mode. Touching any parameter knob will immediately jump out of Preset Mode and put the Solaris into Edit Mode. When in edit mode, the bottom line of the center display will display the current selected parameter, which now includes the part number as P1, P2, etc.

New Oscillator Type: PhaseMod (PhsMod)

In addition to all of the new Multimode features, a 7th Oscillator Type has been added. This features both “DX7-style FM” (otherwise known as Phase Modulation or PM) and Phase Distortion (PD, from the Casio family of CZ synths). The waveshapes provided are as follows: For PM – Sine, Morphing Saw (Morph1), Morphing Square (Morph2) For PD – CZSaw, CZSquare, CZPulse, CZSawPulse, CZReso1, CZReso2, and CZReso3.

For Phase Modulation, use PMod as the mod destination. For Phase Distortion, use the Shape knob and destination. (You can have both types of modulation going on, of course.) On the oscillator’s page 2, you will find Sync and Quant(ization) parameters. For the PhaseMod Type, the only sync value is Gate. For certain PM sounds, you need to ‘lock’ the start of the phase to make sure you have a consistent attack to the sound, or you don’t want to have phase cancellation with stacked oscillators. Gate works with the Phase setting, to restart the phase at a specific point for every note-on event.

Quantize reduces the bit resolution of the PhaseMod oscillator. The range is 0-31 (with 31 = 1 bit). Results are very subtle until you are in the 27-30 range.”

John Bowen Solaris - New Presets and Demo

Published on Mar 2, 2017 Stephen Hummel

"Volume 8 of the 'Circuits and Strings' series of studio jam videos from subtractiveLAD aka: Stephen Hummel.

My usual musical meanderings were pleasantly interrupted by the arrival of John Bowen's Solaris synthesizer in my studio.

I made some of the factory preset patches for when the synth was originally released years ago. Having it around again has been great and I've pretty much been lost in patch-making heaven since it got here. I thought it would be fun to show you the patches that I have made so far, with short little musical pieces to help demonstrate each preset. Some of the modulation stuff is more exaggerated than what I would normally do in a track but it is to show some of what the synth is capable of. Most of the preset demos feature music that I recorded as MIDI data which is then sent back into the synth from Reaper - just wanted my hands free for the joystick and ribbon, etc.

All sounds are from the Solaris only, no other effects or processing, with the exception of a little Verbzilla on the Blade Runner patch...

I feel like I've only scratched the surface on this thing and new ideas keep crowding my brain.

PS: The wooden end cheeks are taken off of this unit as it was being used for programming updates before coming to me."

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Black Octopus Sound - Event Horizon (128 Presets for the John Bowen Solaris)

Black Octopus Sound - Event Horizon (128 Presets for the John Bowen Solaris) by Toby Emerson

Published on Oct 15, 2013

This one in via Soviet Space Child.

Download Here: http://blackoctopus-sound.com/product...

"Black Octopus Sound presets Event Horizon - 128 high quality presets for John Bowen Solaris created by Toby Emerson. This soundset offers everything from huge epic pads, long evolving textures, vintage analog style sounds, deep thundering basses, and many other classic leads and keyboard style sounds.

The John Bowen Solaris is simply one of the most fantastic instruments I have ever worked with. Everything about it screams class. From amazing sounding filters to countless oscillator types, I feel after several months of using it I still have not even scratched the surface. The architecture and programming behind it allows for huge sounds which can range from very organic and analog sounding to crisp and precise digital style sounds. The sound quality of this synthesizer is absolutely exceptional and I would highly recommend this synthesizer to any sound designer or professional musician that can budget for it.

All patches are mapped with the joystick controlling the filters. They are best auditioned by leaving the joystick in the middle position and then adjusting it to taste.

I have spent several months creating these patches for the Solaris users and offer them as a free download. However if you feel like they are of value to you I would love a donation or please pick up one of our sample packs as a way to say thanks and to support the creation of future sounds.

A little bit of compression and additional reverb by Valhalla Room has been added."

John Bowen Solaris - White SN 00122

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

via this auction

"John Bowen Solaris Synthesizer - Serial Number 122 - Built 2013

Beautiful, mint, almost brand new condition John Bowen Solaris in white finish. No scratches anywhere. Looks, works and sounds like new.

Has non-detented pots, but they work smoothly with no glitching or jumping. Volume knob has a very slight wobble that John Bowen himself confirmed is normal on some units manufactured during this time. There is no issue, no crackling or noise. Works perfectly.

Includes, power brick with US power cord, CF Card, USB CF card reader, printed owner's manual and original shipping documentation. Ships in original box and packing foam inserts, which will be supplemented with bubble wrap as needed."

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John Bowen Solaris Has Arrived

A few pics of my newly arrived John Bowen Solaris in the studio. I've wanted one of these since they were announced, but could never afford one until a couple of years ago. I talked myself out of one in the beginning, as I already had a Waldorf Q rack and an XTk keyboard, along with plenty of other virtual analog and real analog gear. In the back of my mind though, I knew I might one day own one. A few years ago I reached the breaking point with the synth collection I picked up over the years. I found myself going into the studio and spending time with synths I wasn't sure about keeping to see if I indeed wanted to keep them. I'd decide yes, this synth is great, I should keep it, only to walk out of the studio neglecting other synths that I honestly wanted to play more. I did this for years. The breaking point for me was when a few of the older analogs started exhibiting problems and I realized I didn't have a solid tech in the area. The only way to fix them would be to ship them off incurring the shipping costs to and back over the cost of the repairs. I also began to realize how redundant my synths were. Seriously. They are all either subtractive analog, wavetable, FM, additive, or PCM/sample based in the end. They are all just different flavors of the same thing. I mean how many different brands of vanilla ice cream do you really need? For me synths are about getting lost in the sound - about exploring sound. So yes, the more brands the better, but... just like there's only so much space in my belly for ice cream, I only have so much time in the studio. I realized it was time to let some go and in doing so I could use the money on other gear I'd been GASing on, like the Sequential OB-6, Elektron Digitakt, a Jupiter-XM to replace some vintage Rolands I gave up, and of course the Solaris. The Solaris was actually the first on the list. As I said, I wanted one since the start. I also know John Bowen, and no I did not get a deal on my Solaris. The Solaris is a labor of love and John pretty much runs the show on his own. He does work with others on building them of course, but this is a small enterprise. You can't find these in shops. They are exclusively sold on John Bowen's website: https://johnbowen.com, and there is a wait time. When I reached out to John about finally getting one he let me know this might be the last run. It was run number 7 and I asked him if I could get the last one. He said yes so I went for it. A couple of years later it arrived. (P.S. I heard there might be another run and John is still working on the OS, an expander, and possibly a desktop version, see the update in red below).

Do I have any regrets? I can emphatically say no. This is an amazing synth. What sets it apart is it has four, not three fully blown oscillators that can be morphed with a joystick for vector synthesis of wavetable and virtual analog synthesis. No other synth that I am aware of can do this. It is also fully modular. If you look at each display panel section, each knob, you can essentially load anything into them and route them however you want. Things aren't locked in place like other synths. The Solaris also runs at a super high resolution - 96kHz to be exact. People say it sounds analog and this is not an overstatement. It sounds amazing. I hate to say it, but it leaves my Q in the dust. It just sounds so much more bold and present. It is hands down the best sounding VA and Wavetable synth I own. I've owned a lot of synths over the years including some of the most sought after - Jupiter-8, OB-Xa, Matrix-12, Prophet-5, Rhodes Chroma, Alesis Andromeda A6, Yamaha CS-60, original Minimoog Model D, ARP Odyssey with CMS mods, and more. The Solaris is right up there with them if not surpassing them. It is that good. It feels different too. It feels like a powerhouse design tool. A synth of synths, so to speak. Note it also has the Prophet VS waveforms. I have a Prophet VS rack (you can see it in the top right), and I can say the Solaris sonically matches it - it has that transparent, bold presence missing in many digital synths. An unintended added bonus is the Solaris joystick actually works with the Prophet VS! :)

That said, if you do plan on picking up a Solaris or a Solaris expander, reach out to John first. This isn't an order now and get it next week sort of synth. It's more of a long term investment. How long? For me it was two years as I wanted the last of the final run. It was worth the wait.

Update: I should note my Solaris has a unique serial number out of the standard sequence. It's 10041. I'm curious if anyone will recognize the reference. :) So, although this might not be the last Solaris keyboard, it will have an interestingly unique SN. :) I also updated the above with the following: "Note it also has the Prophet VS waveforms. I have a Prophet VS rack and the Solaris sonically matches it - it has that transparent, bold, presence missing in many digital synths."

As for a new Solaris, there is work on a Solaris expander and possibly a desktop version. See this post for some desktop pics including an OS update (also in my studio), and see here for the expander sitting on top of two 1U mixers in the top right. You can find a demo from Sonicstate at NAMM 2020 posted here.

John Bowen Solaris Modular Comparisons via Elhardt

Below are some notes on the John Bowen Synth Design Solaris posted on the AH email list by Kenneth Elhardt, reposted here with Elhardt's blessing. One thing that can be argued as standing out the most on the Solaris is it's ability to freely rearrange various components of the synth engine. Typically synths have a basic signal path that goes something like this: oscillator --> mixer --> filter --> output, with various modifiers for each section. Not so with the Solaris. The Solaris is a bit closer to a modular. The beauty of a modular is that you typically have each component of the sound creation process as a separate module with input and output jacks that can be arranged however you like. You connect the various inputs and outputs of modules with patch cords. Apparently the same concept applies to the Solaris, minus the cords of course.

via Elhardt (be sure to read my note on the Oscillators and Rotors further below):

"Since John Bowen reads my posts on AH, I'll have to give you a positive biased rundown. :-) Almost every possible thing you can think of can act as a mod source to just about anything else, including external audio inputs (there are 4 of them) and virtually any component in the synth. So you could mix two Supersaw waves, run them through a filter and use that to modulate an Osc. Virtually everything can become an audio input to anything else, so you could take that above example and run it through a ring modulator. It has 4 simultaneously available filters (each with its own VCA) and mixers, each with a choice of what you want going into them, meaning you can configure them anyway you want without limits, just like a modular synth. There are lots of filter types. 4 lag processors are provided that you can use to smooth out any signal which I'm currently using to provide analog drift to the Osc's, though analog drift may be a future feature. I used the included envelope follower with a Mic to get an expressive Mic controlled trumpet sound. Because of the number of VCOs, filters, VCAs, LFOs and EGs, sounds that required a bi-timbral synth can be done on a single Solaris voice.

I'm also liking the way the OS and patches are all stored on a Compact Flash card. This means no more limits as to how many presets you have available to you. If you have 2000 sounds, then they're all there on the synth. It also makes it easy to back up patches on computer and easy to upgrade the OS because [there's] no more need to connect Midi to a computer, pull up a sequencer, and send streams to data back and and forth. I'd like to see more companies use this method.

-Elhardt"


With that in mind, one thing I thought worth pointing out here is that the Solaris has four oscillators, and each oscillator can have a completely different type of sound source including standard analog modeled waveforms, Prophet VS waveforms, Waldorf and PPG wavetables, samples and more. Via the specs page:

"Four (4) oscillators. Each can be of the following types:

MultiMode (standard waveshapes, combinations, plus saw stack)
WaveTable (wavetables 1-64 from the Waldorf Microwave synthesizers) [1 - 30 are PPG]
Sample playback (.raw format)
CEM VCO chip model (like those used in the later Rev. 3.x versions of the Prophet 5)
All of the waveforms used in the Prophet VS
(temperature stable) model of the oscillator used in the MiniMoog."

There is also a new form of synthesis called Rotors "Two (2) rotors which are special sound sources, implemented as a looping wavesequence of four (4) assignable inputs, played successively." In short think of a sequencer you can assign to trigger any sound source which you can speed up to the point it oscillates and produces sound. You can watch John Bowen give an example of it at the PNW SynthFest starting at 9:28 in this video (the link should take you to the 9:28 mark). You can also find some audio demos on the Solaris samples page starting with sample #5.

As for other components / "modules" on the Solaris, you can find the complete (massive) spec list on http://www.johnbowen.com/.

Now take all that and think of how you can apply it in a flexible modular fashion.

One synth the Solaris frequently gets compared to in interface is the Oberheim Matrix-12. The Matrix-12 has a reputation for being highly modular in editing as well. It might be worth doing some digging to see which is more flexible.

Be sure to also check out Elhardt's first audio demo of the Solaris here.

John Bowen Solaris Test Drive by Carbon111

via Carbon111, via this VSE thread where you will find more images and info.

"I was privileged today to have given John Bowen's Solaris a test drive in my studio! Though its not quite finished yet and there are some re-designs in progress, I can honestly say its a programmer's as well as a player's dream!

It sounds absolutely wonderful and is very powerful! It took a few minutes for the interface to sink in, but once it did...wow! Flexible, deep and yet relatively easy to program due to the excellent UI despite the huge number of available parameters and choices. Most parameters are not buried in menus and are easy to access and tweak.

There are a ton of audio-rate modulations available on this thing, none of which generate any artifacts or aliasing at all...lots of FM possibilities, linear as well as exponential. The Moog-style filter was as warm and squelchy as one could want and could be run in other modes besides LP! The "Obie" clone was a good state-variable emulation. The oscillators were plentfull in both quantity and variety. Each patch has a unique architecture, essentially a massively parallel yet integrated "multi" unto itself.

I was suprised at how organic and non-digital it sounded! A one-on-one "taste test" against my analog gear proved this thing has that elusive low-end "beef". Its no slouch as a complex wavetable synth either, holding its own easily against my Waldorf Microwave XT and Ensoniq Fizmo.

You can do FM, physical modeling, subtractive, wavetable and vector synthesis on it as well as the warmest VA I've yet heard.- I'm really blown away! Time to start saving...or figuring out what will have to go"

Also check out the official John Bowen Synth Design.

Some specs via this thread on the John Bowen Synth Design Forum (BE SURE TO CHECK OUT THE THREAD FOR MORE including clarifications):
"The hardware Solaris has the equivalent of approximately 6 Scope boards (the 14 DSP cards), so 6 x 14 = 84 Scope generation DSPs - but remember, you would have to be running your Scope Project at 96 kHz as well...

We have lots of software to finish, so I can't report exactly as to the polyphony count, but here are some of the other specs:

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