Serge Triple WS Tip

video upload by Todd Barton

"Just realized that the Serge Triple Wave Shaper can also be used as sort of a Triple set of VCAs.
My Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

Print Magazine Modul8 Issue #2 Now Available

You might remember Modul8 from this previous post.

via Issue #2 is now available.

"Modul8 issue two is out now - bigger, better and more in depth.

After being humbly blown away by the support for the premiere issue of Modul8, issue two steps up with more pages, more interviews and more synth devotion.

Go behind the modules with Corry Banks from Eurorack manufacturer Modbap Modular, dive deep into sound therapy with AHRKH, explore modern ballet music with composer Alison Cole and get schooled by Serge scholar Ben Carey.

There's also feature interviews with L.A's best kept secret Voltage Ctrlr,

heartbreak and redemption with Def Jam's Sadiva, Buchla buzz from Beijing's TamiX and the breakthroughs and breakdowns of Aussie breakbeat pioneers Nubreed.

And if all that still wasn't enough we check in with Melbourne theremin maestro Miles Brown, learn about SDEM's latest album, throw it back with the American Gigolo soundtrack and try to figure out why 'INIT' patches are so comforting.

All that, plus everyone's favourite philosopher Todd Barton is back, and this time he's getting saucy with his synths.

And despite our tragic commitment to physical media, we’ve also created a special Spotify playlist featuring music from the artists showcased in issue two.

We’re super proud of this issue, but more importantly we're super stoked to present such a dynamic and diverse range of creators following their own paths

You can grab your copy here now.

*Modul8 acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of the land we live and work on, the Wadawurrung and Dja Dja Wurrung People, and recognises their continuing connection to the land and waterways. Modul8 is produced off-grid and attempts to limit its carbon footprint where possible."

Recent Serge Experiments

video upload by Todd Barton

"Always a delight to explore the Serge paradigm.
My Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

nexus spectrogram

video upload by Todd Barton

"Here's a track from my split album with Hainbach on the Ultraviolet Light label:
https://ultravioletlight.bandcamp.com... [featured here]

I've popped it into Chrome Music Lab spectrogram software for the visuals: https://musiclab.chromeexperiments.com/
Instruments: 73-75 Serge, Buchla Music Easel, piano & prepared piano, waterphone, shakuhachi and Metasynth.
My Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

Serge TKB solo

video upload by Todd Barton

"Yep! It's that time again when I need to get my Serge TKB yayas out! Enjoy!
https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

Serge Distortion

video upload by Todd Barton

"This is Loud! Minimal knob turns, maximal effects. 2 DUSG's as oscillators the bottom one FMing the top one. Then onto the Res EG then to the Wave Mult. The Wave Mult is being CVed by an off camera DUSG."

Surfing Serge Feedback

video upload by Todd Barton

"Inspired by Doug Lynner's recent Serge feedback performance I revisited a favorite Serge feedback patch with the Wave Multipliers, VCFQ and Resonant EQ . . . surfs up!"

Allen Strange's Electronic Music Reprint Seeks Funding on Kickstarter

via Kickstarter

"Hello fans of Allen Strange and electronic music:

In June 2018, I was looking to buy a copy of Allen Strange's Electronic Music: System, Techniques and Controls, at a time when I was getting back into electronics and electronic music after an almost 30-year hiatus. I had vague recollections of a copy in the Electronic Music Studio at York University, where I made my first explorations into sound synthesis. The spine was gone and it was mostly a pile of papers stuffed into a folder. Finding that the only copies available were either poorly scanned PDFs, and used copies for sale online for hundreds of dollars, I was disheartened, to say the least. But I had a thought: what about finding the copyright holder and getting permission to reprint a few copies? It couldn't be that hard, right? I work at a university with lots of resources, so I should be able to figure out how to do it. AND, that way I'd be able to contribute something to the electronic music communities that I'd started to join, such as modwiggler.com, modulargrid.net, and other online forums, and who had been so welcoming, sharing all their collective knowledge and wisdom. These were places where I had heard about Allen Strange's Electronic Music: System, Techniques and Controls, in the first place.

I started a thread on Modwiggler to gauge interest. The interest was overwhelming, and motivating. After tracking down the original publisher, it took time to find out who currently owns the copyright. With the endless help and advice of librarians Ann Ludbrook and Sally Wilson at my school who specialize in e-publishing and copyright, we got to work. One of them tracked down Allen's partner Pat and helped ensure that the family once again held title to the work, and Pat agreed to let us give this whole Kickstarter a shot, and sent us her copy of Electronic Music: System, Techniques and Controls to disassemble and scan. Working with library staff and my research assistant Heidi Chan, we worked to get the book digitized, and ready for reproduction. One of the biggest challenges was to replace all the images of modules. That work fell to Heidi, who scoured the internet for people who still owned the original modules and synths used in the book, getting them to take new photographs for us to use. In some cases, the original designers of some of the modules no longer had them, but they helped us track down modules and acquire new images. With Pat's help, we have added a new introduction by Stephen C. Ruppenthal, as well as a few pages of testimonials from people who learned from and were inspired by Electronic Music: System, Techniques and Controls, from Suzanne Ciani and Todd Barton, to Dave Smith, Dave Rossum, Serge Tcherepnin, Dieter Doepfer and Tony Rolando. The book has a new cover, compliments of Allen and Pat's daughter Erin Strange, who did a wonderful job of creating a new design that carries the spirit of the original 1972 cover into this new edition. The text of book is faithful to the second edition of Allen Strange's Electronic Music: System, Techniques and Controls, published in 1983 by Wm. C. Brown Company.

Republishing Allen Strange's Electronic Music: System, Techniques and Controls, has been a four-year project since its inception. The goal, from the beginning, has been to bring this important work back into the hands of fans of the original, students and teachers of the history of electronic music, musicians and electronic music practitioners, and designers of electronic music systems. We have permission to make Allen's work available in print and electronic form from Pat Strange who holds the copyright, and Pat has been actively guiding our efforts through much of the project. At present, Allen Strange's Electronic Music: System, Techniques and Controls, will only be available through this Kickstarter.

In Pat's own words (from the preface): "Since it's first edition in 1972, Electronic Music: Systems, Techniques and Controls has been acknowledged as the definitive text on modular synthesis. In today’s musical community analogue techniques have made a resurgence among many musicians and composers. The idea of a republication has been in the works for many years and the timing of doing it now just made sense. I am very grateful to Jason Nolan, Ann Ludbrook and the team at Toronto Metropolitan University who saw the importance of this endeavor as well as taking on the task of bring this book back to life. I am so appreciative of their attention to preserving the quality of the book and respecting its content. I know that this project would have meant a lot to Allen, specifically in knowing that his techniques and teachings are continuing to influence the future of electronic music."

This is a non-profit project. Costs involved are royalties, production, logistics and shipping costs. Any residual funds will be donated to community music initiatives focusing on electronic music and electronic music learning. At present two organizations have agreed to receive funds, but we will identify more (in Europe next) depending on the amount of residual funds. These organizations are the Canadian Accessible Musical Instrument Network (http://camin.network) and the Willie Mae Rock Camp (https://www.williemaerockcamp.org).

Finally, I would like to thank Walker Farrell for the wonderful Kickstarter video.

Thank you to all supporters for being part of this project.

Jason Nolan"

SQ 1 sync to Env Follower

video upload by Todd Barton

"Hopefully this will have applications in other systems like the Serge for instance.
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

Update:

SQ 1 sync as Audio Source


"Thanks to @Roland Klinkenberg for the grounding reminder!"

Serge Ext ADSR to Pitch

video upload by Todd Barton

"I was surprised when I sent the Serge Extended ADSR to Pitch in on a static oscillator -- all sorts of pitch patterns became available based on the interaction of the envelop shape knobs with only a single LFO going to one CV in of envelope shape. Enjoy!
My Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

73 75 Serge Snippets

video upload by Todd Barton

Learning Modular Conversations with guest host Todd Barton

video upload by Learning Modular

"This is the replay of the September 2021 "ask me anything" Zoom session for Patreon subscribers of Learning Modular (https://www.patreon.com/LearningModular). In this second session, Todd Barton (https://toddbarton.com) was asking questions of Chris Meyer of Learning Modular, and moderating questions from the live attendees covering modular synthesis composition, performances, and systems. Subscribers to Todd's Patreon channel (https://www.patreon.com/) were also invited.

If you would like the opportunity to view these sessions live and ask your own questions, subscribe to Learning Modular on Patreon (https://www.patreon.com/LearningModular). The August host was Trovarsi, and the October host was Kim Bjørn, with two more sessions planned to fill out 2021. Your response to these replays will determine if we continue them in 2022.

Here is an index to the subjects discussed in this session:

00:00 Introduction
01:33 What is the meaning of life? (Yes, Todd actually asked Chris that, and yes, Chris answered)
02:07 How does Chris not get overwhelmed when approaching The Monster to create a piece of music?
04:43 How does Chris know what he wants to compose?
06:28 Is there a narrative or structure to Chris’ work, or does he create free-form?
08:43 Thoughts from Chris and Todd on compositional “forms” for electronic music
15:47 When to ignore the 'rules'; when to lean on them
19:17 When to introduce a change in the music
23:50 Patching for evolution
28:03 Chris’ lighting during recent music videos
31:22 How much of a performance is written out versus improvised?
35:55 Editing improvisations down to tracks for an album
39:12 How do you organize it when more than one person is improvising together?
42:20 What is coming up for both of us?
45:00 Using synths as individual instruments versus cross-pollinating them
51:20 Todd on the new Buchla Music Easel
54:56 Patching 'from zero' versus pre-patching
56:26 Chris on color-coding patch cables
57:43 Creating the patch symbol language for Patch & Tweak
01:01:18 Serge Tcherepnin’s approach to creating synthesizers
01:04:55 Approaches to stereo and quad sound
01:15:00 Do we use MIDI?"

CuteLab Missed Ops Playdate 3

video upload by Todd Barton

"Third encounter with the Missed Opportunities from CuteLab.

I'm always looking to discover the musicality in randomness. All sounds are from Makenoise and R*S Serge modules. The main plucked melody is Serge NTO triangle wave into the Wave Multipliers . . .

CuteLab: https://cutelab.nyc
R*S Serge: https://randomsource.net
Makenoise: http://makenoisemusic.com
My Patreon: https://soundcloud.com/discover"

Serge Self Cycling Feedback

video upload by Todd Barton

"Checkout my Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

73 75 Serge Cycling Feedback

video upload by Todd Barton

"Exploring a self-cycling feedback patch on the 73-75 Serge Homebuilt
My Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

Serge Matrix Feedback Patch

video upload by Todd Barton

Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd

And here is a great series on feedback patching the Serge:

Uploads from La Synthèse Humaine

Easel Serge Krell Improv

video upload by Todd Barton

"Exploring this new combined territory of Buchla/Serge Krell.
Thanks also to https://tricksmagicshop.com/product/s... for the CV switch pedal.
Easel: https://buchla.com
Serge 73-75: http://www.73-75.com
My Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

Buchla Easel and Serge 73 75

video upload by Todd Barton

"Playtime connecting the Buchla Music Easel with the Serge 73-75 Homebuilt."

https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd

MakeNoise First Date QPAS

video by Todd Barton

"I just got a MakeNoise QPAS: Quad Peak Animation System.
First date, first take. Amazing what a few tiny incremental knob turns can do! Also featured: Serge*Random Source
SSG and Instrō Cš-L Dual Analogue Oscillator. Enjoy!

Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

Serge TKB Pulse Sequenced Events

video by Todd Barton

"I hope you enjoy this!"