Variophon Realton Vintage Synthesitzer

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via this eBay listing

This one was spotted and sent in via
M Me.

A search on Variophon Realton will bring up additional posts including a few demos on the site.

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Realton Variophon Gig ex Talk Talk w/ Provenance

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via this Vemia listing

Click the auction link on top when you get there for additional listings.

"Variophon Gig with keyboard and wind controller (ex-Talk Talk). This superlative instrument was used on every Talk Talk album (except the very first one) [see this post]. This actual example - written provenance included.

Hugely expressive, and probably the best trumpet and oboe facsimile ever made. This example includes the Tuba, Oboe, Clarinet, Trombone, Trumpet and Saxophone modules.

The problem with these instruments is that, now nearly half a century old, the adhesive on the diaphragm has ossified. So it probably plays it's own tunes, to some extent. Couple of broken knobs, but still turnable. The mains plug has been removed. Definitely needing expert servicing - but a hugely worthwhile project. Packing at VEMIA: 24GBP."

You can find another model previously posted here. See the Realton label for additional posts.

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Synthesizer von Gestern (Synths of the Past) Vol 2, Matthias Becker.

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via this auction

"Beautifully-produced second volume of Matthias Becker's authoritative 'Synthesizers of the Past' book - in German, but with so many superb illustrations that it's hardly necessary to read the text. New, unused, still sealed. The photos were taken of another copy of the book.

Too many highlights to mention all, but the book covers such absolute classic synths as the Trautonium, ARP 2500, EMS Synthi 100, E-mu Modular, Steiner-Parker Synthacon, RMI Harmonic Synthesizer, Birotron, PPG 1002, Moog Taurus and Liberation, Roland System 700, Synlab Modular, Roland SH-7, Crumar DS-2, Korg Sigma, ARP Quadra, Roland RS-505 and VP-330, Fairlight CMI, Realton Variophon, Oberhaim OB-Xa, Xpander and OB-SX, Gleeman Pentaphonic, RSF Kobol, Emulator 1, Synergy, Roland SH-101, TB-303, TR-606, MC-202, Jupiter 6, Syntec Banana, SCI Prophet T8, OSCar......... an incredible roster which would (in the beautiful condition they are in the photos) probably now be worth over half a million US dollars.

All with superb photos by Dieter Stork. Hardback, beautifully printed on very high quality paper, bound to the highest standards. A coffee-table book which is also a superb source of information. The Rolls-Royce (OK, Mercedes) of synth literature. (I should know - I produced the Ford Fiestas of the genre.) ISBN 3927954012, printed in 1995."

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Realton Variophon Spot with Seven Cards

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via this VEMIA auction

"Variophons are simply the best wind synthesisers ever produced. This one is a reluctant sale, because although I have another one it is such a unique instrument I would be devastated if that one broke. There is simply nothing else I know of which can make a non-wind player able to play with expression, and, unlike with sampled or digital sounds, sound like a wind player too. The designers need more recognition for making a.) a great controller and b.) the most amazingly realistic impersonations of wind instruments you ever heard. This version was checked over by Lucid recently (May 2014), and is in excellent working order. It comes with seven cartridges - Panflute, Horn, Trombone, Clarinet, Saxophone, Trumpet, Tuba. They are all wonderful. With the glissando control (left hand operated) and the attack, volume and timbre variations you get with breath, this really is astonishingly organic and musical. It comes with a useful info sheet from a previous owner. The wind controller looks like it was silver-painted at some stage, but otherwise the whole thing is in excellent cosmetic condition. It comes with a new unused mouthpiece. (You may need to put it in hot water first to make it easy to attach.) The one design fault is that it seems impossible to close the main unit case safely with the existing Euro plug on the mains lead, so for transit we will cut the lead ready for you to get your own UK or Euro plug fitted to it. Packing 5GBP."

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Synthesizer von Gestern II

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via this auction

"A brand-new sealed example of the most beautiful book ever produced about synthesisers.

Hardback, top quality paper and reproduction, full colour printing on most pages, great photos by Dieter Stork, and authoritative, well-researched text by Matthias Becker.
In German, but still a huge amount of info and synth porn for a non-German-speaker.
146 pp, A4 size (nearly 12 x 8.5"). 750g (1lb 10oz) - a really solidly-made and well-bound book.

First edition, published 1995. This is the second (and bigger) of two volumes of the book, and covers a huge range of classic synthesisers.

Instruments featured:-
Oskar Sala's Trautonium and Mixtur-Trautonium (cf the whole soundtrack of Hitchcock's Birds)
Joergensen Clavioline
ARP 2500
EMS Synthi 100
Moog Sonic Six
E-mu Modular
EMS Synthi Hi-Fli
ARP Pro-Soloist
Steiner-Parker Synthacon
RMI Harmonic Synthesizer
EMS Synthi E
Birotron
PPG 1002
Moog Taurus
Moog Liberation
Roland System 700
Synlab Modular (incredible!)
Yamaha SY-1
Oberheim OB-1
Roland SH-7
Steiner EVI
Crumar DS2
Yamaha CS-30
Korg Sigma
Korg VC-10
ARP Quadra
Roalnd RS-505
Roland VP-330+
Fairlight CMI
Realton Variophon
Oberheim OB-Xa
Oberheim OB-SX
Roland SPV-355
Moog Prodigy
Gleeman Pentaphonic
RSF Kobol
E-mu Emulator I
DK Synergy
RSF Blackbox
Roland SH-101
Roland TB-303
Roland TR-606
Roland MC-202
SCI Prophet 600
Roland Jupiter 6
Korg Poly 61
Yamaha DX7
Syntec Banana
SCI Prophet T8
Boehm Soundlab
OSC OSCar
Korg Poly 800
Oberheim Xpander"

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Realton Variophon Gig wind synth

via this auction

"Made in West Germany early eighties, 1980/1982. Comes with the Martinetta wind blower and 6 voice cards: sax, tuba, oboe, panflote, trompet, horn."

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Synthesizer von Gestern (Synths of the Past) II, sealed

via this auction

"Classic hardback book about classic synthesisers, in German, but with loads of superb illustrations - the most beautiful book about synths ever made.

Sealed, brand new. This is Book II, which is bigger than Book I, and includes authoritative text and diagrams and gorgeous photos.

The book starts with an in-depth interview with Oskar Sala, inventor of the Mixtur-Trautonium (used for the entire soundtrack of Hitchcock's 'The Birds'). Fantastic photos of his studio and various Trautoniums.

Other synths and electronic instruments covered in detail include:- Jorgensen Clavioline, ARP 2500, EMS Synthi 100, Moog Sonic Six, Emu modular, EMS Synthi Hi-Fli, ARP Pro Soloist, Steiner-Parker Synthacon, RMI Harmonic Synthesizer, EMS Synthi E, Birotron, PPG 1002, Moog Taurus, Liberation, Prodigy; Roland System 700, Synlab Modular, Yamaha SY1, Oberheim OB-1, Roland SH-7, Steiner EVI, Crumar DS-2, Yamaha CS-30, DX7; Korg Sigma, VC-10, Poly 61, Poly 800; ARP Quadra, Roland RS-505, VP-330, SPV-355, SH-101, TB-303, TR-606, MC-202, Jupiter 6; Fairlight CMI, Realton Variophon, Oberheim OB-Xa, OB-SX, Xpander; Gleeman Pentaphonic, RSF Kobol, Blackbox; Emu Emulator I, DK Synergy, SCI Prophet 600, Prophet T8; EEH Banana, Boehm Soundlab, OSC OSCar.

A beautiful quality coffee-table book - high production values, great illustrations, hardback, and as rare as some of the rarest synths it contains! Still sealed!"

Talk Talk and the Realton Variophon

via Rick: "Two Talk Talk songs with multiple variphons:"

Talk Talk - APRIL 5TH - 1986

YouTube via ColourOfSpring | November 16, 2007 | "Album : The colour of spring
Piste : 4
Année : 03.1986"

Talk Talk - CHAMELEON DAY - 1986


You can find more info on the Variophone in this post, this post, and the Realton label below.

Synthesizer von Gestern (Synths of the Past) Volume 2

via this auction

"This is a brand new sealed, unopened copy of the rare classic synthesiser book, 'Synthesizer von Gestern' by Matthias Becker. It is the second volume, which (at 146 pages) is larger than the first, and includes an incredible array of classic synths. Unlike the A-Z or Museum book, this is a beautifully-bound hardback, and is printed on very good quality paper. It is the first and only edition of this rare book. The picture is of another book, but it is identical.

When this book was out of print and no longer available, copies were changing hands for 100GBP-plus. Then the publishers found one last pallet of books in their warehouse, gave them to the author in lieu of royalties, and I drove to Koeln in Germany to bring back all I could.

It is in German, but so much of the book is taken up with beautiful full-colour photos and excellent illustrations that that isn't as important as you might think, if you don't speak German. It's a great coffee-table book, but full of serious information too - and the photos are in a class of their own. Crisp, beautiful, detailed, professional!

The book starts with an in-depth interview with Oskar Sala, inventor of the Mixtur-Trautonium (used for the entire soundtrack of Hitchcock's 'The Birds'). Fantastic photos of his studio and various Trautoniums.
Other synths and electronic instruments covered in detail include:-

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Music for the Realton Variophon: " Eat the Beat "

YouTube via taskent99 — May 25, 2010 —

"In this song I play three Variophon´s "instruments" trumpet,sax&clarinet.
Additional instrumens are Korg SP-250 organ and Ecco shoebox.
( more coming from my Atari music archives! )"

Realton Variophon

via this VEMIA auction

click the image for the full size shot
"I'm a dedicated Variophonist and have therefor collected quite a few over the last years. Since I have other priorities in life than repairing gear I've decided to clear out my stash of non-working units. Before you look at the picture I want to point out that all of the now auctioned units come with a full set of voice cards of your choice out of my supply of tested and working voice cards (circa 20 units) but does not include windcontroller. This unit is a Variophon Gig, and I've done some testing and came to the conclusion that everything seems to work except that it only plays sound cards inserted in slot 6 (out of 6). Otherwise it's as great as can be expected. A fair guess is a faulty IC but I cannot verify this without further testing. The case and panel are in great cosmetical condition with only minor scratch marks around edges and on the top of the unit. And, _if the final price exceeds 1000 GBP_ I'll include: A Variophon keyboard controller with mouth piece to go with it. The keyboard is in great shape and is fully working. The mouth piece looks great but has a history of somewhat erratic behaviour (i e sometimes it works flawlessly, sometimes it stops working in the middle of a song and after a short power off/on it's back online again). It is common with Variophons that the wind-to-voltage functions needs both adjustment and some tender love and care. But, as you know if you read this (or have checked out Peter's praise in 'A-Z'), the Variophon is a great instrument when working. Trust me - I have two work horses in the studio. :)"

Rhapsody for the Variophon

YouTube via taskent99

"Realton Variophon:
Very rare german windsynthesizer. I have own this wonderful instrument nearly 30 years.
Haven´t played Variphon for a long time...I had forgotten how lovely&expressive it`s sound is...
Other instrument´s on this little sketch are Cigar Box Synth, Digitech Vocalist VHM-5 & AdrenaLinn.
http://www.variophon.de/"

Realton Variophon

via the VEMIA auction.

REALTON SSAP-ZERO Digital Synth from 1983

Just a shot of the brochure via this auction. According to the auction the brochure has 4 pages.

This one via swissdoc who mentioned "As of synrise it was only a prototype. Realton is the company which made the VARIOPHON." You can read more about the Variophon in this post.

If you know more about the SSAP-ZERO feel free to comment or shoot me an email.

Realton Variophon

via this auction.

Details: "very rare Realton Variophon gig. 19inch 3u rack analogue wind instrument synth made in the early 80s with 6 different instrument expansion cards that slot into the back of the rack. the cards that are included with this unit are tuba, trumpet, clarinet, alto saxaphone, soprano saxaphone, trombone. the sounds can be played individually or you can choose to play any combination (including all of them) at the same time. this is not multi timbral so you can't play a bass line with the tuba a lead line with the trumpet etc. the rack unit has 4 knobs for editing each individual sound
* Upper Partials: for changing the amplitude of the high partials, (Sharpness of the sound),
* Lower Partials: for changing the amplitude of the low partials and the fundamental
* Formant Frequency: for selecting a spectral band which could be attenuated or amplified with the formant level knob.
* Formant Level: for attenuating or amplifiing the choosen spectral band (formant frequency).
includes flightcased 32 note keyboard with cable to connect to the rack unit breath controller with 7 spare mouthpieces and the cable to connect to the keyboard mono and stereo output every instrument card works,the breath controller works,all of the knobs have a nice smooth action and the keyboard plays great. this synth doesn't produce moog type analogue sounds it only makes wind instrument sounds,so if you need a synth to make bonkers noises look elsewhere. there is an enthusiasts website that you can look at to find extensive information about this synth and play a virtual version.the address is www.variophon.de"

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