Let's use CUNSA as a formant filter (but not the one you expect)

video upload by Frap Tools

"There is this lovely paragraph in Allen Strange's Electronic Music where he discusses formant frequencies of rooms and equipments. However, they are not exactly what we may think of today!

https://frap.tools/cunsa

00:00 Introduction
00:43 Allen Strange talks about formant filters
01:51 Creating a formant frequency with a single CUNSA filter
05:37 Modulating the formant frequency

TMP-2-02 Vintage Synth TV Series from Benge

video upload by zack dagoba

Additional Vintage Synth TV episodes by Benge

00:00 Opening Titles
00:32 Introduction
01:29 Little Black Boxes
05:23 Switched On Cybersynths
14:14 Synthesiser Club
16:59 Commercial Break
17:54 Patching Today
30:59 Video Lab
34:56 Outro

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Episode two of the second series of the TV program from Benge, made at his Memetune Electronic Music Studio

The series explores his passion for vintage synthesiser instruments and studio gear and how he uses it on his productions and collaborations

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

It is divided into the following sections:

LITTLE BLACK BOXES - A look at some classic rack mount synths of the 80s and 90s

SWITCHED ON - This second series looks at a type of synthesis based around the ideas of Cybernetics, which Benge calls CYBERSYNTHESIS

SYNTHESISER CLUB - A short musical demonstration of a synthesiser classic or three

PATCHING TODAY - A deep-dive into vintage modular systems and how to set up a patch on them, starting from scratch

VIDEO LAB - A look at old video equipment and how to create experimental visuals

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

In THIS episode:

LITTLE BLACK BOXES - The Emu Proteus 2 Orchestral, from 1990

SWITCHED ON CYBERSYNTHS - A trip back to the 1960s for a look at the very first Cybersynth, the Buchla 100, including a patch based on Allen Strange’s seminal book Electronic Music, taken from the chapter “‘Real-time Networks’

SYNTHESISER CLUB - Connecting up the Korgs - featuring the Monopoly, DW6000, S770 and DDD1 drum machine

PATCHING TODAY - The Polyfusion 2000 system, with the AS1 sequencer, from the mid-1970s

VIDEO LAB - A look at some of the inspiration behind and planning for the making of Benge’s short film “Proof of Hyper-travel”

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

LINKS:
Benge's Studio Blog: http://myblogitsfullofstars.blogspot.com
Memetune Studio Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/memetunestudio
Benge on Bandcamp: https://zackdagoba.bandcamp.com

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

The MemeTune Programme Credits:
Everything in this video was created by B D Edwards (Benge)
All music, design, writing, filming and production completed at Memetune Studios, UK, 2023

Electronic Music by Allen Strange

video upload by Cinematic Laboratory

"What you don't know does not exist. Without the efforts of MakeNoise and Jason Nolan most of us would not be aware of Allan's book and I would not be able to hold it in my hands and film it. I had no idea Allen Strange used to work and perform with Don Buchla in the Electronic Weasel Ensemble, where Pat Strange played the violin. Instead of alien sounds, they made 'eastcoast' music. We may need stop thinking in synthesis coasts. The book is a bit academic by nature, simply because the modular could only be found at the manufacturers, the university and a privileged group of musicians. So it's a bit like going back to college, and it may not be an easy book for people like me - who never went to college in the first place. This book is a bit out of my league, but I'll definitely revisit it for a few episodes, maybe learn a few new things and share it. It's a goldmine of electronic music knowledge, but it's only valuable if it can be applied. The book makes frequent mentions of classic Buchla 200 series modules. Thanks to TipTop and Buchla, we can enjoy them as if they were made yesterday.

Animations by Kaiber.ai"

Entropical Paradise on the Buchla 100

video upload by zack dagoba

"This is a patch similar to the one published on page 141 of Allen Strange's 1972 book Electronic Music, under the heading Real-time Networks. It is a recreation of Douglas Leedy's Entropical Paradise patch from his 1969 album of the same name

This system is mostly original 1960s Buchla, and I have adapted the patch slightly to make use of the 191 Sharp Cutoff Filter, and to take out the 'birdsong' part of the patch which was originally done with pink noise / envelope follower modulation on the main VCO. I still used the VCO, but took out the modulation and put it through the Bandpass Filter instead"

What is filter pinging (and filter ringing)? A demo with BRENSO and CUNSA

video upload by Frap Tools

"Today we'll see what's filter pinging, how to ping a filter, and why it can mean more things."

00:00 Introduction
00:13 Chris Meyer's definition of "pingable"
02:08 Pinging BRENSO and CUNSA
06:20 CUNSA's Combo Mode
08:06 Pinging a resonant filter: analog drums
09:26 Allen Strange's definition of "Ringing"
10:32 Ringing CUNSA
12:25 Adding V/oct and ringing more filters at once
14:19 Closing remark: filter pinging and filter ringing

A Tip from Allen

video upload by Todd Barton

"A tip from Allen Strange’s book, Electronic Music.
My Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

ELECTRONIC MUSIC ALLEN STRANGE Vintage Modular Analog Synth Synthesizer TEXTBOOK

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

via this auction

Additional Tone Tweakers Listings, also on Reverb

"This was THE textbook for analog synthesis from back in the day (1972). It’s great if you want to better understand your analog modular and Eurorack synths. This one’s the second printing.

Overall, this book looks pretty good. There’s normal wear and tear, plus someone wrote their name at least 3 times in this book - twice on the front cover and again on the first page, you know, just in case a synth book thief tore off the front cover and didn’t notice it on the first page which would then essentially become the front cover. Comes with a folded, unused ARP 2600 front panel facsimile (blank patch sheet).

This listing is for used printed materials that came in with one of the many rare and vintage synths or other pieces of electronic musical gear we normally buy, repair / restore and sell."

CLICK FOR MORE »

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"

Mystery Buchla Easel Patch

video upload by Todd Barton

"All sounds are from the same patch, or as Don Buchla and Allen Strange called them, "instrument definitions." Only switches and sliders have changed. It is a patch I'm working on for my Patreon "Easel Patch of the Month" at https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

MAKEN0ISE Strange Phasing

video upload by MAKEN0ISE

"Phase shifting takes many forms, from visual illusions to audio effects and compositional tricks.

Let's pull a patch from our old friend Allen Strange!

http://www.makenoisemusic.com"

MAKEN0ISE Allen Strange

MAKEN0ISE Acousmatic Gestures

MAKEN0ISE

"Let's use some simple control voltage shapes to inscribe rhythm and intelligibility on unrelated sounds with the Tape & Microsound Music Machine.

"Acousmatic music" is, nominally, music whose sonic origin cannot be seen. It is commonly associated with the GRM (Groupe de Recherches Musicales) and the composers there, including Francoise Bayle, Bernard Parmegiani, Beatriz Ferreyra, Pierre Shaeffer and others. Some info about the importance of gestures to this "school" of composition can be found here: https://www.inventionen.de/Inventione...

Further reading on shapes and gestures in music and listening:

Pierre Schaeffer, Treatise on Musical Objects
James Tenney, Meta Hodos
Allen Strange, Electronic Music: Systems, Techniques, and Controls

http://makenoisemusic.com/synthesizer..."

Allen Strange Firgure 21 for Easel

Published on May 11, 2020 Todd Barton

"An impulse broadcast today at 5pm PDT 8pm EDT on my Instagram @synthtodd I'll be exploring the legendary Figure 21 patch by Allen Strange found in his 1974 manual for the Buchla Music Easel. Join me!
https://www.instagram.com/synthtodd/
Patreon
https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd"

Buchla Easel Instrument Definitions

Published on Sep 29, 2019 Todd Barton

"What we call presets/patches Don Buchla & Allen Strange called "Instrument Definitions". They saw a constellation of connections to be explored as its own universe. I'll be posting a new instrument definition each month on my Patreon page: https://www.patreon.com/synthtodd with performance notes, techniques and suggested explorations, See you there."

Strange Patching: Phasing Simulation with QPAS

Published on Apr 17, 2019 MAKEN0ISE

MAKEN0ISE Strange Patching

"In the section of his book that covers Phasing, Allen Strange uses a series of band pass filters to illustrate the concept. As he writes,

“A spectrally rich signal is taken, in parallel, to three or more band pass filters. The filter outputs, the three pass bands, are mixed at unity gain with the original unprocessed spectrum. Each filter must be offset to a different center frequency.. the filter should not be allowed to go into oscillation.

“A slow repetitive control voltage such as a sinewave from an LFO will then cause each filter to sweep through the applied signal, selectively passing different portions of the spectrum…. By mixing the pass-bands with the original spectrum, there will then be varying degrees of phase-cancellation in the signal, producing continually varying multiple notch cancellations or nulls. The effect will be more pronounced if the control voltage for each filter is attenuated a bit differently so that the nulls are not exactly in parallel.”

Allen Strange wrote the book on modular synthesizers in the 1970s. Electronic Music: Systems, Techniques, and Controls. Unfortunately since the expanded 1982 edition, it has never been reprinted, and in today’s landscape where more people have access to modular synths than ever before, very few have access to the knowledge contained within. This video series will explore patches both basic and advanced from Strange’s text. Even the simplest patches here yield kernels of knowledge that can be expanded upon in infinite ways. I have been heavily influenced by Strange since long before I became a modular synth educator. Please share this knowledge far and wide."

Strange Patching: QPAS Gong

Published on Feb 13, 2019 MAKEN0ISE

"This patch uses two low pass filters in parallel to simulate a long ringing bell or gong sound.

Two VCOs are tuned to a perfect fourth apart, and then ring modded together. The result of this is patched one filter, while the unaltered output of one of the VCOs is patched to the other. They are then mixed together and gated using a percussive envelope with a long tail.

Allen Strange wrote the book on modular synthesizers in the 1970s. Electronic Music: Systems, Techniques, and Controls. Unfortunately since the expanded 1982 edition, it has never been reprinted, and in today’s landscape where more people have access to modular synths than ever before, very few have access to the knowledge contained within. This video series will explore patches both basic and advanced from Strange’s text. Even the simplest patches here yield kernels of knowledge that can be expanded upon in infinite ways. I have been heavily influenced by Strange since long before I became a modular synth educator. Please share this knowledge far and wide."

Strange Patching: FM Trills

Published on Nov 28, 2018 MAKEN0ISE

"As Allen Strange put it, one way to describe sub-audio FM is as pitch ornamentation. A series of trills can be produced with a sub-audio square wave controlling the exponential FM of an oscillator.

In this video, Strange's patch is explained and created using MATHS, modDemix, and Pressure Points. Then we explore an alternate "digital" version of the patch using TEMPI and René."

MAKEN0ISE Strange Patching:

Strange Acoustics: Ring Modulation of Acoustic Sound

Published on Jun 20, 2018 MAKEN0ISE

"Allen Strange had a number of ideas for using ring modulators to affect sounds of acoustic origin. Here are just a couple of them."

MAKEN0ISE Allen Strange

Strange Patching: Parallel Envelopes

Published on Jun 6, 2018 MAKEN0ISE

"Allen Strange wrote the book on modular synthesizers in the 1970s. Electronic Music: Systems, Techniques, and Controls. Unfortunately since the expanded 1982 edition, it has never been reprinted, and in today’s landscape where more people have access to modular synths than ever before, very few have access to the knowledge contained within. This video series will explore patches both basic and advanced from Strange’s text. Even the simplest patches here yield kernels of knowledge that can be expanded upon in infinite ways. I have been heavily influenced by Strange since long before I became a modular synth educator. Please share this knowledge far and wide.

This video shows parallel envelope patching to create two simultaneous note events with different shapes and durations."

MAKEN0ISE Allen Strange

Strange Spectral Sweeps

Published on May 16, 2018 MAKEN0ISE

"Allen Strange wrote the book on modular synthesizers in the 1970s. Electronic Music: Systems, Techniques, and Controls. Unfortunately since the expanded 1982 edition, it has never been reprinted, and in today’s landscape where more people have access to modular synths than ever before, very few have access to the knowledge contained within. This video series will explore patches both basic and advanced from Strange’s text. Even the simplest patches here yield kernels of knowledge that can be expanded upon in infinite ways. I have been heavily influenced by Strange since long before I became a modular synth educator. Please share this knowledge far and wide.

This patch is an interesting audio processing procedure from Allen Strange, utilizing two low pass filters. The result is a subtle increase in the intensity of the original sound.

The sounds in this video are from Kimathi Moore's Morphagene Reels, available for free at https://freesound.org/people/makenois..."

MAKEN0ISE Allen Strange

Strange Envelopes: Pitch Envelopes for Slurs and Glissandi

Published on Apr 4, 2018 MAKEN0ISE

"Allen Strange wrote the book on modular synthesizers in the 1970s. Electronic Music: Systems, Techniques, and Controls. Unfortunately since the expanded 1982 edition, it has never been reprinted, and in today’s landscape where more people have access to modular synths than ever before, very few have access to the knowledge contained within. This video series will explore patches both basic and advanced from Strange’s text. Even the simplest patches here yield kernels of knowledge that can be expanded upon in infinite ways. I have been heavily influenced by Strange since long before I became a modular synth educator. Please share this knowledge far and wide.

This video shows using envelopes for pitch rather than amplitude, using the "keyboard" of Pressure Points for amplitude instead: a reversal of the most typical patch. The result is variable-volume slurs, which can be changed to glissandi by patching a sample and hold in series."

All parts here.