Sonja of flight of harmony at the PNW Synth Gathering 2010

YouTube via matrixsynth | July 27, 2010

http://flightofharmony.com/

Quick demo by Sonja. Back on iPhone 4 video from this point on.
See last years's post for the gas mask reference.

Update: This video should now play. I missed setting it from private to public. It should be good to go.

Note: new posts are coming up followed by more of the presentations. Remember you can get to the all PNW posts by clicking on the pnw2010 label below. Book mark it or just search for PNW on the site and then click on the label in one of the posts. You should also be able to find a post or more in the Featured Sites link above for a bit.

Also you can find this one at the top of Jul 27 in the archives section. Click it followed by the label.

PNW SynthFest 2011 - New Modular Maker Anti Matter - Brain Seed Demo

YouTube Uploaded by matrixsynth on Nov 1, 2011

This is a video in the Petting Zoo. I have a follow-up video in the Explanitorium presentation room that will go up later. Note this is the debut of a new modular manufacturer named AntiMatter.

See the PNW SynthFest label for more. PNW SynthFest on Facebook

Video taken with the iPhone 4S on SnapMount Tripod Mount available on Amazonfor those interested.

AES PNW Section March Meeting on The State of Modular & IDOW Trailer

via http://www.aes.org/sections/pnw/

Note this event is on Friday March 14, the day before the MMTA Spring SYNTHFEST.  The AES meeting is free to the public and also at Shoreline Community College.

AES PNW Section
March Meeting Notice
The State of the
Mostly Modular Art of Synthesis

Presented by
James Husted — Synthwerks & MMTA
and the
AES Pacific Northwest Section
Date: March 14, 2013, 7:30pm
Shoreline Community College, Music Building, Room 815

NOTE: anyone can attend this meeting regardless of their status as an AES member. AES MEMBERSHIP IS NOT REQUIRED.

James Husted, of Synthwerks and the MMTA (Mostly Modular Trade Association) gives a short history of synthesis, then walks through a "typical" Eurorack Modular synthesizer setup. This will be a preview of the sorts of things you will see and hear and feel at the upcoming MMTA Synth Fest on March 16th, also at SCC.

We will also show the trailer for the new documentary I Dream Of Wires."

PNW SynthFest 2011 Is Almost Here!

"This is just a reminder to mark you calendar for the PNW SynthFest at Shoreline Community College in the Seattle area on Saturday October 29. There will be tables with power and speakers/monitors to hook up your gear.

Lookers are obviously welcome. There will be plenty to see including the latest from Antimatter Audio, Circuit Abbey, Division 6, Flight of Harmony, The Harvestman, John Bowen Designs, Madrona Labs, Malekko Heavy Industry, Mattson Mini Modular, Synthwerks, The StringStation Project, KMI & The Keith McMillen SoftStep, and a performance by Joel Palmer's ambient & atmospheric guitaring. See the Official PNW SynthFest site for links on each and more."

MATRIXSYNTH Swag & Hall of Fame!!!

MATRISYNTH Ts are $20 in the US and $25 outside the US. This includes the shipping cost, three MATRIXSYNTH cards and one magnet.  A set of three cards and one magnet, minus the T, is $5.

The T-Shirts are from Gorilla Screen Printing - highly recommended. If you get Ts done by them, let them know you found out about them here.

Paypal any amount to matrixsynth *at* gmail.com. Be sure to include the shipping address, size and whether you'd like long or short sleeves.

Below are some MATRIXSYNTH Ts and cards spotted in the wild. If you have them, send them in!

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Dana Countryman at the PNW Synth Gathering 2010 Pt1

YouTube via matrixsynth | July 28, 2010

http://danacountryman.com/

"Dana goes over the Ondioline and his DIY controller based on the Ondes Martenot."

Dana Countryman at the PNW Synth Gathering 2010 Pt2


Note this is the last video in the PNW Synth Gathering 2010 series. Click here for all posts.

PNW SynthFest 2011 - Madrona Labs Soundplane

YouTube Uploaded by matrixsynth on Nov 1, 2011

http://madronalabs.com/

You can see the original he refers to here. The software synthesizer he is controlling is Aalto, also from Madrona Labs.

Be sure to see The PNW SynthFest label for all coverage of the event. You can find PNW SynthFest on Facebook here.

Video taken with the iPhone 4S on SnapMount Tripod Mount available on Amazonfor those interested.

PNW DIY 2008

via Jim Patchell:

"Just to let everybody know, John Marshall informed me that the PNW DIY meet will be on October 25, 2008 at Renton Technical College. (Seattle Area).

If you subscribe to other lists...hey, spread the word. This will most likely be the last one that John will be putting on. I have already purchased my plane ticket...and I will be there. Hope you will be as well."

You can find posts of previous PNW events here.

This Tuesday in Seattle: An Engineer's Perspective on Analog Modular Synthesis

For those of you in the Pacific Northwest, Daniel Casado will be giving a presentation on modular synths. It will be held at Shoreline Community College (map) in room 818 of the Music Building. The talk is open to the public.

via http://www.aes.org/sections/pnw/

"AES MEMBERSHIP IS NOT REQUIRED.
AES PNW Section
September Meeting Notice
The Circuit Is The Sound
An Engineer's Perspective on Analog Modular Synthesis

With
Daniel Casado
Tuesday, September 24th, 7:30pm
Shoreline Community College, Music Building, Room 818
Directions to Shoreline Community College

Modular synthesizers offer endless sonic potential, but they require a deeper level of understanding than most instruments. The intuition of the musician must be complemented by the insight of an engineer.

In this presentation Daniel will briefly review basic electronics (so we're on the same page) and then apply those concepts to the operating parameters of a synth module and how it interconnects to others in the system. He will also discuss important points to be aware of when mixing modules from different manufacturers. Joins us for an evening of sources & signals, modules & modulators, controllers, sequencers, and patch cords, lots and lots of patch cords.

About the Presenter

Daniel Casado was a PNW AES Committee member until his job got in the way. He recently retired, having just completed a stint as Director of Engineering Support for McCauley Loudspeakers and is now able to serve again. Previous to that, Daniel was the N. W. manufacturer's representative for a number of leading audio manufacturers. With over 30 years in the professional audio industry, his experience includes front of house for national acts, mixing live performances for radio & television broadcast, sound system design & installation, manufacturing, R & D, and teaching electronics & audio theory. Daniel has extensive studio experience, and is a musician as well, with a life-long interest in electronic music."

Pacific Northwest Synth 2009 - photos via Computer Controlled

PNW Synth Meeting 2009 flickr set here or on Facebook here.

Pictured: Stephen of Synthwood and red martian on Syntar and MMM, and Scott of Division 6 maker of Midify. Bottom: Midified skull and MMM.

event comments in this post

click here for all PNW 2009 coverage.

Mattson Mini Modular MMM Debut @ PNW Synth DIY 2007

YouTube via redmartian.

"This is a little montage of footage shot at the PNW Synth DIY in Renton, WA. The music was composed entirely on the MMM by William Horne of inside synthesis aka williamroh."

Update via William in the comments: "I posted a much high quality version at http://insidesynthesis.com, since the YouTube compression hardly does it justice.

Only delay on the lead bits, and a highpass on the hihat were used. No chorusing, phasing, reverb, or compression/EQ, so it's overall a pretty raw sound.

I double-tracked the lead and bass parts for stereo width.

I'll make a more modern, less 80's song later. Assuming I have time - I'm only borrowing the prototype for a few days."

Thre is also a great shot of George and William in the post. Be sure to check it out.

Mattson Mini Modular at the New Wave Modular Synthesizer PNW AES Meeting

YouTube via matrixsynth

http://mattsonminimodular.com

"George Mattson of Mattson Mini Modular at the New Wave Modular Synthesizer PNW AES Meeting at MS Studios."

Remember to click on the PNWAES label below for all posts in this series.


Pic of MMM DIY modules in Eurorack format and Billy Corgan's Ichabod below, and a close-up of the Handicon on bottom (click on the images for the full size shots and click here for more images of the event).

PNW SYNTHFEST 2011

The Pacific Northwest Synthfest will be held on October 29 at Shoreline Community College near Seattle Washington. Click on the image for the full size shot. Details will be updated on the MMTA (Mostly Modular Trade Association) website here. Save the date!

Note this replaces the PNW Synth Gathering of previous years. If you attended that event you know it is a pretty casual affair. Bring your gear and share with like-minded individuals. There will be three rooms this time around. See the flyer for details.

Lorne at the PNW Synth Gathering 2010

YouTube via matrixsynth | July 28, 2010

"Lorne (http://www.youtube.com/kidtronic) goes over his various noisemakers including a modified Roland Compuphonic Jupiter-4 at the Pacific Northwest Synth Gathering.

via Lorne: "The Compuphonic Jupiter 4 is custom modified with four banks of eight user memories. On top are space rockets gristleisms, fm3s, original buddha boxes, a postcard weevil and the jackson pollock-ish item is a Dearraindrop videoscope [video below] by critter & guitari for audio to video synthesis."

Other noisemakers include the Shruti-1, Casper Electronics Drone Lab, Eric Archer, 4ms, and Where's the Party At 8-bit sampler. Click here for all PNW 2010 posts. Another MATRIXSYNTH T :) I added this and John's video to the MATRIXSYNTH Ts post.

PNW SynthFest is Tomorrow!!!

Just a reminder that the event is tomorrow. If you are in the Pacific Northwest drop by. This is an open event and it's free. You don't need to bring gear to attend.

See These Manufacturers and Their Gear: Antimatter Audio • Circuit Abbey • Division 6 • Flight of Harmony • The Harvestman • John Bowen Designs • Madrona Labs • Malekko Heavy Industry • Mattson Mini Modular • Synthwerks • StringStation • Keith McMillen SoftStep & Joel Palmer Ambient & atmospheric guitaring

Full details are up on the MMTA website here.

Just for fun, if you plan on attending, take the poll below. Obviously if you won't be in the area there's no reason to vote. Not sure why I put No in there anyway. :)

Pacific Northwest Modular Manufacturers to Present in PNW Division of AES

via the Pacific Northwest Section of the Audio Engineering Society:

"Meet the Seattle Area Modular Manufacturers

Wednesday, February 17, 2010 - 7:30PM
Microsoft Studios
4420 148th Ave NE, Redmond WA 98052, Building 127

Our February meeting features some of the rising stars of the new wave of Modular Synthesis giving demonstrations of some innovative new products as well as showing off some of the more tried and trusted, but never completely predictable, modular delights. This will be a great opportunity to play catch-up for those of you who may be new to the world of modular synthesizers - a world of infinitely variable possibilities that started in the early 70s when modular synthesis was pretty much the only way to go. If you're old enough, think back to the Buchla, Moog 900-series, and the ARP 2600 synthesizers. If not...

In the beginning, there were several separate modules, each responsible for a specific aspect of sound creation: Voltage Controlled Oscillators (VCOs), Voltage Controlled Filters (VCFs) and Voltage Controlled Amplifiers (VCAs). It wasn't too long afterwards that Low Frequency Oscillators (LFOs), Sequencers/Arpeggiators, and Envelope Generators joined the party, creating a broad range of wonderful synthesized sounds. The flexibility of such a system was tremendous - primarily because the modules were connected together by patch cords, encouraging sound exploration and design. That flexibility came at a cost - complexity and price. The modular synths of the day were well out of range of all but the most serious musicians and academia. In addition, the different manufacturers had proprietary sizes and interfaces for their equipment.

This complexity led to an integration of functionality - the standard modules and patches that create sounds were put together and pre-patched, with control mainly of the parameters of the components, but not their order/configuration... These units incrementally came down in price until the pendulum swung furthest in the mid to late 80s. Here we had synthesizers whose human interface consisted of a couple of 7 segment LEDs and a data slider. The majority of the "patches" (named for the earlier use of patch cables to build a sound) were pre-set and canned. Much of the joy the synthesist derived from creating and manipulating their own sounds in real time evaporated. On the other hand, for live performance, a synthesizer with presets was really the only practical solution, because there was no way for a modular synthesizer to change patches quickly during performance.

Fortunately, with lead of several visionaries in the field, modular synthesis has been revived and the costs have dropped enough to become accessible to the general audience. There are new modular standards that provide opportunities for many manufacturers to make modules that interoperate seamlessly and inexpensively. On February 17th, we'll meet several of those manufacturers. Come and learn the history, state of the art, and future trends in modular synthesis.

Confirmed guests include:

* George Mattson, Mattson Modular www.mattsonminimodular.com
* James Husted, Synthwerks www.synthwerks.com
* Kevin O'Neill, Flight Of Harmony www.flightofharmony.com
* Scott Rise, Division 6 www.division-6.com
* Sebastian Jaeger, The Harvestman www.theharvestman.org
* Performance by Stephen Jones member of Red Martian http://redmartian.com

Interviews with the featured guests and more information about the new wave of modular synthesis can be found on electronicmusic.com

Steve Turnidge
AES PNW 2009-2010 Section Chair"

Evolution of a Synthwerks Module

Evolution of a Synthwerks Module Part 1 of 2

YouTube via watchelectronicmusic.
"Steve Turnidge takes us through the design, evolution and realization of the Synthwerks FSR-4 synthesizer performance module."

Synthwerks will be presenting at next Wednesday's PNW Modular Synth Manufacturer's event

Evolution of a Synthwerks Module Part 2 of 2

"Watch as the Synthwerks team hooks up the very first FSR-4 for the very first time. Will it work?"
Be sure to check out the Synthwerks interview on electronicmusic.com. via that interview:
"Synthwerks will strive to make a variety of modules but we are really focussing on performance modules. Modules that the player interacts with to control the rest of their rig.

The first set of modules in production include a module based on FSR (Force Sensing Resistor) technology and will produce control voltages and gates based on the pressure applied to 4 pads on the front panel. There also will be two different manual gate modules using light touch arcade style pushbuttons. Synthwerks will also be producing utility modules such as our 5V supply modules that will provide not only a 5 volt source to the bus, but offer a patch cord checker and either a gooseneck LED light or access to the 5V source to frontpanel jacks.

We have many designs in the queue and there often will be various versions of the same modules so the user can pick one that really fills the hole they see in their system. That is what Synthwerks is all about - looking at the market, seeing what holes are there and filling them. You will probably not see any standard, vanilla modules from us - no VCOs, Ring Modulators, LPFs and the like. There are plenty of those to choose from other companies."

Note Steve Turnidge is the Chair of the Pacific Northwest Division of AES. James Husted will be presenting at next Wednesday's PNW Modular Synth Manufacturer's event.

PNW SynthFest 2011 Pics by MATRIXSYNTH

flickr set by MATRIXSYNTH

Videos will follow. See the PNW SynthFest label below for more coverage of the event.
Update: rotated a few of the images. Remember you can watch the slideshow full screen as well.

PNW Synth Gathering this Saturday

Just a reminder. See this post for details. See the PNW Synth Gathering label below for videos and pics from previous years' events.

Morgasmarings!

Published on Jul 9, 2018 Comparative Irrelevance

"Lately I've been spending some time with my new Morgasmatron! I've been a big fan of the MS-20 filter for a long time, and the Morgasmatron builds on that heritage but takes it to a different level in terms of flexibility and modularity. Still, that wonderful grit and scream is there once you start to push its limits. I think it makes a great pair with Rings' natural, clean timbres. It's almost like plugging a guitar into a crunchy tube amp or analog distortion pedal: all sorts of little gritty artifacts start popping up in the cracks of the sound.

I used this combo in the "Foehn Wind" video I published the other day [below] with just some sparse patch notes, so I figured I'd make another video to take a closer look at Rings+Morgasmatron. Now, this isn't patched up exactly like in Foehn Wind. In that video I used Pam's New Workout and µScale for sequencing Rings' pitch and Structure in the same way that I show in 3 Modules #64 [below]. And I used a sine wave LFO in addition to Sheep to modulate the cutoff, and modulated Sheep's wavetable selection with Mod Tools. I also used Clouds for reverb and additional "lofi-ness".

Here I've simplified a little, and I'm sequencing Rings with my SQ-1 (off screen), which is being clocked by Sheep's 1-bit output. Sheep is also modulating Rings' Position and the filter cutoff for both filters in opposite directions, which can make for a neat stereo effect at more extreme settings.

Rings is in sympathetic strings mode (yellow) and I have Damping set to fully open for most of this recording, which produces almost indefinite sustain. Morgasmatron takes care of the dynamics.

Most of the magic just comes from pushing Morgasmatron's input levels, Q-drive and resonance. Here I'm taking it into pretty overdriven settings.

✌︎

See you around! :)"

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