L. Ron Hubbard Synth Musician

I recently read about how L. Ron Hubbard, founder of Scientology, had and cherished a Fairlight CMI. I didn't realize how much he appreciated music. Some links in via AH:

Ron The Music Maker
Synths
Fairlight


“Dear Sir Fairlight:
“Please have the engineer store on your floppy disc that we have now been properly introduced. I am very glad to make your acquaintance. You have very charming circuits and I am certain that we can co-vibrate to the astonishment and ecstasy of a vast audience. With all praise to your exulted frequencies, consider me your friend.”

L. Ron Hubbard

Manikin Electronic: Memotron & Schrittmacher

In from schism of Analogue Haven. Digital remake of the Mellotron. Click here for the German page for the Memotron with some sound samples just added. For the English page click here: http://www.manikin-electronic.com/en/index.html. They also make the Shrittmacher, a midi step sequencer developed with Klaus Schulze (check out that display).

Memotron

Schrittmacher

New Nord USA Website

http://www.nordusa.com

Update: I have word that this is an official Clavia site. I first posted it as such then second guessed myself. It also has a user forum. Have fun. : )

Posted on the gas station. This is a resource site. Flash based with loads of pictures and sound. Absolutely gorgeous design.

Wayoutware TimewARP Arp 2600 Emulation Video on Sonic State

http://www.sonicstate.com/news/shownews.cfm?newsid=2296

Last time I checked, the video wasn't live yet. It is now, and it's definitely worth watching. I'm not a guitar player, but the effects section of the video had me impressed. Also, the demo on setting the ranges of multiple paramaters to a given controller was pretty nice. Most synths let you assign a paramater to a controller like a knob. The knob then controls the paramater's range from min to max. With the TimeWarp you can set a range to control instead and you can assign various params to one knob. This effectively allows you to morph between how ever many paramaters you want, all with different ranges, at the same time. Now that would be fun.

Pic from Sonic State:

Buchla Schematics

Long list of Buchla schematics in via AH. Pulled this nice shot from the site as well. It's a CBS Performance System 03:

System built by Buchla consisting of
410 Module Cluster
242 Programmable Pulser
216 Keyboard
258 Dual Oscillator

Oberheim Polyphonic

Zawinul playing the FVS.

via Vintage Synth Explorer. Someone noted an Oberheim Polyphonic listed in the liner notes of a 1977 Weather Report album. This would of course be the Oberheim Four Voice (VFS).

And then there's...

the Metasonix Butt Plug... I mean probe. Guarunteed to get you going with that low frequency bowel rumble.

EMS Adverts

I made reference to the Every Nun Needs a Synthi Advert on an earlier post and I thought it would be worth creating a post just on it. Click here for more Every X needs a Synthi adverts. Pretty cool advertising for a synth then and now.

More Buchla Bits

Click here for an interesting read on a visit by Don Buchla to Cikira's Mushroom Studio.

Music Easel PDF

History of Buchla's Instruments PDF

Happy B-Day Leon Theremin!

Image via Wikipedia.

Just read that he would have been 109 today on Create Digital Music.

Thought I'd put up a link to Wikipedia's article on Leon, but there isn't one! Someone put one up! I did however find one on the theremin with the following pic though. BTW, Bob Moog started with theremins which were always dear to him. When he left the synthesizer business, he started up Big Briar and made theremins. Moog Music still makes em as part of their Etherwave product line.

Update: I'm a loser. Cikira corrected me in that it is Theremin, not Theramin! So I looked up Leon Theremin on Wikipedia and there is a section on him. Funny thing is the link on Wikipedia takes you to the article on the theremin but leaves the address "theramin." I missed it. Also proper etiquette is lower case T for the instrument and upper case for Leon Theremin, and his original Russian name was Lev Sergeivich Termen, anglicized later to Leon Theremin. Sorry Leon. Thanks Cikira! : )