Teenage engineering - They have gone modular

I was surprised and delighted to see this today.
I'm a big fan of this Swedish company.

The teenagers have got a new series of synths out.
Beautiful Scandinavian designs.
Their website describes this as the poor man's modular but I can see these being sold in art galleries.

The System 400 (as my friend Justin pointed out) harks back to the EMS Synthi E
And I think the similarities are more than just its colour

The Synthi E was designed for education, and I feel that these new TE synths will open up the world of modulars to a much wider audience.

The flat pack idea reminds me of  IKEA. Another Swedish company... who are known for selling good, minimalist designed products at affordable prices.

As far as I can tell from the manual, the patch cables are 3,5mm but the module size is their own format (not Eurorack).

The 400 has  3 OSCILLATORS, NOISE, RANDOM GENERATOR, 2 ENVELOPES, 2 VCA'S, LFO, FILTER, MIXER, SPEAKER BOX, POWER PACK AND A 1–16 STEP SEQUENCER.

THE COMPLETE KIT COMES WITH CHASSIS,16 MODULES, 15 PATCH CABLES.

It doesn't look like you can move these modules around within the system.
The kit comes with a flat metal face (reminds me of my old Meccano set) where you bend (the edges) to make the case...

The modules are then screwed onto the back of the face ??

The other two synths released are the 170 & the keyboard

The 170 is a analog monophonic synth with step sequencer. It costs $349USD and includes a chassis, nine modules and eight patch cables.
The modular membrane keyboard has tuneable keys and a step sequencer. It seems to be designed for use with the 400 & 170 model... and hopefully will conform to Eurorack CV/ gate standards

The module dimensions are here.

The TE system uses M2 screws., 5mm spacing mount holes. Module dimensions are 30x90 for a 6HP module. ie the height is 90mm which is approximately 2U

Euro specs are M3 screws, 5.08 mm spacing mount holes, and a 3U height.

But the PSU  is compatable ... both +/-12V

I hope this is the first of many future module additions. Maybe a case that allows for free placement of the modules..... I can see this system expanding 

Links:
Teenage Engineering

Top 40 Synth Blogs

Wow, FEEDSPOT has selected the top 40 blogs / websites from thousands of synthesizer blogs in 2018.
This site has reached #22.
Thanks to everyone who helped put us on this list.
It's a great honor. 

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Masters Of Modern Sound - AGNSW

An awesome exhibition. There is one more day to see this music/painting combo.
I saw this last night.
This is part of the Festival of Sydney 2019

The program:

Shchukin, Matisse, Dance & Music

This multimedia installation is by Saskia Boddeke & Peter Greenaway.
Shchukin comissioned the paintings Dance & Music for his Moscow residence in 1910.
They are now in the collection of the Hermitage.
The dancers are from the Dutch National Ballet and music by Italian composer Luca D’Alberto,

I enjoyed all the performances esp Caterina Barbieri
http://djjondent.blogspot.com/2019/01/caterina-barbieri-masters-of-modern.html

If you miss the performances, there are still these masterpieces to see.
Some of my fav pieces:

Cézanne, Fruit 1879/80; oil on canvas, 46.2 x 55.3 cm, Inv GE 9026, The State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg

Kandinsky

Sonia Delaunay-Terk’s illustration of Blaise Cendrars' text

Othon Friesz - Roofs & Rouen Cathedral, 1908

Henri Matisse

Black Square (1932)
I wish there was more Malevich.Can't get enough of this guy.

Corin Illeto, Becky Sui Zhen & Casey Hartnett performed surrounded by masterpieces of the Hermitage.



You can see the Masters of Modern Art from the Hermitage till March 3rd, 2019.

Caterina Barbieri - Masters Of Modern Sound

I really enjoyed this performance last night at the Art Gallery of NSW, Sydney, Australia.
This was part of an exhibition of art from the Hermitage, St Petersburg, Russia.


The exhibition attempted to fuse the paintings with modern music.

Thank you Caterina.

I was blown away with the breath of sounds Caterina was able to provide with such a small rig.
A lesson that less really is more.

For the geeks out there who are wondering about the system format. As far as I could tell from a distance:
Case: Make noise 7U shared system with a central CV bus.
Top row: Orthangonal Devices ER 101 sequencer, Make Noise Echophon, Erb Verb,
                LxD filter VCA,   Maths, Optomix (Voltage controlled filter/amplifer/LPG),
                Doepfer 190 USB midi to CV
Bottom row: Verbos Harmonic Osc, Make Noise woggle bug & DPO, ALM Pamelas workout,
                    Doepfer 135-1 VCA/mixer, doepfer A-105 VCF SSM 24dB Low Pass & Doepfer ADSR??

Possibly, Caterina was using a laptop to process the audio. Not 100% certain about this. I read somewhere she uses Abelton and is a fan of the ping pong delay. That's a Novation midi controller at the bottom with a MOTU audio interface.

Links:
https://caterinabarbieri.com/
FACT MAG
Discogs
Resident Advisor
Soundcloud
Loop//Abelton

RIP Alan R. Pearlman

A good innings.
He can stand shoulder to shoulder alongside the likes of Don Buchla & Bob Moog.

Alan was born in NYC in 1925. He worked for NASA and served in the US military before founding ARP instruments ( (originally Tonus, Inc.) in 1969. He designed amplifiers for NASA's Gemini and Apollo programs

ARP shaped the early development of analog Synths.
These 2500 & 2600 synths were and still are among the greatest synthesizers ever made.
I love both these instruments. Though many describe the 2500's matrix as unreliable, I wish more manufacturers would adopt this technology. It really makes the 2500 special.

The 2600 was produced from 1971 until 1982. Instead of the matrix, it used traditional patchords.
The synth has preset internal connections so users can get sounds out of it & play it straight away without any knowledge of modular synthesis or patching.

These internal connections are broken when a patch cable is inserted, making this synth 100% modular. This was I think one of the earliest if not the first time such a idea was implemented.  It's so common these days and most people don't give it a second thought. Alan was a true pioneer.

A great sequencer !!!

The ARP Little Brother was meant to be a companion to the 2600.

These are battery powered modules (9V DC). They were intended to educate kids.
The modules helped to teach me be the basics of synthesis.

The ARP Avatar guitar synthesizer.

Thank you Alan.
(June 7, 1925 – January 6, 2019)

Ciat Lonbarde _ Gerassic Organ

My first build for 2019.
The Ciat Lonbarde Gerassic Organ.

This is what is called a "Paper Circuit".
iTS  a Dual Organ.
Here are some links for paper circuits.
http://ciat-lonbarde.net/paper/

More Links:
http://www.ciat-lonbarde.net/TIMARACURRICULUM/TIMARATERIALS/cirques/index.html

Totally DIY . I'm trying to avoid using any "traditional" PCB materials.
Art meets Electronics

The PCB design is a beautiful, organic creature. Totally divorced from the grid like PCBs I'm used to.
The plan is to use transparent perspex to hold everything together.
You could easily build this on some perf board but you wouldn't be able to see the connections.

The 4067b is a digitally controlled analog switch.
It's a 16 channel CMOS analog multiplexer.

There are 4 binary control inputs (A,B,C,D) and a inhibit input, arranged so that any combination of the inputs selects one switch.

PNP's = BC557 (x3) ... identified by the "+"
NPN's = BC547 (x1)... identified by the "-"
Diodes = 1N4001 (x3)
Pots = B100K (x16)   .... mouser- part number 531-pt6kv-100k
Momentary switches (x3)

Pluck length Attack resistor X = 47K to 470K
Might use a rotary switch (1P6T)
47K,100K, 150K, 200K, 300K,  470K  ???
or a A500K pot

Hairy Capacitor * = 0.001uF to 10uF ??
0.001uF code 102 ....high treble?
0.01uF code 103 ....treble
0.1uf code 1004 ... bass
1uf ...sub-bass
10uF ... sub-sub bass
The hairy capacitor is for tuning.... might use a rotary switch to pick the capacitor value.
 1P6T rotary switch ???
Add an  additional variable tuning capacitor in parallel.?

 Final Capacitance = C1+C2+C3....+C10 etc etc

Waiting for parts.......To be continued....

Links
+ CMOS

Happy New Year

I spent New Years Eve at Luna Park, on Sydney Harbour.

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#sydney #fireworks

A post shared by jono (@dj_jondent) on Dec 31, 2018 at 8:01am PST

May 2019 be a good one for everyone with lots of electronic Music

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#2019newyear #sydney #fireworks #sydneyharbourfireworks #sydneyfireworks #lunapark

A post shared by jono (@dj_jondent) on Dec 31, 2018 at 7:29pm PST

and Sausage Dogs

Meet Frankie-Bunnings:

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#sausageroll #dashund #dashundsausageroll #sausagedog

A post shared by jono (@dj_jondent) on Dec 31, 2018 at 10:43pm PST