Sunday, 8 December 2013

The Warren Burt Serge/Driscoll Synthesizer


Warren Burt, one of the early pioneers in Electronic Music is among my favorite composers.
Many of his early works from the late 1960s & early 70s used the Moog Modular and Buchla 100 synthesizers. In 1973, he built his first Serge synthesizer.

Many of his recordings can be found on his website: Warren Burt.com.

Warren emigrated to Australia from his native America in 1975 to teach at La Trobe University (Melbourne, Australia). He still lives in Australia, in beautiful country Victoria.
Over a period of roughly 10 years, he put together 3 Serge synthesizer systems of which this one (built between 1977 and 1983) is the last.


It started with just 4 panels, but when I purchased it in 2013 it had grown into this12 panel beast.

The 12 panels are made up of 3 Julian Driscoll panels & 9 Serge panels.

The top two boxes of six panels are the earliest and consist of the following modules:

    Box 1:
  • 2 Original Oscillators
  • 4 VCA
  • 1 Triple Waveshaper
  • 1 Phaser
  • 2 Dual Analog Shift Register
  • 3 New Timbral Oscillators
  • 1 Triple Wave Multiplier
  • 1 Original Serge VCF
  • 1 Extended Range VCF
  • 4 Interface Convertors
  • 2 Handmade VC Low Pass Filters (Ladder)
  • 2 Dual 3in-1out Mixers
  • 3x Dual Processors 

    Box 2:
  • 2 Dual Positive Slew
  • 2 Dual Negative Slew
  • 2 Smooth and Stepped Function Generators
  • 1 Dual VC Slew Generator
  • 1 Peak and Trough
  • 2 Envelope Generators
  • 1 Triple Bi-directional Router
  • 1 Triple Comparator
  • 1 Schmitt Trigger
  • 1 8x Interface Connectors
  • 2 Homebrew Joysticks
  • 1 Mic Preamp
  • 1 Ring Modulator
  • 1 Homebrew Dual Additive Programmer
  • 1 Quad Panner
  • 1 Original VC Filter 




And some pics of the rear of these two boxes:

These panels are currently being restored by Andrew F of NonLinearCircuits.
Andrew has a blog devoted to the restoration.



     


     

Thursday, 5 December 2013

The NonLinearCircuits Synth Project

Like the Driscoll Synth, the NLC synthesizer shares the same format as your average Serge panel.
4U (7" high vs 17" wide). The original Serge panels used a grid of holes on 1 inch centers, so Serge "module" width tends to be also a multiple of 1 inch.

The NLCsynth also uses the same banana jacks & has a similar audio & CV structure.
Not all the panels are finished and the final case is still being fabricated.

For more information check out this site: NonLinearCircuits
The NLC synthesizer marries very well with my Serge.

The final synthesizer will consist of 9 panels.

1.SEQUENCER PANEL (Bindubba 3 & 1)
2.VCO PANEL
3.FILTER PANEL
4.CMOS PANEL
5.NEUROTIC PANEL
6.NICE PANEL
7.VOX PANEL
8.DRUM PANEL
9.CELLULAR AUTOMATA PANEL

To this setup I plan to add 3 vintage Oakland Serge panels to make up the dozen.


Dec 2011. First tests of the Sequencer & VCO panels with a Eurorack modular.
At this time I hadn't decided upon the final shape or size of the case.
We toyed with lots of designs ..... ???
These pics date from early to mid 2012 & we still hadn't decided upon the final case shape.

The PSU was a simple PowerOne +12,-12,0V affair. It's very heavy and I think now will be housed in an external case.

Today (6th Dec, 2013) the NLC looks like this:


And


As you can see, my woodworking skills aren't to die for, so these cases will be scrapped in 2014 in favor of a professional case made by my mate Nathan. The Serge Creature will be gone and two 6 panel cases will be used. The pics below are some of the prototype cases we mulled over.
I quite like this design. 5 panels and quite practical. Easy to dismantle & very similar to my current setup.

 Getting more streamlined. I especially like the rear design.

The rear design is very similar to my Buchla 100 cabinet. I will possibly have Nathan build one of these in the future to house some Buchla modules. But the cabinet we finally chose was for the front 6 panel case.
It's quite a simple design. Practical, not fussy and portable. It reminds me of some classic early synth cases such as the "David Morley Serge".



Wednesday, 4 December 2013

Driscoll Synthesizer


The Driscoll synth was designed by Julian Driscoll at La Trobe University in Melbourne Australia between 1977 and about 1982.

 I have 3 panels which form part of a larger collection of Serge panels put together by Warren Burt.

The first panel (Voice):




                                
                                         

Some pics of the internals of the voice panel:


The second Panel (CV processors & Filter):






The third panel (Sequencer):




Maestrovox Synthesizer

This synth was purchased a few years ago. Discovered in an antique shop in Tasmania, Australia
it was restored in Sydney by Hutchings Keyboards.


I have a love for all things with valves. There is something special about an electric current running through a sealed glass container.

Modern firms such a Metasonix & Trogotronic are leading the revival in vacuum tube technology applied to music, but it's nice to find something made back in the days before transistors & ICs were around.

Maestrovoxes were built in the United Kingdom by Victor Harold Ward in the 1950s.
They were intended to be bolted under a piano.The pianist could play the piano with the left hand,
the maestrovox with the right (and control its volume with his/her knee).



Some very old Maestrovox valves:


And some pics of the old resistors etc post restoration.


Tuesday, 3 December 2013

Two Panel Vintage Paperface Serge

This is a very early, kit-built Serge.
I'm not sure of the exact date but I think it's prob around 1974 - 78.

The first panel  has a dual Negative Slew module,  two Programmer modules, and a triple Bi-Directional Router.



The second panel includes a module labeled "Dual 7486" (a ring-mod or dual VCA or both), Sequencer, Dual Processor, Envelope Generator, dual Positive Slew, and dual Negative Slew.





Both panels are unusual in that they don't use banana jacks.
The current 3.5mm jacks work fine with my Eurorack modular setup, though it's very tempting
to convert to bananas. For the moment, I've decided to leave things unchanged.

The power supply still works though it does heat up quite a bit.
Supplies the Serge
standard +12,-12,0V.
Possibly a potential fire hazard ???  I think  I will replace it soon with a modern one.


More pics:









Makenoize Pressure Points & Paper Face Serge 

The Buchla 100


This classic of Don Buchla was built in the late 1960's.

It's made up of 2 cabinets. The upper one is 15 units.


The lower is made of 10 Units.






Together, they look like this:


The system includes the following modules:

101 2 piece 25 Panel Unit Cabinet
115 Power supply
110 Dual Gate
160 Dual Noise Source
175 Dual Equalizer
194 Comb Filter
190 Dual Reverberator
171 Dual Instrument Preamplifier
111 Dual Ring Modulator
106 Six Channel Mixer
196 Phase Shifter
192 Dual Lopass Filter
158 Dual Sine/Saw Generator
144 Dual Square VCO
156 Dual Control Voltage Processor
107 Voltage Controlled Mixer
140 Timing Pulse Generator
123 Sequential Voltage Source (8 Stage Sequencer X 3)
180 Dual Attack Generator (2 Envelopes)
170 Dual Microphone Preamplifier
130 Dual Envelope Detector
114 Touchplate keyboard

The Buchla 100 and a Elektron Analog Four