Tuesday, 15 April 2014

Korg Party

I had forgotten how much fun these old Korgs are.

Apologies for the poor audio ... camera mic recording.
Mucking around with two old MS 20s, one MS 50 and a Korg SQ-10.



 And a previous party. More Korg videos coming.

Tuesday, 8 April 2014

Barbarella - classic Sci Fi & Serge Sci Fi sounds

This poster just arrived in the mail today.
It's a vintage (& original) daybill movie poster from 1968.

The Australian daybill is the Aussie equivalent to the US insert and measures approximately 13" x 30" and was issued with 3 folds.


I've not seen one of these... possibly produced in Australia using a stone lithograph.
Quite a few stain marks from spillage, but otherwise in pretty good condition.

The standard Barbarella movie poster looks like this:

This type of poster is called a US R77. It measures 24 x 47.
It also has triple folds (as they all did back then).

It's condition is better than my Aussie Daybill though I quite like the look on Jane Fonda's face in the 68 Ausie Litho.

Watching movies like this, Dr Who,Star Trek  and Lost in Space were I guess responsible for introducing me to those electronic sounds I love so much today.

Guess I never grew up.

Below is a video taken of my beloved serge making some sci-fi noises.




And I couldn't resist placing this link:
Barbarella vs the "Excessive Machine" making her own brand of noises. :-)

Thursday, 27 March 2014

Krell Music & the Buchla

What's Krell Music ?

Is it ambient, improvisational or sci-fi?
It's been described as organic & free flowing, ....self-generating?
Maybe it's a combination of all of the above.

The term appears to have connections with the movie "Forbidden Planet" (1956) directed by Fred M. Wilcox, starring Walter Pidgeon, Anne Francis, and Leslie Nielsen.



The Krell are a species of highly advanced aliens that once populated the Forbidden Planet.

This is a groundbreaking movie on many levels. The film though loosely based on Shakespeare's "Tempest" is set entirely on another world in interstellar space. And the humans travel on a spaceship far from the earth.

However the most interesting aspect of the film for me is the music score.
This was composed by Louis and Bebe Barron before the invention of modular synthesizers.
They used custom built circuits which they "drove till they exploded". The sounds created where recorded on a early tape recorder (which must have been rare in the 1950s) and the results cut & spliced together to "compose" the sound track.

Below is a Krell inspired patch made on a Buchla Music Easel:

....

And the pic :


Below is a rare German promo poster of Robbie the Robot for the Forbidden Planet.
It measures about 33' x 25''. This type of poster had very limited runs. They were released on behalf of the cinema companies for promotion only.


Below is an earlier Krell piece made using a vintage Buchla 100 and 259 oscillator

Monday, 24 March 2014

Syria - Travel pics - 1999 - Aleppo before the War

It's upsetting when I hear all the bad news coming out of Syria these days.
More refugees, more killing, heart break & suffering.

I first visited Syria back in 1999.
I had wonderful experiences. The people were gracious, warm and friendly.

Here are some pics taken during those times. Seems like it was 1000 years ago.

Aleppo. The citadel ...  (Arabic: قلعة حلب‎) is a large medieval fortified palace in the centre of the old city. It is considered to be one of the oldest and largest castles in the world. It is listed by UNESCO World Heritage.


These pics were taken before digital panoramas. So please excuse my rather primitive attempts to paste them together (David Hockey style).

Below is a recent video of the citadel. Makes be very sad to see it's current state.




 View of the theatre ...inside of the citadel, Aleppo, Syria. 1999.

The Citadel bridge.. crosses the "moat".

Several famous crusaders were imprisoned in the citadel, among them Count of Edessa, Joscelin II & the king of Jerusalem, Baldwin II. It was never captured by the crusaders.
 




View from inside the citadel looking over the city of Aleppo.

The Tea Vendor, Aleppo, 1999.

Aleppo street scene.

Aleppo Grand Bazzar



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For more travel postcards click here

Thursday, 20 March 2014

Korg PS 3200 - Filter workout

The Korg PS 3200 uses dynamic Low-Pass Filters (DLPF) with Cutoff Frequency and Peak controls.
(resonance or Q) - this emphasises the harmonics at the cutoff point.




It's a 12dB/octave, two-pole design.

 The Doepfer Dark Time provided the sequence.

Tuesday, 18 March 2014

Korg PS 3200

It's a real pleasure and indeed an honor to own this synth.

Weighing in at 37kg the 3200 was much derided due to its lack of the famous Korg triple resonators found in its brothers, the PS3300 & PS3100. Korg replaced the resonator with a graphic equaliser.


 I still love it to bits. It has much warmth & richness ....a truly unique machine.

In this first video the Doepfer Dark Time sequencer is triggering drum sounds.


 The synth is much much deeper than this first demo (I'll post more videos in the future to demonstrate).



The PS3200 is a fully polyphonic, 16 memory semi-modular system.... yes memories / presets.
The system Korg used for editing the sounds is unusual. You pull the knobs out to make your changes, then push them back in to store your new settings. You can see me do this in the video.
Above the Dark Time sequencer you can see a bank of 16 white buttons. These store the presets.

Released in 1978, it has 2 VCOs per voice. You can play all 48 notes simultaneously.
It was the last of the PS series. .... strangely the order was: PS3100,PS3300 then the PS 3200.
You can see a resemblance to the MS20 (but it sounds nothing like an MS20).

My PS3200 has a Kenton MIDI retrofit.
This old video demos this. I used a ipad running an old version of the genome sequencer app.
There is probably a much better version of the app now.



 More videos to come.

Wednesday, 12 March 2014

191 Sharp Cutoff Filter - build notes

My Build notes for the LA191 filter.
It's not a Buchla Module.
It follows the same size & format & the circuits used are I understand based on Don's schematics.
I would love Buchla USA to make a official 191 filter.
Until that day, this will have to do.
 
These are not official build notes Just my personal pics to help trouble shoot.



The vintage Buchla 191 is a very rare filter. I'd love to see or purchase a real one.
Maybe Buchla USA will come out with one ... lets hope.

 Anyway, I'm building this for a friend.
The PCB (LA 67) looks great. An easy build I think.


aLL through hole.

Parts are standard .. all discrete.
Some of the transistors need to be matched.


The switch is a bit confusing.

My wiring guide

These pics are the top section (its upside down in the photo)


nOW it gets confusing ... the bottom bit




tHE heatshrink seemed like a good idea at the time, however, it later made my job harder as the hole the switch fits into was too small.
 
got it in ,,,, but was a real mess.
My apologies to the future techo who needs to service this.





 The "Lamps" are polarized.
THey  are actually LEDs  not incandesent lamps
(Incandescent Panel Mount Indicators Panel Mount Indicator Lamps)







A bit of a mess...
But the filter seems to work.
Anyway, I have no idea how this stacks up to a real 191.