Synthesizer

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Pepe
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Re: Synthesizer

Post by Pepe » Tue May 10, 2022 3:40 pm

The_Doc wrote:
Tue May 10, 2022 9:23 am
Pepe wrote:
Mon May 09, 2022 4:53 pm
It does, indeed! Well, at least with the right playing method, pickup, damping ... The circuit for the guitar tracking is the same as (or a variation of) the single MS-03 Signal Processor unit. Much better reliability than the External Signal Processor circuit of the MS-20.

I often heard people ranting about the tracking of the X-911, but I have played octaver pedals with way worse tracking. For people like me KORG did a brilliant thing back then! :geek:
I’ve never got on with that ESP section of the MS-20. I set it up exactly as shown in the manual but still struggled to get it tracking properly. In the end I ended up buying a Roland GI-10 Midi Converter & GK2A pickup for a Yamaha Pacifica to connect to my other synths via midi.
That was a good decision. I tried the ESP of the MS-20 for a few times years ago and I was really disappointed. No matter how I tweaked the knobs or which pickup I used, it always only tracked a few notes properly and the rest was unusable.

For the MS-20 mini that I have they could have implemented the improved circuit of the MS-03 or the X-911 - but they chose to keep it as original as possible.
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Pepe
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Re: Synthesizer

Post by Pepe » Thu Jun 16, 2022 11:26 am

What a great way to start a week! I picked up two vintage KORG classics: an MS-20 (finally a standard-sized model, hooray!) and the rare MS-50. I had never thought that an MS-50 might find its way to my place someday. :shock: :D

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Re: Synthesizer

Post by The_Doc » Thu Jun 16, 2022 11:52 am

Wow ! That is awesome Pepe. Congratulations :D

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laurie
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Re: Synthesizer

Post by laurie » Thu Jun 16, 2022 11:57 am

Holy. Cow. Those are awesome!! Congrats.

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Re: Synthesizer

Post by BearBoy » Thu Jun 16, 2022 1:09 pm

Amazing 8-)

Congrats, Pepe

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Old_Iron
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Re: Synthesizer

Post by Old_Iron » Thu Jun 16, 2022 1:19 pm

Nice toys, congrats!

Pepe, do you know an Italian group of engineers that built a synth, and to demo it, they created a few pieces of music that ended up to be the album Automat in 1978 ?

It is a sweet memory of my early teenage, my favorite is Droid at 16:44 in the video below.



Droid cover:


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Re: Synthesizer

Post by Pepe » Thu Jun 16, 2022 3:47 pm

Thanks, my friends! Now I have a summer project, since the potentiometers and switches are crackling like crazy. After a good portion of love and care and proper calibration both synths are going to be used a LOT! :D

Old_Iron, that's a very interesting story that I have never heard before. A unique synthesizer called "MCS 70" - very cool! I'm going to listen to that album later, thanks a lot for your suggestion!
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Re: Synthesizer

Post by Old_Iron » Thu Jun 16, 2022 4:38 pm

Pepe wrote:
Thu Jun 16, 2022 3:47 pm
Old_Iron, that's a very interesting story that I have never heard before. A unique synthesizer called "MCS 70" - very cool! I'm going to listen to that album later, thanks a lot for your suggestion!
Happy to help. :P

Yes, it is an interesting story since none of them were a "proper musician" but they created something very special (at least to me).

I'm going to confess a bad behavior here, at the time I was a teen. :o

Kids, don't do this, it is very dangerous. 8-) :D

I had a friend, by the the early 80's, that completely restored a 1974 Dodge Charger RT (Brazilian version), and we used to go to a very quiet, no traffic, road, to put that beast to run at 200+ Km/h. ( at that time, for us, it was SpaceX kind of speed)

And the soundtrack was always the music Droid, played very loud.

The thrill of being at more than 200 Km/h in such a gorgeous and big car, with the V8 engine roaring and that music beating my ears is unforgettable.

If you like vintage cars, like me, this is how a Brazilian Charger RT from the 70's looks like:

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Re: Synthesizer

Post by Pepe » Fri Jun 17, 2022 11:08 am

I started listening to the "Automat" album and so far I must say that some parts sound VERY futuristic for an album from 1978! :o
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Re: Synthesizer

Post by Old_Iron » Fri Jun 17, 2022 5:45 pm

Pepe wrote:
Fri Jun 17, 2022 11:08 am
I started listening to the "Automat" album and so far I must say that some parts sound VERY futuristic for an album from 1978! :o
Agreed!

I believed this was my first contact with "synth music", after that came a bit of Vangelis, Kraftwerk, Rick Wakeman, Pink Floyd...

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Edit: Found a playlist on youtube with remastered tracks, way better:

It is the channel of one of the composers, Romano Musumarra:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2WzNRL ... 72YL31ugpI

Edit 2:

Okay, I did some more research about the album and I was wrong about the fact that 2 guys in the project are indeed musicians, keyboardists.

The album was released only in Italy and Brazil, that's why I knew it and you don't Pepe. I didn't know that.

The whole text I found, translated from portuguese by google:


"Automat is the name of an Italian space-themed electronic music group. The group met only once for the production of an album of the same name, which was initially intended to promote the MCS70 synthesizer. All tracks on the album were played using the instrument. Although the final result of the work did not please the composers, it can be considered a reference for lovers of experimental electronic music, a style that marked the 1970s.

An original choice for an Italian group of the 1970s, Automat was a duo from Rome that comprised two keyboardists and a producer, Mario Maggi, inserted into the keyboard programming. Maggi was the builder of the MCS70 sinth used on this album, and the sounds and potential of the new instrument were the basis of inspiration for this work.

At the same time as Automat, Romano Musumarra also played in a totally different group, La Bottega dell'Arte, active between 1975 and 1984 with many successful singles. The other member of the duo, Claudio Gizzi, in turn had a classical preparation.

Their album is from 1978 and is a very rare example of Italian instrumental electronic music, built entirely on synthetic sounds and rhythms. In addition to being in the same style as the contemporary works of Kraftwerk and Jean Michel Jarre, whose album Oxygene was recorded in the same period and published a few months before the group Automat.

Side "A" is entirely taken up by Claudio Gizzi's long Automat suite, while track "B" contains three shorter songs by Musumarra. One of them, Droid, was chosen as an acronym for TV Globo, and the album was released in Brazil.

Musumarra continued to compose keyboard music in the 1980s, with soundtracks, particularly in France, as well as work as a producer. In turn, Claudio Gizzi, appears with a song in the guise of arranger and orchestra director on the album My favorites tones, published in 1973 by the legendary Picci label, in addition to releasing several albums under the nickname of "Jean-Pierre Posit", being that the title track of the album "Magie D'Amour" had huge acceptance in Brazil, as the soundtrack of the soap opera "Baila Comigo", by Rede Globo TV, in addition to becoming a musical background for prayers and preaching, especially evangelical"

Source: https://80minutos.com.br/artist/779

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