Synthesizer

• 1. Introduction

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  In 1969, Mort Garson used a Moog to compose a soundtrack for the televised footage of the Apollo 11 moonwalk. That single choice linked electronic music and outer space in the American popular imagination. The instrument behind it, the synthesizer, generates audio signals electronically rather than from strings, reeds, or struck surfaces. In 2016, the publication Fact called it as important and as ubiquitous in modern music as the human voice. Yet it began as an avant-garde curiosity, prized by 1960s psychedelic and counter-cultural scenes but thought to have little commercial potential. How did a machine controlled by punch cards and built from hundreds of vacuum tubes become an instrument used in nearly every genre? Who decided it should have a keyboard at all? And why did musicians' unions once try to ban it outright? The answers run from a Princeton laboratory to a bestselling album of Bach, from disco basslines to the theme of a 2016 television show.

• 2. From Tubes To Touchplates

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  In 1957, Harry Olson and Herbert Belar completed the RCA Mark II Sound Synthesizer at the RCA laboratories in Princeton, New Jersey. It read punched paper tape that controlled an analog synthesizer containing 750 vacuum tubes. The Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center acquired it, where the Princeton University composer Milton Babbitt used it almost exclusively. Earlier electronic instruments had already appeared as electricity spread. The early 20th century saw the Telharmonium, the Trautonium, the ondes Martenot, and the theremin. In the late 1930s, the Hammond Organ Company built the Novachord, powered by 72 voltage-controlled amplifiers and 146 vacuum tubes. The Canadian engineer Hugh Le Caine completed the electronic sackbut in 1948, a precursor to voltage-controlled synthesizers whose keyboard sensitivity allowed vibrato, glissando, and attack control. The authors of Analog Days mark the early years of the synthesizer as between 1964 and the mid-1970s. They begin with the Moog, designed by the American engineer Robert Moog. The Moog was built from separate modules connected by patch cables that generate, shape, or control sound. Moog developed the voltage-controlled oscillator, a means of controlling pitch through voltage. That, with envelopes, noise generators, filters, and sequencers, became standard. Around the same time, the American engineer Don Buchla created the Buchla Modular Electronic Music System. Instead of a conventional keyboard, it used touchplates that transmitted control voltages based on finger position and force. The Moog's keyboard made it more accessible and marketable, and keyboards became the standard way to control synthesizers. Both Moog and Buchla at first avoided the word synthesizer, which was associated with the RCA machine. By the 1970s, the term had won out.

• 3. Smaller, Cheaper, Programmable

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  In 1970, Moog launched the Minimoog, cheaper and smaller than the modular systems before it. It was the first synthesizer sold in music stores and far more practical for live performance. It standardized the idea of a synthesizer as a self-contained instrument with a built-in keyboard. The British composer Ken Freeman introduced the first string synthesizer in the early 1970s, designed to emulate string sections. After retail stores began selling synthesizers in 1971, new companies formed, including ARP in the United States and EMS in the United Kingdom. ARP's products included the ARP 2600, which folded into a carrying case and had built-in speakers, and the Odyssey, a rival to the Minimoog. The less expensive EMS synthesizers were used by European art rock and progressive rock acts including Brian Eno and Pink Floyd. By the mid-1970s, ARP was the world's largest synthesizer manufacturer, though it closed in 1981. Early synthesizers were monophonic, able to play only one note at a time. The American engineer Tom Oberheim built some of the earliest commercial polyphonic synthesizers, such as the OB-X in 1979. In 1978, the American company Sequential Circuits released the Prophet-5, the first fully programmable polyphonic synthesizer. Earlier instruments forced users to adjust cables and knobs with no guarantee of recreating a sound exactly. The Prophet-5 used microprocessors to store sounds in patch memory. That shift moved synthesizers from making unpredictable sounds toward producing a standard package of familiar sounds.

• 4. The Digital Decade

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  1982 saw the introduction of MIDI, a standardized means of synchronizing electronic instruments, which remains an industry standard. The market grew dramatically across the 1980s. The Fairlight CMI, released in 1979, was an influential sampling synthesizer that could record and play back samples at different pitches. Its high price kept it from amateurs, but high-profile pop musicians including Kate Bush and Peter Gabriel adopted it. Its success drove competition, improving sampling technology and lowering prices. Early competing samplers included the E-mu Emulator in 1981 and the Akai S-series in 1985. In 1983, Yamaha released the first commercially successful digital synthesizer, the Yamaha DX7. It was based on frequency modulation synthesis developed by the Stanford University engineer John Chowning. Its sounds were harsh, glassy, and chilly, set against the warm and fuzzy sounds of analog synthesis. The DX7 was the first synthesizer to sell more than 100,000 units and remains one of the bestselling in history. The Synclavier, built with FM technology licensed from Yamaha, offered 16-bit sampling and digital recording. With a starting price of $13,000, its use was limited to universities, studios, and wealthy artists. The Roland D-50, released in 1987, blended Roland's linear arithmetic algorithm with samples. It was the first mass-produced synthesizer with built-in digital effects such as delay, reverb, and chorus. In 1988, the Japanese manufacturer Korg released the M1, a digital synthesizer workstation featuring sampled transients and loops. With more than 250,000 units sold, it remains the bestselling synthesizer in history.

• 5. Software And The Analog Revival

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  In 1997, two software synthesizers that could be played in real time via MIDI appeared: ReBirth by Propellerhead Software and Reality by Seer Systems. In 1999, an update to the music software Cubase let users run software instruments as plug-ins, triggering a wave of new software instruments. Propellerhead's Reason, released in 2000, introduced an array of recognizable virtual studio equipment. The market for patchable and modular synthesizers rebounded in the late 1990s. In the 2000s, older analog synthesizers regained popularity, sometimes selling for much more than their original prices. In the 2010s, new and affordable analog synthesizers arrived from companies including Moog, Korg, Arturia, and Dave Smith Instruments. The renewed interest is credited to the appeal of imperfect organic sounds and simpler interfaces. Modern surface-mount technology also made analog synthesizers cheaper and faster to manufacture. Clones extended this affordability into unlicensed territory. Synthesizer clones are unlicensed recreations of earlier instruments, marketed as cheaper versions of famous equipment. Arturia and Native Instruments have sold software clones. Behringer manufactures equipment modelled on the Minimoog, the Pro-One, and the TB-303, plus drum machines such as the TR-808. Other clones include the MiniMOD, a series of Eurorack modules based on the Minimoog, the Intellijel Atlantis based on the SH-101, and the x0x Heart based on the TB-303. Cloning older hardware is legal where the patents have expired. In 1997, Mackie lost its lawsuit against Behringer because copyright law in the United States did not cover its circuit board designs.

• 6. Switched-On Mainstream

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  Switched-On Bach, released in 1968, was a bestselling album of Bach compositions arranged for Moog synthesizer by Wendy Carlos. It demonstrated that synthesizers could be more than random noise machines and carried them into the mainstream. Debates followed over whether synthesizers belonged in baroque music, and according to the Guardian they were quickly abandoned in serious classical circles. The Moog reached 1960s rock acts including the Doors, the Grateful Dead, the Rolling Stones, the Beatles, and Keith Emerson. Emerson was the first major rock musician to perform with the Moog, and it became a trademark of his shows. Analog Days says Emerson, with his Moog performances, did for the keyboard what Jimi Hendrix did for the guitar. The instrument helped take his band Emerson, Lake & Palmer to global stardom. String synthesizers served 1970s progressive rock bands including Camel, Caravan, Electric Light Orchestra, Gentle Giant, and Renaissance. As polyphonic synthesizers rose in the 1970s and 1980s, the keyboard in rock reverted to the background, used for fills and atmosphere rather than soloing. Queen included notes in their 1970s albums specifying that no synthesisers had been used, then added them in their 1980 album The Game. The Minimoog also took a place in mainstream African-American music, most notably in the work of Stevie Wonder, and in jazz through Sun Ra. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, it was widely used in disco by artists including Abba and Giorgio Moroder. Sampling, introduced with the Fairlight in 1979, shaped the development of electronic and hip hop music.

• 7. Synth-Pop And The Screen

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  Gary Numan's 1979 hits "Are 'Friends' Electric?" and "Cars" made heavy use of synthesizers, feeding the emergence of synth-pop from the late 1970s to the early 1980s. German krautrock bands such as Kraftwerk and Tangerine Dream contributed to the genre, as did British acts John Foxx, Gary Numan, and David Bowie. So did the African-American acts George Clinton and Zapp, and the Japanese electronic acts Yellow Magic Orchestra and Kitaro. Earlier, in the 1970s, composers Jean Michel Jarre and Isao Tomita released successful synthesizer-led instrumental albums. OMD's "Enola Gay" in 1980 used distinctive electronic percussion and a synthesized melody, and Soft Cell used a synthesized melody on their 1981 hit "Tainted Love". Nick Rhodes, the keyboardist of Duran Duran, used synthesizers including the Roland Jupiter-4 and Jupiter-8. The Yamaha DX7 became a pop staple after 1983, used on songs by A-ha, Kenny Loggins, and Kool & the Gang. Its E PIANO 1 preset grew especially famous for power ballads, used by Whitney Houston, Chicago, Prince, Phil Collins, Luther Vandross, Billy Ocean, and Celine Dion. Korg M1 presets spread through 1990s house music, beginning with Madonna's 1990 single "Vogue". The sequencer-based Roland TB-303 from 1981, with the Roland TR-808 and TR-909 drum machines, became a foundation of house and techno once producers bought cheap second-hand units. On screen, ARP synthesizers created sound effects for the 1977 films Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Star Wars, including the voice of the robot R2-D2. Synthesizers scored thrillers and horror films including A Clockwork Orange in 1971, Apocalypse Now in 1979, The Fog in 1980, and Manhunter in 1986. Brad Fiedel used a Prophet synthesizer for The Terminator in 1984, and the filmmaker John Carpenter used them heavily. Television themes followed, from Knight Rider in 1982 to Twin Peaks in 1990 and Stranger Things in 2016.

• 8. Inside The Machine

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  In subtractive synthesis, oscillators generate complex waveforms that filters then shape by removing or boosting frequencies, producing sounds described as rich and warm. Additive synthesis combines a large number of waveforms, usually sine waves, into a composite sound. Frequency modulation synthesis, also called phase modulation, modulates a carrier wave with the frequency of a modulator wave, and the result can be modulated again and again. Phase distortion synthesis, used in Casio CZ synthesizers, works similarly to FM synthesis. Wavetable synthesis modulates smoothly between digital representations of different waveforms to change shape and timbre. Sample-based synthesis plays back digital recordings and shapes them with filters, envelopes, and LFOs. Vector synthesis, pioneered by the Prophet VS, crossfades between sound sources using joysticks, envelopes, and LFOs. Granular synthesis splits an audio sample into grains, usually between one hundredth and one tenth of a second long, then recombines them. Physical modelling synthesis builds a mathematical model of a physical sound source. The components behind these methods are shared. Oscillators produce waveforms such as sawtooth, sine, or pulse waves with different timbres. Voltage-controlled amplifiers control volume, their gain set by a control voltage from an envelope generator, an LFO, the keyboard, or another source. Envelopes control how sounds change over time, most commonly the ADSR envelope, where attack is the run-up from nil to peak, decay falls to the sustain level, sustain holds during the main duration, and release fades to zero after the key is let go. Low-frequency oscillators modulate parameters such as pitch, producing vibrato. Filters remove frequencies to shape sound, with low-pass filters cutting audio above a set frequency and high-pass filters doing the reverse. Arpeggiators turn input chords into arpeggios. This rise also reshaped the music industry. The synthesizer could imitate strings and horns, letting one keyboardist or programmer produce the range of an entire orchestra. That threatened session musicians, an upheaval compared to the 1920s arrival of sound in film, which put silent-film accompanists out of work. The American Federation of Musicians negotiated a ban on the Moog in union work for a period. Robert Moog felt the union imagined that all the sounds musicians could make somehow existed in the Moog, as if pushing a button marked Jascha Heifetz would summon the most fantastic violin player. The musician Walter Sear persuaded the union that the synthesizer demanded skill, and the category of synthesizer player was accepted, though players faced suspicion and hostility for years. In 1982, after a Barry Manilow tour used synthesizers instead of an orchestra, the British Musicians' Union tried to ban them, drawing controversy. The same decade rewarded a few musicians skilled at programming the Yamaha DX7, who found employment creating sounds for other acts.