Howdy

Here's what I liked at the show

The Hartmann Neuron

I had to see it since I couldn't make head or tails out of their http://www.hartmann… website[/]="http://www.hartmann… website[/]. It was pretty f**king hip. I mean, it did all this fizzy stuff but it got down and dirty as well. Some of the sounds reminded me of Yamaha's VP1 but these were actually playable...or should i say "controlable". That was the key, the way the demo guy "played" the joystick.

The designer guy said that it was a complex form of wavetable resynthesis so you can "morph" between sounds. This made for some really cool effects as the demo guy "morphed" between various sounds. Starting from a fizzy pad and ending up with a time-stretched snare drum thing was really fresh.

The interface was cool too featuring endless pushwheels with a value display enderneath, orange golf tee looking joysticks and the regular assortment of black and white keys, etc...

Minimoog Voyager

Right next to Hartmann was Big Briar. They had the new "Voyager" on display. Its basically a modern Minimoog with new features like oscilator sync, switchable 2 pole/4 pole filters, a new "touch pad" controller and onboard memory.

The sound was right on. Starting with the filter open and one oscilator up the thing sounds like a Mini. Not some lame sample of a Mini, not a VST plugin ...a REAL Mini. It just up and "GRRRRRRRRR"'ed at you.

One reason I think it sounded so good was because it didn't have a bunch of crappy synth reverb and delay on it. I mean, that stuff is great and all but so many of the synthesizers come programmed entirely too "my first delay pedal!" causing one to wonder "what are they hiding?" Not the Voyager! It displayed its analog credentials with aplomb!

Of course, the Voyager would sound good, Bob Moog is behind it. My day was made when he came over and "hung out" with us for a bit. Should've gotten pictures... :(

I'm sure there was lots more in keyboard land. However, the ROMplers are all played out for me. They're fantastic for live play but I can't get enthusiastic about running a sample through a low pass filter anymore. The "virtual" and "not so virtual" analog stuff is getting better but how many do you need? So, that's why I'm only writing about a fantastic new SYNTHESIZER and a well done classic.