Sujet Commentaires sur la news : Un synthé ARP Odyssey chez Behringer ?

Désolé pour la plantade.

Dear all,

Thank you for the great comments and questions.

Allow me to give you some background about us entering the synthesizer market.

Over the past few years I have seen that a strong demand for analog synthesizers has resurfaced. This is wonderful, not only because of my personal passion for those instruments, but I always believed that digital synthesizers simply do not match the sound of the legacy analog synthesizers (and there are physical reasons for this).

I grew up with these analog jewels and vividly remember when products such as Juno and Prophet 5 were released. In those days, most of these synthesizers were simply unaffordable not only for me, but most other musicians.
In fact this was a major reason why I built my own synthesizer almost 40 years ago.

Over the years, we have repeatedly been asked by our customers to build synthesizers and in 2010 we decided to move forward with his project. We started a research project and also conducted surveys with a German magazine called amazona.de. We even did a quick rendering to gather feedback about interest in a Juno redesign.

Frankly, the response was overwhelming and we subsequently came up with a detailed plan and roadmap. That included a whole series of classic analog synthesizers, including many popular legacy synthesizers including the Arp Odyssey, Mini Moog, Juno, Prophet 5, etc., but also completely new designs.

In order to pursue our plans, we realized that we needed specific engineering horse power in both the analog and digital domains. On the analog side, because most classic designs are based on Curtis/SSM chips which are no longer available, we looked into replacing these legacy components with equivalent parts with exactly the same functionality. We partnered up with a semiconductor foundry Coolaudio and developed analog and mixed architecture semiconductors such as VCA’s and the highly desirable BBD’s (Bucket Brigade Delay lines) used in analog chorus and delay effects such as the original Juno’s etc.
At the same time we studied the legacy Curtis and SSM chips and we’re in the process of designing our own versions of these highly regarded IC's in collaboration with Coolaudio.

However analog synthesizers only make sense now if you combine them with the control and functionality of today’s synthesizers, so we researched the requirements of a digital control system that would combine the sophistication expected of modern digital synthesizers with the immediacy of classic analog VCO and VCF circuits.
It is my strong belief that the real power of synthesizers only comes to life when you combine the amazing sound of analog with the modern functionality of digital technology - very much a case of combining the best of both worlds.

In recent years we acquired Midas and Klark Teknik, one of most prestigious and powerful mixing console and signal processing companies. 40 years ago it was Midas who built sound systems for Pink Floyd, Supertramp, Frank Zappa and many other world-famous bands.
If you look them up, you will see that these amazing engineers design not only today’s most respected analog products, but also the industry’s most complex and sophisticated DSP and FPGA based digital mixing consoles and other audio products.

But what does that have to do with Synthesizers?

If you look at modern synthesizers, you will understand that while analog technology has its own challenges, such as component tolerances and parameter drift, thermionic noise etc., the biggest complexity lies on the digital side with storage, sequencer, FX etc.
Luckily, we have not only some of the world’s best digital engineers, but also an analog designer and industry icon called John Price who has over 40 years of analog experience. John is considered a legend in the audio industry and it is no surprise that he loves synthesizers, too.

Leveraging our team of legendary talent, we have now assembled a team of the finest engineers to form our new Synthesizer Division.
However we are also looking to recruit more talent and we invite everyone here to watch out for job openings. It’s a very exciting time as the first prototypes are already playing music and the team is working around the clock to incorporate their new ideas.

You are our biggest collaborator and we will continue to engage you on forums and bounce off ideas to see how you feel about our progress. While we cannot promise to incorporate every idea, we will promise to carefully listen. So feel free and share your ideas.

Our plan is to build several classics and also some completely new concepts - monophonic as well as polyphonic synthesizers and classic analog as well as digital synthesizers.
Will we be making an Odyssey? Frankly, we always had the Odyssey on our roadmap and among the several legacy synthesizers we intend to build, our version of the Odyssey will be different, with full-size keys, multi-mode filters and full digital control, potentially a sequencer and arpeggiator, as well as high-end effects from our award-winning X32 digital mixing console.
At the end more models mean more choices for customers, and that is a good thing.

However we like to manage expectations; since building synthesizers is a long-term project, it will take some time for us to release actual products. But we intend to keep you informed, and hopefully soon we can release the first video of our prototypes.

Finally I would like to thank you for your support and encourage you to communicate with us on the usual forums and our social media sites as we will continue to ask for your opinions.

Happy New Year!

Uli
__________________
Uli Behringer
CEO
MUSIC Group
www.music-group.com

rien que le prophet 5 serai cool....

après son idée de mélanger le numérique ...franchement à part le midi qui est pratique ..le reste on peut faire avec...selon mo