The CAT synthesizer remains an iconic piece of music technology, representative of Octave’s legacy of groundbreaking innovation and a relentless drive to make audio and music technology accessible to all.īe sure to see our fascinating exclusive interview with Carmine Bonanno recounting the incredible inside stories of The CAT and Octave Electronics, from his earliest days at Syn-Cordion to his views on the future of synthesis! Octave Cat: A Curious Collaboration Octave-Plateau Electronics continued to manufacture and develop The CAT (as CAT SRM and SRM II) through to 1981. ![]() Some of the biggest names in electronic music have used The CAT, including Devo, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, Dave Greenslade, Split Enz (notably for the keyboard break in their hit track, "I Got You"), and, more recently, The Prodigy and The Chemical Brothers. It also caught the attention of more affluent musicians, who praised its exceptional performance and versatility. The result was The CAT synthesizer - an elegant and easy-to-program monophonic/duophonic synthesizer that offered an innovative combination of features including cross-mod, configurable sample and hold, extensive modulation, dual sub-oscillators, combinable waveforms, two types of oscillator sync, and a lowpass filter with uniquely powerful resonance.Įven more revolutionary was the 1976 introduction price of only $599 - a game-changer for musicians who couldn’t afford more expensive alternatives. Recognizing this, a small group of engineers in New York led by the brilliant 22-year-old Carmine Bonanno decided to shake things up and create affordable synthesizers with innovative features, giving birth to Octave Electronics, which later became Octave-Plateau™ Electronics.ĭrawing from his own designs for a modular system, Bonanno and his team set out to create a synthesizer that was not only accessible to up-and-coming musicians but also boasted groundbreaking features. The full version includes an extra couple of sliders that control the fifths across two octaves.Īs a result, the effect can be pushed even further with the full version of Graillon, although the freeware edition can still lead to some interesting sounding results.In the early 1970s, portable synthesizers were a rarity, and only a select few musicians could afford the legendary Minimoog or ARP Odyssey synthesizers. The CPU hit is around 1% on a quad core processor, which is an excellent result.Ĭompared to the full version of Graillon (priced at €29), the freeware edition features only a couple octave sliders in addition to the input/output gain, placebo, mix, and low cut controls. This makes the higher notes sound particularly disharmonic, somewhat similar to ring modulation. ![]() In order to reduce latency, Auburn Sounds have decided to use frequency shifting instead of pitch shifting. See also: Free Panagement Biaural Panner By Auburn Sounds! The result is an artificial and somewhat robotic-sounding version of the original voice, which can work really well for achieving certain types of effects. What’s particularly interesting is that only the vowels and voiced consonants are changed, whereas the rest of the signal is left unaffected, thus making the processed signal (especially speech) easier to understand. Graillon Free is an interesting voice processing tool that mixes frequency-shifted copies of the processed audio signal with itself. ![]() ![]() Auburn Sounds released Graillon Free, a freeware feature-limited edition of their Graillon voice octaver effect for PC and Mac-based digital audio workstations.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |