My vocalist wants a synth to use onstage when my band goes into jams so she can "do something" and participate. She said she wants something that "makes wild sounds," and wants something small. I'm assuming she wants something with oscillators and lfo control, etc. She found something on ebay called "The Cat," but I know nothing about it. I was also thinking maybe a moog prodigy? Any tips or info would be very much appreciated.
synth for a nu-b
- Thread starter spoonie g
- Start date
LAZI
New member
a lot of people are liking the korg keybaords... the ms2000b and the microkorg are popular as hell for bands looking to make some extra noise. cheesy catchy synth lines are the thing...
ssscientist
Info you can use...
I agree. The Microkorg is about the size (and price) of a Moog Prodigy, but has actual memory slots for preset sounds. The Moog Prodigy has no memories and needs the knobs to be changed to produce different sounds.
I saw a band last weekend try to use an old small Moog with the settings written down on index cards. It was one minute into their set when those cards fell on the floor hoplessly jumbled -- that was the end of the Moog for the night.
http://www.zzounds.com/a--2676837/item--KORMICROKORG
I saw a band last weekend try to use an old small Moog with the settings written down on index cards. It was one minute into their set when those cards fell on the floor hoplessly jumbled -- that was the end of the Moog for the night.
http://www.zzounds.com/a--2676837/item--KORMICROKORG
The Green Hornet
New member
Yo Spoons:If you are a New-person to synths, here is a suggestion.
Buzz up a Junior college in your area and ask if they are offering any electronic music courses. Take one. The price is right at a JC or a state college. Taking a class where you have someone showing how all the knobs and switches and sliders work with one workstation will certainly give you a good start when you buy your own synth.
Even if you just are after a synth with no workstation, take a class if you can. You'll thank me later.
Green Hornet
Education/knowledge on synths is pretty necessary unless you want to fiddle with (typically bad sounding) presets all day long. Unlike most rock instruments keyboards are NOT self-evident and require some knowledge to utilize--more so than guitar, bass or drums.
It's small wonder that most synth players are tech-geeks at heart. Between sound programming, optimizing for live performances, possibility of sampling, tweaking, MIDI and dealing with the fact that for the most part no two synthesizers have the same *capability* for sound, much less sound, it can be daunting.
Don't understimate the variability of synths--it's not like guitar where most guitars can play similar stuff and achieve similar tones easily. A "synth" will many times not be able to even approxmate the sound of another synth--so if you have a specific type of sound or sounds you may have to get 2-3 keyboards! Heck, at one point I had SEVEN synths to get the sounds I wanted, ranging from expensive vintage keys--OBXa and Prophet 5, to analog monosynths--the Korg Mono/Poly, to vector/waveshaping synths like the Korg Wavestation, to sampler/synths like the Kurzweil K2000, to digital PCM rom based synths like the Roland JD800, to physical modeling keyboards like the Korg Z1.
It can get heady. Learn synthesizer history too. Know what a Jupiter 8 is, what a Fairlight CMI was, an Emulator II, a Yamaha DX7, ARP Odysseys, a Korg M1, an Access Virus, and so forth. It's actually pretty interesting.
It's small wonder that most synth players are tech-geeks at heart. Between sound programming, optimizing for live performances, possibility of sampling, tweaking, MIDI and dealing with the fact that for the most part no two synthesizers have the same *capability* for sound, much less sound, it can be daunting.
Don't understimate the variability of synths--it's not like guitar where most guitars can play similar stuff and achieve similar tones easily. A "synth" will many times not be able to even approxmate the sound of another synth--so if you have a specific type of sound or sounds you may have to get 2-3 keyboards! Heck, at one point I had SEVEN synths to get the sounds I wanted, ranging from expensive vintage keys--OBXa and Prophet 5, to analog monosynths--the Korg Mono/Poly, to vector/waveshaping synths like the Korg Wavestation, to sampler/synths like the Kurzweil K2000, to digital PCM rom based synths like the Roland JD800, to physical modeling keyboards like the Korg Z1.
It can get heady. Learn synthesizer history too. Know what a Jupiter 8 is, what a Fairlight CMI was, an Emulator II, a Yamaha DX7, ARP Odysseys, a Korg M1, an Access Virus, and so forth. It's actually pretty interesting.