Contributor Max Alper on finding a balance between familiarity and uncertainty in electronic instrument design through examining Buchla & Moog, pioneers of two styles of synthesis.
In today’s vast market of hardware and software synthesizers available to hobbyists and professionals alike, it’s quite easy to take these endless electronic waveforms for granted in our sonic palette. As musicians it’s crucial for us to not only dig deep into the sounds of early synthesis innovation and the artists who popularized these instruments, but to examine from a tactile, hands-on perspective the designs of their pioneering inventors as well.
Two early synthesis pioneers whose names are synonymous with innovative sound and instrument design are Bob Moog and Don Buchla. Well known amongst electronic musicians, Moog and Buchla are responsible for paving the way for two schools of thought regarding synthesis design, respectively known as East Coast and West Coast synthesis. While our synthetic sound palettes have certainly expanded beyond this binary since its development in the 1960s, most if not all contemporary designers will attest to the massive influences these two had on the generations of synthesists to come.
Much of what makes the sounds of a Buchla or Moog so influential is demonstrated through their unique approaches to user interface design. While nowadays we have nearly endless ways of controlling electronic instruments, whether it be through pads, step-sequencers, etc, these control surfaces were by no means universal in early electronic instrument design. For Buchla and Moog, analog voltage control became a key towards understanding their differing philosophies as designers. To examine this dichotomy of interfaces, we can look at the two earliest modular synth designs from Bob and Don, the Moog Modular System and the Buchla 100 Series, as well as the artists whose work became synonymous with these instruments.
Moog System
Originally designed in 1963, the Moog Modular System was, due to its size and cost, developed with university music programs in mind. Combining cutting-edge subtractive synthesis modules with a traditional keyboard controller meant that synthesizers were no longer just for academics in lab coats. Traditional musicians were now able to apply their muscle memory to new sonic frontiers.
One particular musician who put the Moog Modular System on the map for both mainstream pop and classical music listeners is composer Wendy Carlos. In 1968, Carlos released a collection of Bach re-arrangements for Moog Modular entitled “Switched On Bach”, which earned her 3 Grammys that year and connected her with the many in the mainstream entertainment industry, including her future collaborator Stanley Kubrick.
It was through the commercial success of Wendy Carlos and “Switched on Bach” that Moog saw an uptick in synthesizer interest from the general public, eventually leading to the release of the Model-D, a smaller and more affordable keyboard-controlled synthesizer. Bob Moog designed with the average musician in mind first and foremost, as he so blunt puts it, “There was never a notion that a synthesizer would be used by itself for anything.”
Buchla System
Don Buchla would disagree. While Bob Moog made his name in applying new techniques in subtractive synthesis to familiar control surfaces, Buchla intentionally took his designs into uncharted territory. Rather than filter and amplify oscillators to create new timbres, why not modulate multiple oscillators and utilize randomized pulse generators? Instead of a traditional keyboard, why not use a “multi-dimensional kinesthetic input port”? Perhaps “uncharted territory” was an understatement.
Buchla fully embraced the counter-cultural hub of early 1960s San Francisco as the ideological haven for his experimental and often hallucinogene influenced sonic inventions. This appeal to the experimentally minded in the Bay Area was heavily influenced by the San Francisco Tape Music Center, a non-profit artspace founded in 1962 by Morton Subotnick and Ramon Sender as a hub for avant-garde sonic and visual arts. The SFTMC acted much like an R&D lab for Buchla’s designs, through trial and error these alien instrument designs pushed artists into alien soundscapes.
The culmination of these experiments led to the first commercial release of exclusively electronic music for home listening. In 1967, Morton Subotnick composed, performed, and recorded “Silver Apples of the Moon”, a 31.5 minute magnum opus demonstrating the power of the Buchla 100 Series. The sounds on this record range from squelching modulated oscillators in collision, lush drones, to synthetic kicks and hi-hats that some might describe as one of the earliest examples of “proto techno”. The record not only proved to be a success amongst classical and experimental music listeners at the time, but also was the first instance of the electronic musician as the solo recording artist, predating many popular electronic music genres by well over a decade.
Both Moog and Buchla designs have become crucial parts of more contemporary instrument builds and are arguably the godfathers of modular synthesis. Thankfully for working artists, these designs have become more accessible beyond the academic and elite artspace settings. We owe it to ourselves, as electronic musicians in 2021, to adapt these instruments into our own creative workflow, whether it be via analog hardware, VST software, or simply a smartphone.
