Addendum: now watching this video after its release, I realize that, in the section in which I talk about the formation of the San Francisco Tape Music Center, my wording makes it sound as if the SFTMC was entirely Subotnick & Sender's idea-but the SFTMC also owes a lot directly to Pauline Oliveros. Prior to the SFTMC's official formation, Oliveros and Sender organized Sonics, a popular concert series of tape music, multimedia pieces, and improvisation. This series was responsible for much of the community-building that led to the SFTMC's success/popularity, and truly, the SFTMC effectively WAS the next evolution of the Sonics events. And, though she was not as directly involved in the SFTMC's "official" incorporation as were Subotnick or Sender, she did remain an important figure in keeping the SFTMC alive, active, and functional. Without her, the SFTMC would likely never have existed-and without her, it certainly wouldn't have seen the success that it did.
Thank you for, totally riveting (and ratcheting). Making me think I should try some no-filter FM/AM experiments. Some really marvelous sounds at the end, really showed off what it can do. Thanks again for the in-depth video of such a rare and strange system.
Kind of mind blowing that there were no filters in that system. Thank you for taking us with you to explore this instrument. Sometimes looking back helps spark new ideas for today.
I find it mind-blowing this is still in use! I learned the basics on its baby brother in 1970. This one was twice as much ti rent, so I never got to play it.
Sarah, it is absolutely great to finally find someone (with very advanced 'musical' analog sound synthesis expertise) able to make these kinds of early electronic music type sounds and structures, most often neglected (or forgotten :-) by analog modular players!! Very much appreciated!! Greetings from Willem Twee Studios, The Netherlands :-)
I taught and undergraduate class on Synthesis on this very synth when it was located at UCSD in the mid 70’s. Was an honor and a privilege to get to know this very quirky instrument in a very intimate way. It’s really quite something!
I worked with a Buchla system at the University of Chicago in the early 80s. This was when Easley Blackwood was in charge of the joint. I had tons of fun with the Buchla + a 4-track reel-to-reel.
Super cool history video/demo!!! Something I found fascinating while watching this are the physical gestures you made while engaging with the instrument. For example, you aren't simply touching the touchpad, you've got this flicking motion almost like you're plucking a string. How cool! That would be a great video if you haven't made it already, how you perceive physical embodiment of music and performance in your work.
I feel like I was able to experience this trip along with you and really get a pretty intimate look into this historical instrument. Thank you for taking us there! This was great!!!
Thanks Sarah for the best explanation and demonstration on the Buchla 100 that I’ve ever seen. It took me back to my earlier days in the 70’s at the Columbia- Princeton lab. We programmed music on a mainframe using Music 360, Wylbur and Fortran. The digital tapes were bussed from NY to Princeton for D/A conversion and then shuttled back. The whole round trip took days before you could even hear if you actually generated any audio, much less the audio you were hoping for. Synthesizers were a truly disruptive technology. As you said, these early machines were designed with the thought in mind of reducing the turnaround time and making sound creation a more immediate experience. They really did come to be their own ecosystem though. I remember splicing, tape, snippets and coming up with some truly serendipitous, unique and unexpected results. I don’t think any of the new hardware come close to the feel of composing with actual magnetic tape, but certainly it did open up an even more expansive palette and musical dictionary. Even as a hobbyist, I have assembled a home studio containing enough modular gear, synths and equipment that I should probably delete the word “home”. Thanks for getting an old geezer excited enough to actually leave a comment. Maybe I’ll go dust off that reel to reel now. Great job 👍
Morton Subotnick, along with Derbyshire, Ussachevsky,Cage, Stockhausen, Schaeffer, Henry, Milton Babbit, and Alan Splet (David Lynch and Alan Splet's music and sound design for EraserHead is criminally ignored). I've stumbled back into this video a few times now, it's a lovely video. Thank you for making and sharing it. ❤ It is beautiful to also see that piece of history is still getting great use to this day.
I appreciate how the panel designs aid in understanding the pathing of the signals. Clearly, this was all really new so more visual guidance probably helped make it less cryptic and overwhelming. Thanks for the dive into the system!
Love it! My first exposure to synths was with a Buchla system at East Texas State University about 1977. Spent many hours exploring that synth and composing with it. We referred to it as Beep Squawk music.
Super stoked you got a chance to do this deep-dive on the system 100 and decided to share it. It really gives a good idea of the process instrument itself and some of its possibilities. I have been working with Buchla systems quite a bit in the last couple of years and am very happy to see interest in it growing.
What a fantastic look into this machine and it’s history. Great patches ! Your genuine love of these machines comes across and it’s very inspiring. So glad this machine still exists and sounds so good. I particularly loved the start stop sequence. I’ve never thought to make a patch like that.
This was absolutely mesmerizing to me as I did not know that an original Buchla system still existed and working! My love for electronic music and synthesizers came about with my dad bringing 2 LP's to the house: Dick Hyman's 'The Electric Eclectics of Dick Hyman' and Walter Carlos 'Switched On Bach' and, he build for me and my brother a PAIA kit synth back in the early 70's and my love for synths and electronic music has never stopped. Thank you for this wonderful video. Cheers
Truly incredible and inspirational - both the sounds and your adeptness in manifesting them. So visceral yet so beautiful. Thank you - it’s been totally fascinating to learn more about and made my evening!
Thank you so much for this amazing video on this historic instrument. Loved how you shed a light on the fascinating minds of everyone involved. Such amazing tones, can"t wait to hear what you come up with it. A daunting task no wonder, even being so familiar with the Buchla world.
Fascinating video! i just purchased some software emulations of some Buchla modules, and I've been watching various video to learn how to use them effectively. Thanks for all the information in this video. i look forward to more of your content as a new subscriber.
This was available to rent for, I believe, $5/hr, along with a four-track tape machine and a full Moog system in 1970. . I learned on the smaller one ($2.50/hr and a two-track recorder.) You really LEARNED on these, nothing of the 'normal' world was relevant. SO much more fun than piano. Ms. Reid, the 132 Waveform module was also on Mills' smaller System 100. (I used it as a VC B3 Hammond.)
This is the best video on Buchlas, and incredibly well researched. As someone who owns several of Morton’s albums, it’s cool to have actual insights as to the technical side of what he was doing. Thanks for this!
My composition teacher Dr Beverly Grigsby actually studied with buchla. Grigsby later created the computer music lab at Cal State Northridge and I learned how to use a Fairlight. I’ve been into analog synthesis my entire musical life and after years of composing for symphony orchestra, I am starting to build a euro rack system. Thanks for sharing this.
I've been pretty interested in this instrument since I discovered Mort Subotnick. It really has such an incredible history. But also DAMN does it still sound amazing! Great video.
It's amazing how the bell tones patch instantly made me remember Stockhausen's "Studie 1". Anyways, thanks for sharing this wonderful and historic synth with the rest of the world :D
What an incredible tone this has - played around with one at UNCSA back in the 90s - recorded the whole session. Made the hairs stand up on the back of my neck. Some of the sounds are so familiar and almost "natural" in an electronic way. They make sense and are aurally pleasing. Thank you for sharing this!
"It could be the precursor of fascinating developments in the field of electronic music" Love it I'd be interested to hear it synced with a drum machine
That was a very interesting and informative talk. Thank you! My 18-year old son walked in near the end during the patch demos. He got right away that the synthesizer was at the frontier of electronic music at the time. I think it was built right around the time I was born.
What an incredible video. I was in the Bay Area lately, and I wondered if it was possible to see any of the SFTMC stuff, and found out it’s non trivial to see. I’m grateful for the peek behind the curtain! Thanks!
This is terrific - thank you so much, both for the historical background, and for the detailed walkthrough of the modules! One question comes to mind about the model 132 waveform generator: as you noted (and apparently Don also acknowledged), building a waveform with 32 knobs is pretty tedious and cumbersome! So, I wonder if anyone ever thought to reconfigure it with sliders (like the layout of a typical third octave graphic equalizer), so you could "sculpt" the waveform using the side of your hand (or two hands) to move multiple sliders at once. To your knowledge, did anyone ever try that? That would be super easy to emulate on an iPad, of course, but that would lack that certain magic that hardware has!
This was so cool! The stuff you're doing in this video with the 100 is so musical, I can't believe how (comparatively) "basic" the system is. Might be time for me to see what I could do with FM/AM and without filters for a bit...
Awesome video and cool insight into how things really started. Thank you! Amazing how technology evolved since then. We can do a lot more complex musical things with devices that fit in our pockets now.
Thank you this. The sequence at 41:01 sounds quite close to the start of "Brain in the Bottle" by Thomas Yorke. Not exactly the same notes but close. I know Yorke has used modular synths at least
Really interesting video! I am particularly inspired by the part where you describe that the sequencers were not primarily used to create loops but as a device for unique sound events.
What a great insight! Thanks for sharing - and for explaining this fascinating piece of musical history. (Now, if only I could fit one in my small house … ?!)
Sarah, a needed correction. The SFTMC was founded by Pauline Oliveros and Ramon Sender, although Morton came quickly after. It's unfortunately a common misconception. It's also a long story and it's also true that thanks to Morton that Donc Buchla came to work for the SFTMC.
Thanks for this brilliant video! Really interesting, and some of those patches are absolutely incredible. I built the ‘Mort’s Barge’ DIY 100 series replica (158, 110, 180, 140 and 123) last year which is lots of fun as a mini-system, so it was great to hear/see some of the other modules. Would love to build another row (or two) to expand it now! Inspiring stuff 👍
Maybe they could get a grant to have someone clean the thing. I just don’t think of dirty fingers as adding a beautiful patina. The square wave generator looks like it has some jam residue on the frequency knob.
17:50 It's worth pausing the video and reading this text. Very interesting! I've experimented with using software to generate sounds, and I've sometimes encountered similar disappointment, when something that seems like an incredibly cool idea relating to making weird shapes in the waveform actually turns out not to sound special in the slightest :)
Very informative, thank you! I'm wondering if the quote of "Yankee Doodle" in the intro is a reference to Daniel Goode's "Faust Crosses the Raritan..."?
You can do the waveshape via knobs with the DFAM if you turn the tempo up to audio rate. Since there are only 8 steps it's pretty quick to set up a sound and each knob makes a difference. It's kind of fun, but you'd need an external adder if you wanted anything other than a static pitch.
This sounds just so rich and vibrant ❤ Also the caotic sounds you archive by crossmodulating the 158 ... you almost need no random voltage source 😅 I wonder if with all the possibilities of later synth developments composing got more and more complex in the sense that the sound design got (more) interweaved with the composing part which can obstruct the latter. These really early synth designs come with a certain "purity" that is somewhat appealing to me 😀 Top content here 👍👍👍
liked the video a lot, glad i have in my euro the red panel 158 love that oscillator, also have the tiptop buchla stuff, great fun, besides subotnick stuff, Michael Czajkowski "People the Sky" is a great buchla 100 lp
this gated voice patch is beyond cool ! the amplitude from the mic controls sequencer speed and you're ringmodulating the voice with a vco controlled by the sequencer?
“So, Don, how do you propose to build a machine that captures the full gamut of this brave new frontier of music for only five hundred bucks?” “Well, I figure about ten oscillator cores, some ringmods, and a few sequencers oughta do it.” “…” “One of the oscillators is gonna be, you know, sort of unconventional.” Don was right.
I am a big Kraftwerk, Tangerine Dream, Jean-Michel Jarre, Vangelis, Larry Fast, old school electronic music fan. Why is it that nowadays, every frigging time that I see a video like this one talking about amazing machines, the only sounds that seem to be created are either wet farts or R2D2 vocalizing?
I recall a recent documentary that featured this syste.. I think with MortonSubotnick. The faculty apparently has a policy to not wash or clean the device. Something about “having a piece of everyone that has touched it retained”. I’m probably butchering the quote or what they said, and maybe it was a little tongue in cheek, but I agree they should try and preserve this historic system a little better.
