I had long thought Soft Machine's "Carol Ann" was about the only example I'd ever heard of a Minimoog outputting a pure sine wave, with no modulation or ADSR enveloping whatsoever. Then today I happened to hear a track on Mannheim Steamroller's first album (1975) which does the same thing.
I believe it's still rare though. Any other examples you can think of?
Barry Miles' "Fusion Is" album maybe?Originally Posted by rcarlberg
Not sure it was a Mini... the only synth Mike Ratledge owned and used (parsimoniously) when Seven was recorded was a EMS (Synthi A). Though the sound is very pure (very likely started as a filtered triangular waveform) it has some dynamics: if you listen carefully you can hear amplitude modulation (tremolo) in some parts and subtle variations in attack time. I can't point you to other exemples right now but this kind of "Anti-Emerson" synth sound can be heard in many jazz and electronic/ambient tracks, most usually used for solo lines.
That would be an interesting trick, given that the Mini-Moog doesn't do sine waves. You have a choice between triangle, sawtooth, the so-called "super saw" wave on oscillators one and two, square, and two different variations of pulse.
By "modulation or ADSR enveloping", I'm assuming you mean on the filter cut off, right? There'd be little point in doing that, since sine and triangle waves don't have much in the way of harmonics to filter out, it's mostly just the fundamental tone. Thus, sweeping the filter on a sine or triangle produces little or no effect, or at least, it's not nearly as dramatic as what you get with a more complex wave like a sawtooth or pulse wave.
Now, you could route a sine or triangle into a wave shaper, which adds harmonics to the waveform, but the Minimoog didn't have that either.
That's correct. But if you LP filter a triangular wave (already very poor in harmonic contents) you'll only let the fundamental pass through and be very close to a perfect sinewave. (especially with a high slope 24dB/Oct filter). But (AFAIK) the Mini doesn't allow you to LFO modulate the VCA for tremolo, but this effect can clearly be heard in some parts of the track. Modulating the filter cut-off by the LFO will give similar (amplitude modulation/tremolo) effect if the waveform has low harmonic contents (triangle) and heavily filtered. Thus it can be a Mini... or not. Mike Ratledge didn't owned a Mini (but a EMS Synthi) when Seven was recorded.
But maybe all this is trivial and purely academic re. the O.P request. (other tracks and works including a similar sound)
Last edited by Mr.Krautman; 09-02-2017 at 03:53 PM.
Not sure what gear was used on Seven. Was that Ratledge soloing on "Carol Ann" or was that Jenkins (who wrote it)?
Not exactly. I'm sure you know this, but by "modulation" I meant either frequency modulation (tremelo) or amplitude modulation (vibrato) and by ADSR enveloping I meant the Attack, Decay, Sustain and Release controls most synthesizers had. Never owned a Mini myself (obviously) so maybe they weren't capable of what I suggested. Maybe the EMS Synthi AKS was used on this track?
Last edited by rcarlberg; 09-02-2017 at 05:41 PM.
"Carol Ann" was written by Jenkins (dedicated to his wife) but he's not credited for using a synth (Ratledge is). In Aymeric Leroy's (L'Ecole de Canterbury) book it is mentioned (p.385-386) that Ratledge used a EMS (AKS) synth on Nettle Bed and Carol Ann.
Correct, at least, a stock Minimoog won't let you do that. I'm sure it's a relatively simple mod that can be done (and I bet a lot of people had it done, too). Of course, it could some kind of outboard gear too. I could well imagine he could have patched into a guitar amp, or used some type of pedal to get tremolo effects.
You've got tremolo and vibrato mixed up. Vibrato would be achieved by modulating the oscillator frequency, and tremolo is amplitude modulation. That's partially (or perhaps entirely) Leo Fender's fault, since he swapped those two words around in the first place, and I guess they continue to be confused in a lot of people's minds, 60+ years later.
Oh and for the record, the Minimoog only had Attack, Decay and Sustain controls for each of it's two envelope generators. Over by the modulation and pitch bend wheels is a switch that activates the Release stage. If you have that switch in the off position, when you take your finger off the key, the envelope automatically defaults to the zero setting. With it on, you got a release, but it was governed by the Decay control, ie both decay and release are adjusted by the same control.
At any rate, I think it's more likely the EMS than a Minimoog. It's easy to get tremolo effects from it (either by patching the LFO or the trapezoid generator into the VCA, or using the ring modulator), and I believe it also had the ability to get a sine wave too.
Thanks, I defer to your superior wisdom.
Exactly.
The beautiful moog solo on this, is kind of unmodulated
Sounds very similar to the one Manfred Mann used on UH's July Morning
Kind of but not totally -- there is a pitch-dependent filter on it.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks