Moog Engineer Rick Shaich discusses the Ladder Filter, the first Voltage Controlled Filter, which is the heart and soul of the Moog modular synthesizers of the 60s, the Legendary Minimoog of the 70’s, and is still the same filter topology used in all Moog Synthesizers to this day. The Ladder Filter creates the massive, thick sound for which Moog instruments are renowned.
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Thanks for this post.
I would have missed this video if not you picking it up and posting it.
Back a few years I built a Moog and have had a soft spot for that fat analog sound.
The thin digital sounds these days just does not have the same heart and sole as an analog Moog….
Ditto. Many thanks for that video. It also got me to this excellent documentary:
Moog – A Documentary
Part 1 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us-HXqy5GXQ
Part 2 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RV5WfQfSVg
Part 3 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mj5IlY-XymE
And a mention by Bob Moog of the original alternative/progressive/symphonic rock Moog innovators in Part 1 reminded me of this brilliant album:
Emerson, Lake & Palmer – Trilogy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5Od0jF9TA4
“Back a few years I built a Moog and have had a soft spot for that fat analog sound.
The thin digital sounds these days just does not have the same heart and sole[sic] as an analog Moog….”
I’m sorry to drag out this discussion from the ’80s, but what does this even mean? It reminds me of how some people describe wine– it has a piquant bouquet, a round bottom and great legs. What exactly do you mean by a “fat analog” sound? Isn’t sound from a CD player analog by the time you hear it? Are you implying that the human ear can tell the difference between an analog synthesized note vs the same sampled at 44kHz, 16 bits i.e. CD quality? I would venture that no one can discriminate vs the two above random chance.
Does an fat analog synth sound fat when played on a CD player? Or is it still fat only on vinyl or cassette?
If by “fat analog” you are referring to nonlinearity, more harmonics, more/less distortion of one kind or another, you can recreate pretty much all of that using digital technology.
Don’t get me wrong, I have a fondness for old electronics but lets be honest about what the human ear can discriminate and just how far digital sound has come in the past three decades.
I’m not the author whose comment you are questioning, but the term “fat” used in reference to tube (valve) audio amps is a “rich” sound quality cause by harmonic distortion:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tube_sound#Harmonic_content_and_distortion
There’s sound and then there is math. If you want the math on the ladder
filter check out: http://www.timstinchcombe.co.uk/synth/Moog_ladder_tf.pdf
It will test your understanding of the long-tailed pair.