Edgar FROESE playing in a garden

mis psiquicios y yo · Post by **mis psiquicios y yo** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 4:43 pm

For everyone interested, here is E. FROESE playing his synths and sequencers on a garden. I think this is from early eigthies it sound from the time of the R.B. soundtrack or Exit album.

Z · Post by Z » Tue Feb 12, 2008 5:04 pm

What are in the racks? There's a couple of close ups, but I still can't tell what they are.

waveterm · Post by **waveterm** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 5:23 pm

The leftmost rack is this :

http://matrixsynth.blogspot.com/2007/08 ... s-ppg.html

The other big rack is a bunch of custom sequencers.

WT

Z · Post by Z » Tue Feb 12, 2008 5:32 pm

That left rack looked like Apple II's to me. So what are the custom sequencers triggering? THe OB-X & PPG are being played live. I guess there's some modules in the left side of the right rack...

waveterm · Post by **waveterm** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 6:05 pm

No, no modules, just two videomonitors and below those a frame with input/output-connectors.

WT

waveterm · Post by **waveterm** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 6:12 pm

They are Cv/Gate sequencers with slightly over 1000 notes capacity. Notes are input via a PPG remote keyboard. The sequencers have a bit of PPG software in them. Sequences are stored on cassette.

WT

Micke · Post by **Micke** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 8:00 pm

I believe this is from a German TV program which was broadcast back in 1981.

The rack on the left comprises a PPG Wave 340/380 wave computer, the same model as used by Thomas Dolby on his debut album.

The PPG 340/380 was part of Edgar Froese's stage rig during TD's 1980 tour.

The huge sequencer on the right was custom-built by Helmuth Grothe and used on part of the 1981 tour and 1982 tours. Schmoelling also had one of those in his stage setup.

Micke

Z · Post by Z » Tue Feb 12, 2008 8:47 pm

Thanks for the info WT & Micke. What synths are the sequencers triggering?

waveterm · Post by **waveterm** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 9:37 pm

Who knows.....The PPG Wave 2 has CV/Gate for one voice and I think the OBX has it too.

The 340/380 is 8 or 16 voice polyphonic so it could be that the Wavecomputer was sequencing itself and the custom sequencers was just for show.

Or it was all on tape......

WT

Micke · Post by **Micke** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 9:51 pm

I think I've read somewhere that those big custom sequencers had built-in voice-circuits. I can't confirm whether or not this is true though.

Micke

waveterm · Post by **waveterm** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 10:07 pm

I think you could be referring to Chris Frankes programmable voice in the modular that he used.

As I can see, it consisted of a SCI 700 programmer controlling various modules such as the EMU Audity, sequenced by a custom sequencer.

WT

mis psiquicios y yo · Post by **mis psiquicios y yo** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 10:34 pm

The noise at the beginning could be made with the PPG or is it a tape?

waveterm · Post by **waveterm** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 10:44 pm

Which noise ? lol

The almost Sid-station sounding stabs could be a Wavecomputer. The scraping sound, your guess is as good as mine....

WT

mis psiquicios y yo · Post by **mis psiquicios y yo** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 10:51 pm

Yes, the scraping noise

Micke · Post by **Micke** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 11:39 pm

waveterm wrote:I think you could be referring to Chris Frankes programmable voice in the modular that he used.

As I can see, it consisted of a SCI 700 programmer controlling various modules such as the EMU Audity, sequenced by a custom sequencer.

WT

No, I was referring to the big custom sequencers built by Helmut Grothe.
But as I said, I can't confirm whether that info was correct.

Anyways, Chris Franke does mention in an interview from late '82 that at the time they were using the sequencers with the Jupiter-8 and PPG Wave 2.