Electronic sound synthesis seems to have sprung to life in the mid 1960s. Mainly American innovators such as Moog and Buchla utilised the growing electronics industry and possibly sensed the impending cultural revolution to produce early examples of these exciting devices. Over the last 40 years I have (nearly) built a twenty module analogue synthesiser.

I started building this elecronic sound synthesiser in 1979. At that time a range of module kits became available from DIGISOUND, a small family-run business based near Blackpool. This approach became prctical largely due to the availability of dedicated analogue synthesiser ICs - which greatly simplified the construction of these kits. The modules at the heart of my synth - VCO, VCF, VCA use the SSM range of ICs, these were superceded by the CEM range to form the DIGISOUND 80 modular which featured in the monthly magazine Electronics Today International. My modular subsequently used this range as well as a pair of Oakley modules and one or two of my own design. I am pleased that I was among the first constructors to order from Charles Blakey; the original SSM based modules are still going strong and I also have the original invoices and correspondence associated with this time. Digisound owners/purists will no doubt be horrified that I have replaced the original 3.5mm mono jack sockets with simple 4mm banana-type sockets; they are very much easier and cheaper to patch and a welcome degree of colour coding is possible. Generally, signals are all line-level-plus, everything is earthed internally and I have had no problems with hum or rf pickup. I make no apologies. The details of SSM, CEM, and DIGISOUND are covered very thoroughly elsewhere. http://www.digisound80.co.uk/digisound/default.htm It is probably worth listing the specification of my DIGISOUND modular synthesiser: 3 x VCO (20301) Built on SSM 2030 1 x VC LFO (20302) Built on SSM 2030 1 x Triple LFO (Oakley) 1 x VCF Low Pass (20401) Built on SSM 2040 1 x VCF Band Pass ( ) Built on SSM 2040 1 x VCF High Pass ( ) Built on SSM 2040 1 x VCF All Pass ( ) Built on SSM 2040 1x Dual Resonant Filter (80-16) Built on CEM 3350 1 x Dual Voltage Controlled Transient Generator (20501) Built on SSM 2050 1 x Voltage Controlled Transient Generator (20502) Built on SSM 2050 1x Dual Voltage Controlled Amplifier (20201) Built on SSM 2020 1 x VC Mixer (80-4) Built on CEM 3320 1 x Dual Ring Modulator (80-11) 1 x Processor (80-5) 1 x Noise, Sample and Hold 1 x MIDI DAC (Oakley) 1 x Reverb (Accutronics spring, circuitry based on Polyfusion design with some extra voltage control) 1 x Stereo Power Amplifier (80-14) Built on TDA 2030 Power Supply Dual 15 volts. Pcb originally intended for Elektor Formant. Uses 723 voltage regulators (to be continued)