Now, before we begin with today's lesson, I would like to relate a few facts about the synthesizer's history and the men who so valiantly labored to explain the instrument to me.

In 1910 a wonderously mad musician, named Thaddeus Cahill, put together a steam-powered machine which he called the Tel-Harmonium. This awesome 200-ton device was constructed to play a somewhat limited range of tones through the telephone lines. The Tel-Harmonium was portable, in that it was housed atop something like seventeen flatbed railroad cars. Perhaps portable is a bad word—I mean, can you imagine Edgar Winter stringing that thing around his neck?— call it mobile. Anyways, Thaddeus happily diddled away on his instrument over the phone lines late at night while everybody slejM: and i didn't make ( phone calls that would interfere with his music. Thaddeus Cahill with his Tel-Harmonium is, as far as \X/e know, the father of the modern electronic synthesizer (and probalby a great-uncle to today's Phone Phreaks). (InformaL tion courtesy of Dr. Tom Rhea.)

About a half century later, in 1965, Robert A. Moog, who for years had been working with some rather esoteric electronic tone machines, got together with Herbert Deutsch at Hofstra University and constructed the first actual synthesizer modules, the first functional electronic musical instruments.

, (I had the pleasure of meeting Dr. Moog recently at a demonstration of / the latest Moog showpiece. Expecting to find a cross between Mr. Spock and Albert Einstein, I was surprised to meet a completely pleasant, unassuming middle-aged grey-head who wears hush puppies, baggy corduroys, a yellow knit tie and lives in rural upstate New York. I was also surprised to hear this sbft-spoken man describe his new synthesizer as "the biggest motherfucker in existence." But his quiet, proper little homespun wife didn't flinch, so what the hell.)

Before we get into the actual lesson, I would like to introduce the class to my synthesizer teacher, Roger Powell. Roger is one of a handful of the world's grand masters of the synthesizer and the man Weather Report's Joe Zawinul describes^ as ""the greatest one-man band in the land, or the world." Roger is currently on tour with Todd Rundgren, and what he plays on synthesizer effectively doubles the size, as well as the musical range of Todd's band. In fact, if you didn't notice, the second guitarist in Utopia is Roger Powell at the Moog.

But without further adieu, here is the CREEM Synthesizer Lesson, Number One, Part One.

Sit down. Right here behind the dual keyboard. What we have here is the biggest motherfucking synthesizer on the road. It's a Moog and was custommade according to. specifications laid out by Roger Powell. You couldn't actually walk into the Moog showroom and pick this up. You could have one built for you for the nominal fee of $20,000.

For the purposes of this lesson this instrument is near-perfect. It includes virtually the entire range of synthesizer capabilities. It has components that are usually only found on portable models and others that are usually only found on the mammoth studio models. Not that this thing is all that small. Four standard-size steamer trunks, however, will hold it all very nicely.

As I said, before you is a two-tier keyboard setup, each keyboard containing four octaves. To the left of the keyboards are the BEND CONTROL wheels and several PRE-SET switches.

Resting atop the keyboard unit is a RIBBON CONTROLLER. And, here, arrayed to your left and right, in person, are the actual SYNTHESIZER MODULES. On the left Roger has placed two units containing several modules that include the guts and the controls for: all of the OSCILLATORS, the MIXERS, the FILTERS, the AMPLIFIERS. These units also include the ENVELOPE GENERATORS, the RING MODULATORS, the FREQUENCY SHIFTER, and the WHITE and PINK NOISE switches. (Had enough? Be a sport.) To the right are displayed two units containing (this is easy) the SEQUENTIAL CONTROLLERS or• sequencers, as they are commonly shorthanded. Now bear with me because it's not as hard as it sounds. Here's how it works: .

OSCILLATOR-This is the primary component of a synthesizer. An oscillator produces the tone that will be* amplified and altered by the rest of the machine. Just as other instruments, or the human voice, produce sounds by some sort of vibration, either of the instrument itself or the air inside it, the oscillator produces a tone by "vibrating" its voltage. The oscillator alternates the incoming voltage positively and negatively, on-off-on-off. This "vibrating" voltage begins to be heard as a pitch at around eighteen cycles— or alternations—per second. There are several oscillators in a synthesizer.

MIXER-This is a "switchboard". in the synthesizer. It does not produce or have any modifying effect upon sound. All tones are sent*to the mixer where they are sorted out and then "requisitioned" by the rest of fhe machine at the ultimate direction of you, the player.

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FILTER-A filter is a much-used and very basic modifying component of the synthesizer. It's the same sort of filter as you have on your stereo, in that it emphasizes an aspect of the sound coming through it, but it is much more selective and precise, nearly capable of drawing out individual harmonics.

AMPLIFIER-Guess what? You know this one already. Just like on your stereo, this amplifier beefs up the signal electronically so it's "readable" by the speakers. It is voltage-controlled —that is, give it some more , juice by turning your volume control (here called an "attenuator") up, and it gets louder (and vice-versa).

Throw in some speakers and patch chords and plug it in and, at this point, you've got a fairly mature synthesizer. You can play it just like it is now and get lots of real swell effects. Go ahead. Start dialing those oscillator and filter knobs. Go on. Not so hard, huh? But there's more. So to be a real, honestto-goodness spaceman, tune in next issue when Ring Modulator meets the White Noise From Islip.