The ARP Avatar really is amazing; it will do everything the manufacturer says it will do and more. However, you have to have a couple of things together in order to operate it properly and get the full potential out of the Avatar. A working knowledge of synthesis is prerequisite to stage performance and a solid body guitar with enough room immediately in front of the bridge is necessary in order to mount this special pickup provided with the Avatar. The crucial mounting of the Avatar pickup should be performed by a qualified guitar repairman who understands the nature of the pickup itself, particularly how it is affected by string bending because an improperly placed pickup will react to several string vibrations at once, thus causing “false notes." Obviously, no one will be anxious to drill holes in his/her vintage guitar for the sake of modern science. But the design of many guitars such as the Aria Pro II Les Paul Copy, the Ovation Deacon, the Les Paul Deluxe and the Fender Stratocaster are ideally structured for the Avatars pickup.

-Allen Hester/Strings N Things Memphis, TN

by Robert Hoffman

If there is one technological development that has changed the course of music, it is the electronic music synthesizer.

No other musical instrument in this century has had the impact of the synthesizer on popular musical forms. The Who, Led Zeppelin, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Yes, Stevie Wonder, Herbie Hancock, Jan Hammer and Chick Corea have all spearheaded an incredible new wave of music based upon the chameleon-like qualities and stimulating sounds of the synthesizer. Theres a new chapter being written on the synthesizer saga: guitar synthesizers.

The electric guitar can now control and drive a synthesizer. So, the power that brought people like Stevie Wonder, Chick Corea and Rick Wakeman to the forefront of music has been transferred to musics mainstay—the lead guitar player.

While the synthesizer circuitry has been in existence during this time, the greatest hurdle for the musical engineers working on the project was the developmerit of a pickup that would activate the synthesizer in much the same-way as a keyboard. Unlike the keyboard, which offers a very obvious and reliable activating mechanism, an electric guitar did not permit contact switching. The problem of reading the string vibration was a tough one indeed—so tough that one company, ARP Instruments, assigned several engineers v and many thousands of dollars to this single project while the rest of the design group worked on the front end, or guitar interface circuitry.

The result of this major investment of time and money is the ARP Avatar, a dual-oscillator instrument which successfully interfaces the guitar and synthesizer into one incredible musical instrument.

ARPs Avatar makes sounds in a manner very similar to keyboard synthesizers. The difference is that the pitch of the sounds generated by the Avatar are controlled directly from the guitar. At the heart of this process is a circuit called a “pitch extractor." The pitch extractor follows every nuance of the guitar signal, including bends, finger vibrato, hammer-downs, and glissando. It continues to follow the pitch of the guitar string until the strings vibration becomes too weak to analyze.

The pitch extractor gets its signals from a tiny pickup which is mounted on the guitar. The special pickup transmits a completely separate signal for each string. To achieve the riecessary isolation, the ARP pickup uses wire which is invisible as a single strand and is so fine that a ten pound spool contains enough wire to go around the world! The pickup connects to the synthesizer console through an elegant Swissmade miniature connector equipped with gold contacts. The pickup can be mounted on nearly any solid-body electronic guitar by the user or a guitar technician.

Each string of the guitar i$ connected to its own low-noise preamplifier. The preamplifiers have adjustable gain so that each string can be perfectly balanced with the others. Each string also has its own fuzz circuit which permits what ARP calls “clean fuzz." With clean fuzz, you can play a full chord without the chord getting muddy—each note of the chord is clear and distinct since all the distortion occurs before the signals from the six strings are mixed. “Performance" and splitstereo “studio" outputs are available on the rear of the console.

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The synthesizer circuitry is similar in capabilities to an ARP Odyssey keyboard synthesizer. Two VCOs can be tuned over a ten-octave range and phase-synchronized. Other functions include VCF, VCA, Sample and Hold, Noise Generator, ADSR and AR Envelope Generators, High Pass Filter, Ring Modulator, and LFO.

The Avatar is also touch responsive. A superbly designed envelope follower translates the strength of the guitar signal into a control voltage that can be used to control the dynamics of the giiitar synthesizer. Adjustable trigger sensitivity allows the musician to set a minimum picking force necessary to trigger the synthesizer. When you play softly on the guitar, just the straight guitar sounds are produced. When the strings are picked harder, then the synthesizer is activated and follows the pitch being played. The Avatar includes ARPs “system interface" jacks and can be hooked up to an ARP expander module, the Axxe, Odyssey, or for real power, a 2600 console.

The Avatar is easy to play, easy to demonstrate, reasonably priced, and straightforward to service.

ARP has already taken the Avatar on the road, starting in London with a special demonstration at Pete Townshends Twickenham Studios before an audience that included Justin Hayward of the Moody Blues, Mike Rutherford of Genesis, London studio guitarist “Big Jim" Sullivan, Jimmy McCulloch of Wings and, of course, Mr. Townshend. The Who leader is excited about the prospects of working with a guitar synthesizer after several years of composition and performance with ARPs 2500 and 2600 keyboard synthesizer systems.

Of course, ARP is not alone in the guitar synthesizer business. A Japanese synthesizer manufacturer, Roland Corporation, has introduced the Roland GS-500 guitar synthesizer. The Roland approach to synthesizing the guitar is significantly different from the ARP approach, as Roland supplies a guitar with their instrument. The guitar is actually built by Japans Greco guitar makers.

Another company, 360 Systems, Inc., started by custom-guitar engineer Bob Easton, is marketing an instrument dubbed “The Slavedriver." The Slavedriver is somewhat similar in approach to the ARP Avatar, in that a separate pickup is offered for mounting onto the guitarists own instrument. The Slavedriver must be used with a synthesizer made by one of the big three American synthesizer manufacturers — ARP, Moog or Oberheim—in order to achieve guitar synthesizer effects. It is basically an interface device which provides the pitch-to-voltage conversion necessary to translate the pitch of the vibrating guitar string into a control voltage. When the retail cost of the Slavedriver (now listed at $795) is added to the retail list of an ARP Odyssey, the cost is virtually the same for the Slavedriver as for the ARP Avatar ($2500 suggested list).

The implications of the guitar synthesizer as a new musical tool are mindboggling. The electric guitarist is now equipped with total control over sound. His instrument can produce the sounds of sea gulls Screaming, waves crashing, flutes, trombones, tubas, bass guitars, pianos.. .you name it. Rock composers whose only instrument is the guitar are sure to find themselves freed of the limitations of the guitar, and more able to communicate their ideas to fellow musicians.

Of course, the major impact is expression. As with keyboard synthesizers, guitar synthesizers give the musician " the ability to conjure up any sound, create any mood, express virtually any feeling.