Pimp My Moog, pt. 1

Welcome to the repository for all of my synth-related projects. If you love electronic musical instruments like I do, I hope you will appreciate the contents of this blog. I must warn you of two things: first, it's going to get very geeky. Second, I know VERY little about electronics, so I am kind of flying by the seat of my pants here. If you're here looking for knowledge you may find it in the "resources" section on the right, or perhaps in the comments if anyone happens to say anything enlightening (or indeed anything at all). I'm not going to pretend to be an expert about anything electronics-related, and hopefully this will be a learning process for me.

Allow me to introduce you to a good friend of mine:


This is, of course, a Minimoog synthesizer, model D, made in 1973 by Moog Music Inc. If you've never heard of it you'd better ask somebody.

I purchased this synth about six months ago, and it sounds amazing. It's got the "original" oscillator board (later Minimoogs have a re-designed osc board to improve tuning stability; some folks say they don't quite have the character of the original synths). Work has been done on the synth to fix tuning issues, and it seems to be fine in that department. It sounds warm and, pardon the cliché, fat.

There are a few minor aesthetic issues with the synth though (but come on - it's 34 years old!), and that is the subject of the first series of posts I will be making to this blog. I will be cleaning it up, doing some minor part replacement, restoring the keyboard, and hopefully giving it a brand new custom-made wood casing.