Nostalgia – Casio SK1 Sampler Keyboard
The Casio SK1 was once the cheapest sampler in the world. Now that some software samplers are available for free off the internet and magazine cover CDs, the SK1 probably doesn’t qualify for that title anymore.
The sampling was 8-bit and with a bandwidth of around 4kHz (compared with CDs’ 16-bit, 20kHz bandwidth), it’s fair to assume that you know what to expect of the sound quality – distinctly low lo-fi !
It offered a handful of sampled instrumental sounds stored in ROM but its main appeal was its ability to sample. Of course, with such poor sample quality, it was another of those novelty ‘toys’ like the Stylophone and Casio’s own VL-Tone.
There was little you could do with the sound once you’d sampled it but there were thirteen preset envelope shapes you could apply to the sample along with portamento and vibrato. Interpolation was also poor and so sounds (preset or sampled) didn’t transpose well but that only added to their ‘character’. There was no way to store your sample which was lost when you switched the SK1 off!
Naturally, the keyboard was not velocity sensitive but neither was there was any MIDI to play the sounds with velocity from an external keyboard to overcome that limitation.
The SK1 also came with ‘drum’ sounds in ROM which were required for the auto-accompaniment function.
The SK1 is used by Fatboy Slim, Beck, Autechre, Portishead and Blur (amongst other lo-fi enthusiasts) who favour it even today, presumably for its lo-fi, crusty sound quality.
Louis van Dompselaar has kindly donated the entire soundset from his own SK1. The samples were taken from the line out and Louis deliberately powered the thing off batteries to eliminate mains hum. There is a distinct DC ‘thump’ at the start of each of the preset instruments but this is apparently a ‘feature’ of the real thing! There are eight presets and all but one are presented ‘authentically’. However, the ‘Voice’ preset has been run through Antares Infinity looping software to create quite a beautiful and ethereal pad sound which, despite its humble origins, sounds quite classy and ‘expensive’.
The SK1’s drum samples are also included in Nostalgia which Louis has extracted from the patterns. Most bear little or no relationship to their acoustic counterparts but they are interesting metallic electronic percussion sounds nonetheless that could find a place in any number of musical genres.
New super cool voice tweaking effect box
from Shuriken of course, who else 
Want to see more of this make sure to visit Matrixsynth where wacko stuff like this is published daily
Have a good weekend
Play with Rubik´s Cube
This is not all that new, some of you have probably seen this before, but I still think its worthwhile promoting again and again and again….
American/Frenchman Douglas Edric Stanley is professor of digital arts at Aix-en-Provence school of art, where he gets to build things like this sequencer controlled by a rubiks cube and there’s a playable online version. This is Douglas’ point: Most electronic instruments have a more-or-less obscure interface (lots of knobs and buttons), which can be intimidating. However, once you know what the knobs do, they’re often very simple to use, with limited possibilities. With this thing, the interface is very immediate (everyone knows how to manipulate a rubiks cube) but it’s phenomenally difficult and complicated to actually play – because every move messes up another side.
Star Trek and ADS 100 = cool stuff, LOL
The ADS system comprised a dual-manual splittable keyboard, a video display for envelopes, a ‘control cube’ the size of a filing cabinet for disk drives and computer hardware, and a rainbow-buttoned front panel for 64-oscillator additive synthesis and real-time sequencing that would have looked at home on the Starship Enterprise of the Star Trek of your choice. The analogy is apt, in fact – the ADS 100’s most notable public appearance was in the sound effects for Star Trek: The Motion Picture. No price was given when the ADS 100 was introduced, but it sure looked expensive.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwivz3gECus]
Cheers
DATAMASKIN
