Hi, I’m a newcomer to the world of moog and I’m not clued into the possibilities that a moogerfooger has. My girlfriend however is a big fan and recently has been checking out minimoogs on ebay. I would love to buy her one but cannot afford it and she already has a top quality digital piano so I really want to know if you can link up the various moogerfoogers to a digi piano and what kind of results u get! All advice or experiences on this matter very welcome!! Thanks for your time
A quick and simple answer is to think of the MoogerFoogers as effects pedals (like stompboxes for a guitar). These types of devices will modify the sound of whatever you put through them - including digital pianos. Although they can create synth-like tones, they will not turn the piano into a synth.
MoogerFooger pedals are actually much more sophisticated than your run-of-the-mill guitar stompboxes. MoogerFoogers have highly flexible I/O connections for those of us who deal with control voltages (think ‘old-school analog synth’ stuff), but are also simple enough for any guitarist, keyboardist, etc. to use in their setups. MoogerFoogers are high quality devices that produce high quality sounds, and this accounts for their (relatively) high price compared to Boss, Ibanez, DOD & other effect pedals.
While you should be able to easliy process the digi-piano through a MoogerFooger pedal, you will need some kind of amplifier to hear the result. A number of digi-pianos have built-in amp/speakers making them totally self-contained, but this scheme generally doesn’t allow for external signal processing (unless there are external inputs available). So be sure to consider that as well.
- G
Thanks G! your help is much appreciated!
could u perhaps advise me on which one would be most suitable for a digi-piano?? thanks again
Probably the MF-103 Phaser. It will impart a nice animation to any electric piano presets on the digi-piano. If the digi-piano is strickly reproducing acoustic piano, however, a phaser will generally subtract from the realism.
I guess it depends on what the digi-p can do.
the mf-102 sounds great on electric pianos, for adding anywhere from general weirdness to the sound or subtle texture or vibrato. If the digital piano has a good Rhodes or Wurlitzer e-piano sound, those can realy come alive with some light ring mod, imho.
The mf-101 might be able to add some synth-ish filter sound to a piano, but I don’t have one of those.
The MF-102 would give a tremolo effect when the carrier frequency is set low. This would indeed impart an appropriate effect to an EP sound (if one is available on the digi-piano). From there, things can get pretty wild very quickly as you crank the knobs. Definately a cool pedal that has some possibilities with a digi-piano. Nice call, Robo!
As far as the MF-101 filter, this device doesn’t work so well on acoustic piano sounds, IMO (actually, aside from a touch of delay and maybe some reverb, not many effects do).
Greg
How about an MF-105? Would it be appropriate for a digi-piano and how would the sounds differ,would there be more choice/variety/options etc.? Excuse my ignorance of moog products but you really are helping a complete novice and I very much appreciate your advice, you guys sound like you are very passionate about moog and I am starting to understand why!!
gfunk,
Happy to help, but there is no definative answer as to what might be appropriate for a digi-piano.
The line of MoogerFooger pedals includes:
MF-101 Low Pass Filter
MF-102 Ring Modulator
MF-103 Phaser
MF-104 Analog Delay (several models were produced)
MF-105 Multiple Resonant Filter (MuRF - two models available, one appropriate for bass sounds)
Any of these pedals could be a nice addition to the digi-piano, but it really depends on the type of effect you wish to achieve. It might be best to check each of them out at your local music dealer and then decide if one is right for you.
Cheers,
- Greg