as Kenneth was so kind and has told us Moog would be now the new owner of the ARP copyright, I think I don’t need to have a bad conscience to post this in the Moog forum. From this, I think, it would be probaly reasonable to start here a new heading for the ARP synths. I know, Moog doesn’t want to deal with the old stuff but it woud be not false. What do you mean, Mr. Moderator ?
Now here my question:
Does anybody out there know, what’s happened to those few (abot 20) “Blue Marvins” since their beginning of production ? Are some of them lost ? Are there museums or private persons who make up some shows from time to time ?
I’ve just found only one demonstration on youtube from an Italian.
I’d be very lucky to have the possibility to face one personally one day and listen to live.
I know, yes, it’s a Moog-forum, but there’s no ARP-forum out there and maybe I’ll have more luck here.
Most of them would be in private collectors hands by now. They are the least serviceable ARP synth around (modules are completely potted with epoxy and impossible to repair) and used opamps that were prone to failure, thus not likely to be in 100% functional condition. Even ARP cringed when a blue marvin came back for repair.
I have a couple pics around of one or two blue ones, but they’re very rare.
I don’t recall ever having serviced any, but have done a few in grey.
Same wood handle across the top and all that.
I believe these grey ones came right after the blue, but cannot be certain.
Much of the early circuitry is crude, but can arguably sound better than later ones.
However, I like a sort of mix which is available only via modding: replace some opamps like the ones in the voltage processors and lag with lower offset types.
This allows these “modules” to be used in keyboard and V/oct applications better and without tuning offsets.
As stock, most 2600s will go out of tune if one decides to put musical pitch CV through a voltage processor first.
Also and after many years bugged by it, I came up with a mod to eliminate residual noise found in the left speaker of some Tonus 2600 models.
The problem being that Arp routed some amplifier lines too close to their noise generator and left some things unshielded.
When I tried just shielding, it didn’t help.
When I tried just rerouting signals so they weren’t adjacent, it didn’t help either.
But somehow by doing both mods at the same time, it completely helped.
Well I presumed, that the most would be in private property, but I believed the one and the other would show what he has and make up a show from time to time…well,…I think they’re kept safe in secure places as collector items. What a pity .
My original intension had been to veryfy the difference between the Blues with their Teledyne-oscillators and the sound of the later Tonus-models. I had become very curious when I had read the Blues would sound far more better than all the later Tonus.
I thought to myself, as my Tonus has a tremendously great sound, what could be better then.
But on the other side, after I watched the demo of that Italian guy I can see no difference between. But not live and A/Bd directly, I believe, it’s not possible to get a correct impression of some eventual differences.
I think, I’ll have to try to contact that Italian directly.
Kevin,
thank you for telling your former experiences you had made with the Tonus. It’s even more worthy for me now, as this oddy noise in the left speaker appeard only in the last two years. The decades before all was quiet. I had always thinking about what it could probably have been.
It’s also very interesting for me what you’ve told aditionally about influencing the sound. So I’ll discuss this in the next time with my tech.
But on the other side, although I’m not a collector I refuse in general to do some alterations on these old instruments.
What’s also annoying to me are the pretty short Envelopes.
