![Optigan keyboard](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4e/Optigan_keyboard.jpg)
The Optigan (a
portmanteau
A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of words[keyboard instrument
A keyboard instrument is a musical instrument played using a keyboard, a row of levers which are pressed by the fingers. The most common of these are the piano, organ, and various electronic keyboards, including synthesizers and digital piano ...](_blank)
designed for the consumer market. The name stems from the instrument's reliance on pre-recorded optical soundtracks to reproduce sound. Later versions (built under license and aimed at the professional market) were sold under the name
Orchestron
The Vako Orchestron is a keyboard instrument made in the 1970s, that produces its sound through electronic amplification of sounds pre-recorded on an optical disc. It is the professional version of the Mattel Optigan, an earlier and lower-priced ...
.
Production history
Engineering work on the project began in 1968 and the first patents issued in 1970. The Optigan was released in 1971 by Optigan Corporation, a subsidiary of toy manufacturer
Mattel, Incorporated of
El Segundo, California
El Segundo ( , ; ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. Located on Santa Monica Bay, it was incorporated on January 18, 1917, and is part of the South Bay Cities Council of Governments. The population was 16,731 as of th ...
with the manufacturing plant located nearby in
Compton, California
Compton is a city in southern Los Angeles County, California, United States, situated south of downtown Los Angeles. Compton is one of the oldest cities in the county and, on May 11, 1888, was the eighth city in Los Angeles County to incorporat ...
. At least one TV commercial from the era is extant, featuring the Optigan demonstrated by actor
Carl Betz (best known for his role as the father on ''
The Donna Reed Show''). The Optigan was promoted in at least one Sears-Roebuck catalog. All rights to the Optigan, the disc format, and all previous discs were sold in 1973 to Miner Industries of
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
, an organ manufacturer who formed a subsidiary, Opsonar, to produce it. Miner had record sales for a time, in part due to Opsonar. However, sales declined shortly thereafter and production of the Optigan and its discs ceased in 1976.
Appearance and construction
![Optigan chord buttons](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ef/Optigan_chord_buttons.jpg)
The Optigan looked like a scaled-down version of the electronic
organs
In biology, an organ is a collection of tissues joined in a structural unit to serve a common function. In the hierarchy of life, an organ lies between tissue and an organ system. Tissues are formed from same type cells to act together in a fu ...
of the day. The various cabinet designs and their matching benches were simulated wood made out of a molded plastic the manufacturer dubbed "Temperite" and finished with matching speaker grille cloth and occasionally reverb units inside the unit. A mechanical
reverb
Reverberation (also known as reverb), in acoustics, is a persistence of sound, after a sound is produced. Reverberation is created when a sound or signal is reflected causing numerous reflections to build up and then decay as the sound is abso ...
unit and cabinetry with genuine
wood veneer
In woodworking, veneer refers to thin slices of wood and sometimes bark, usually thinner than 3 mm (1/8 inch), that typically are glued onto core panels (typically, wood, particle board or medium-density fiberboard) to produce flat panels s ...
were available as extra-cost options; the control for the reverb on units so equipped is located below the power switch. Non-reverb equipped Optigans feature a metal plate which reads "Stereophonic" in raised relief and which hides the unused opening. Reverb-equipped units had a slightly different plate which read "REVERB Stereophonic" affixed immediately to the left of the rocker switches and above the power switch. According t
optigan.com two piano bar prototypes were produced. The Optigan played in stereo through two
solid state amplifiers with the right-hand keyboard assigned to the instrument's right channel and the chords and effects assigned to the left.
The optical disc format
![OptiganProgramDisc](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f9/OptiganProgramDisc.jpg)
The Optigan's playback system functioned much like the
storage and reading of an optical soundtrack as was used in motion pictures, using a light bulb to energize a row of
photodiode
A photodiode is a light-sensitive semiconductor diode. It produces current when it absorbs photons.
The package of a photodiode allows light (or infrared or ultraviolet radiation, or X-rays) to reach the sensitive part of the device. The packag ...
s on the opposite side of spinning, 12" diameter clear plastic film discs (officially referred to as "Program Discs") encoded with fifty-seven
concentric
In geometry, two or more objects are said to be concentric, coaxal, or coaxial when they share the same center or axis. Circles, regular polygons and regular polyhedra, and spheres may be concentric to one another (sharing the same center point ...
optical tracks. The system then translated the
analog waveforms on the disc to an audio signal. A flip-down door beneath the keyboard allowed access to the disc's loading area to the left of the unit and a disc storage area to the right. Program discs were loaded by simply sliding them onto the felt-covered platform; a V-shaped notch on the front of the panel aided in alignment. When power was applied and the front cover closed, a spindle engaged the center hole of the disc and a motor-driven
idler wheel
The Idler refers to someone idle:
* An idle game
* A slacker, a person who habitually avoids work
* Idler-wheel, a system used to transmit the rotation of the main shaft of a motor to another rotating device
* Idler circuit, a circuit in a parame ...
spun the disc on the spindle. The power switch itself was mechanically linked to the disc's drive system; lowering the front panel dropped the spindle and disconnected power to the instrument, allowing the program discs to be changed without the need to fully power down. A broad, flat, white plastic cleaning tool with a purple, simulated velvet cleaning surface was supplied with each Optigan to allow periodic cleaning of the photoelectric cell, located near the rear of the instrument.
Thirty-seven tracks were sustained or repeatedly percussive notes in the
timbre of a particular instrument and were played through a standard three-octave
piano
The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...
-style
keyboard
Keyboard may refer to:
Text input
* Keyboard, part of a typewriter
* Computer keyboard
** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping
** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware
Music
* Musi ...
with the right hand; twenty-one were of a live band or
soloist playing
chords in different
keys
Key or The Key may refer to:
Common meanings
* Key (cryptography), a piece of information that controls the operation of a cryptography algorithm
* Key (lock), device used to control access to places or facilities restricted by a lock
* Key (map ...
arranged per the
circle of fifths, specifically B-flat, F, C, G, D, A and E
major
Major (commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicators ...
,
minor
Minor may refer to:
* Minor (law), a person under the age of certain legal activities.
** A person who has not reached the age of majority
* Academic minor, a secondary field of study in undergraduate education
Music theory
*Minor chord
** Barb ...
, and
diminished and were played with the left hand in much the style of a chord organ or
accordion
Accordions (from 19th-century German ''Akkordeon'', from ''Akkord''—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a reed ...
. The remaining five were assigned to rocker switches above the chord buttons and featured (depending on the disc in question)
percussion
A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...
,
sound effects, introductions, vamps, and endings synchronized with the chord buttons. Pushing upward on the rocker switches locked them in place for use with percussion; pushing downward allowed momentary use for vamps, introductions and endings.
Not all of the chord buttons had their own track assignments, the result being only fifty-seven sounds on sixty-three buttons, keys and switches. There was also an optical
metronome incorporated into the discs which showed as a red flashing light for the downbeat and white for the upbeats inside the Optigan badge above the keyboard. The advantages of this unique optical playback system were that the Optigan's range of timbres was infinitely expandable and that there was no limit on the duration of a note as there was on the Optigan's professional-grade counterpart, the
magnetic tape
Magnetic tape is a medium for magnetic storage made of a thin, magnetizable coating on a long, narrow strip of plastic film. It was developed in Germany in 1928, based on the earlier magnetic wire recording from Denmark. Devices that use magne ...
-based
Chamberlin or its successor the
Mellotron
The Mellotron is an electro-mechanical musical instrument developed in Birmingham, England, in 1963. It is played by pressing its keys, each of which pushes a length of magnetic tape against a capstan, which pulls it across a playback head. A ...
. The disadvantage was that notes could have neither
attack
Attack may refer to:
Warfare and combat
* Offensive (military)
* Charge (warfare)
* Attack (fencing)
* Strike (attack)
* Attack (computing)
* Attack aircraft
Books and publishing
* ''The Attack'' (novel), a book
* '' Attack No. 1'', comic an ...
nor decay, as the tracks had no specific beginning or end.
The "Starter Set" sold with the Optigan contained discs with fairly self-explanatory titles: "Big Organ & Drums", "Pop Piano Plus Guitar", "Latin Fever", and "Guitar in 3/4 Time". More modern styles were represented by titles such as "Movin'!", which was a
rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, frequently abbreviated as R&B or R'n'B, is a genre of popular music that originated in African-American communities in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly ...
disc and "Hear and Now", with a sound clearly based on the hit single "Sweet Seasons" by
Carole King
Carole King Klein (born Carol Joan Klein; February 9, 1942) is an American singer, songwriter, and musician who has been active since 1958, initially as one of the staff songwriters at 1650 Broadway and later as a solo artist. Regarded as one ...
(and cover art evocative of that of her ''
Tapestry
Tapestry is a form of textile art, traditionally woven by hand on a loom. Tapestry is weft-faced weaving, in which all the warp threads are hidden in the completed work, unlike most woven textiles, where both the warp and the weft threads may ...
'' (1971) album). Other discs were marketed individually and packaged much like long-playing
phonograph
A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910) or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogu ...
records. These individual titles were also bundled in much the same way as the "Starter Set" and sold as six-disc "Entertainment Folios". Some discs were available only as part of a two-disc "Style Pak" with titles such as "The Joyous Sounds of Christmas", "Country Style Pak.", "Polka" and "Songs of Praise" - these last two being produced towards the end of production and in very low quantities. Music books of various styles and even arrangements intended for individual disks were also available and sometimes packaged with the different bundles.
The initial run of musical tracks were recorded by Southern California studio musicians in
Hollywood
Hollywood usually refers to:
* Hollywood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood in California
* Hollywood, a metonym for the cinema of the United States
Hollywood may also refer to:
Places United States
* Hollywood District (disambiguation)
* Hollywood, ...
and
Torrance. However, a musicians' union strike meant that some of the later discs were recorded in Germany. One disc is of particular note. The instrumental tracks for "Bluegrass Banjo" were recorded by members of the
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band
The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band is an American country rock band formed in 1966. The group has existed in various forms since its founding in Long Beach, California. Between 1976 and 1981, the band performed and recorded as the Dirt Band.
Constant ...
. The Vox Humana disc keyboard sound was used for the "Vocal Choir" Orchestron disc.
For the benefit of those unable to read music, the notes in the books were numbered in correspondence to a numbered and color-coded foil strip above the keyboard. The Optigan's songbooks were written and arranged by Optigan Corporation's music director,
Johnny Largo
Johnny is an English language personal name. It is usually an affectionate diminutive of the masculine given name John, but from the 16th century it has sometimes been a given name in its own right for males and, less commonly, females.
Variant ...
. Largo, an accordionist and session musician, was a contemporary of
Johnny Marks, a composer best known for his popular mid-20th century Christmas melodies. As such, many of the songs in the Christmas books were Marks compositions.
Problems
![Optigan metronome](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/55/Optigan_metronome.jpg)
Despite its use of recordings of actual musical instruments instead of internally generated sounds, the Optigan suffered from poor tonal quality due not only to the
bandwidth limitations of its optical system, but its mechanical system as well. The Optigan concept was similar to that of the
Mellotron
The Mellotron is an electro-mechanical musical instrument developed in Birmingham, England, in 1963. It is played by pressing its keys, each of which pushes a length of magnetic tape against a capstan, which pulls it across a playback head. A ...
(early sampling technology), but while the Mellotron used magnetic tape, the Optigan borrowed its technology from motion-picture
optical soundtrack technology and its
amplitude-modulated format.
The disc could be sped up or slowed down using a thumbwheel next to the chord buttons to cause a corresponding change in
tempo
In musical terminology, tempo (Italian, 'time'; plural ''tempos'', or ''tempi'' from the Italian plural) is the speed or pace of a given piece. In classical music, tempo is typically indicated with an instruction at the start of a piece (often ...
and
pitch; however, higher speeds tended to
roll-off the lower frequencies, lower speeds rolled off the highs, and moderate to slow tempo lent a slightly muddy quality overall. Natural imperfections on the
acetate
An acetate is a salt (chemistry), salt formed by the combination of acetic acid with a base (e.g. Alkali metal, alkaline, Alkaline earth metal, earthy, Transition metal, metallic, nonmetallic or radical Radical (chemistry), base). "Acetate" als ...
discs, as well as dust and dirt, came through as scratches, clicks and pops, much like a worn phonograph record. Furthermore, the pitch change brought on by the tempo adjustment made session work with live musicians a difficult proposition, especially since the pitch varied greatly from disc to disc.
Even though the technology of the day was more than sophisticated enough to avoid them, there were numerous mechanical problems with the disc's motor drive due to its having been engineered to be as affordable as possible. Changes in environment, which had a physical effect on the photocells, frequently led to crosstalk between tracks. One common example involves the F at the upper end of the keyboard: press this key, step on the volume control pedal, and the C-diminished/A-diminished chord can often be heard in the background.
These same diminished chords intentionally found their way onto the row of major chords. And as pointed out earlier in this article, not all of the chord buttons had their own track assignments. In a very unusual move, A-major utilizes the same soundtrack as B-flat-diminished, G-diminished, and E-diminished, while E-major shares space with F-diminished and D-diminished, thereby making it impossible to play in the keys of A or E, at least with left-hand accompaniment. Apparently, this was done to save space on the disc, further explaining the lack of
dominant seventh chords or any chords in the keys of E-flat, A-flat, D-flat, B and F-sharp.
Since the instrument was aimed at amateur players, the majority of the songs in the Optigan's music books are written in the much simpler keys of F, C and G.
Vako Orchestron
Vako Synthesizers Incorporated, founded by electronic instrument pioneer
David Van Koevering
David (; , "beloved one") (traditional spelling), , ''Dāwūd''; grc-koi, Δαυΐδ, Dauíd; la, Davidus, David; gez , ዳዊት, ''Dawit''; xcl, Դաւիթ, ''Dawitʿ''; cu, Давíдъ, ''Davidŭ''; possibly meaning "beloved one". w ...
, and who built licensed versions of the Optigan under the name Orchestron in the mid-1970s. Intended for professional use as an alternative to the Mellotron, the Orchestron featured improved recorded sounds over the Optigan. Some models included
sequencers and
synthesizer
A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and ...
s. While the same fidelity limitations of the Optigan applied to the Orchestron, these instruments were built to be more reliable and were used successfully in commercial recordings.
Use in the music industry
Regardless of its limitations and its problems with pitch, many notable musicians have used the Optigan or, more likely, samples of the instrument if the recordings are made after the year 2000. Among them: Trace,
I Dont Know How But They Found Me
I Dont Know How But They Found Me (stylized in all caps), often shortened to IDKHow (stylized as iDKHOW), is an American musical duo based in Salt Lake City, Utah and formed in 2016. The band consists of lead vocalist and bassist Dallon Weekes a ...
,
Steve Hackett,
Third Eye Blind,
The Clash
The Clash were an English rock band formed in London in 1976 who were key players in the original wave of British punk rock. Billed as "The Only Band That Matters", they also contributed to the and new wave movements that emerged in the wa ...
,
Elvis Costello
Declan Patrick MacManus Order of the British Empire, OBE (born 25 August 1954), known professionally as Elvis Costello, is an English singer-songwriter and record producer. He has won multiple awards in his career, including a Grammy Award in ...
,
Jon Brion,
Driefzand, NL, in single "Zunlicht",
Blur,
Marco Benevento
Marco Benevento (born July 22, 1977) is an American pianist, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and record producer, who has been a fixture of the New York experimental music rock and jazz scene since 1999. He is the founder and recording e ...
,
Fiona Apple
Fiona Apple McAfee-Maggart (born September 13, 1977) is an American singer-songwriter. She has released five albums from 1996 to 2020, which have all reached the top 20 on the U.S. ''Billboard'' 200 chart. Apple has received numerous awards an ...
,
Crash Test Dummies,
Kraftwerk
Kraftwerk (, "power station") is a German band formed in Düsseldorf in 1970 by Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider. Widely considered innovators and pioneers of electronic music, Kraftwerk were among the first successful acts to popularize the ...
(Orchestron),
Coil,
Money Mark,
Ani DiFranco
Angela Maria "Ani" DiFranco (; born September 23, 1970) is an American-Canadian singer-songwriter. She has released more than 20 albums.
DiFranco's music has been classified as folk rock and alternative rock, although it has additional influe ...
,
Michael Penn
Michael Daniel Penn (born August 1, 1958) is an American musician, singer and composer. He is noted for the 1989 single " No Myth", a top 20 hit in the US and successful in several other countries.
Early life
Penn was born in the Greenwich Vi ...
,
Steve Fisk,
Tom Waits
Thomas Alan Waits (born December 7, 1949) is an American musician, composer, songwriter, and actor. His lyrics often focus on the underbelly of society and are delivered in his trademark deep, gravelly voice. He worked primarily in jazz during ...
,
Marilyn Manson
Brian Hugh Warner (born January 5, 1969), known professionally as Marilyn Manson, is an American rock musician. He came to prominence as the lead singer of the band which shares his name, of which he remains the only constant member since it ...
,
Nan Vernon,
Hala Strana
Hala Strana is the name of a recording project of American musician Steven R. Smith. Smith began recording under the name in 2002 as an outlet which allowed him to explore the traditional music of Eastern Europe more fully than possible with his ...
,
TISM
TISM (an acronym of This Is Serious Mum) are a seven-piece anonymous alternative rock band, formed in Melbourne, Australia on 30 December 1982 by vocalist/drummer Humphrey B. Flaubert, bassist/vocalist Jock Cheese and keyboardist/vocalist Eu ...
,
Thinking Fellers Union Local 282,
The Real Tuesday Weld
The Real Tuesday Weld are a British band, founded in 1999 by lead singer and producer Stephen Coates, who studied at the Royal College of Art. They have released several albums, many singles and EPs, and many tracks on compilations. Their comb ...
,
King Princess
Mikaela Mullaney Straus (born December 19, 1998), known by her stage name King Princess, is an American singer, songwriter, and musician from Brooklyn, New York. She is signed to Mark Ronson's label Zelig Records, an imprint of Columbia Records. ...
,
Them Crooked Vultures,
C418, and
Mark Mothersbaugh of
Devo
Devo (, originally ) is an American rock band from Akron, Ohio, formed in 1973. Their classic line-up consisted of two sets of brothers, the Mothersbaughs (Mark and Bob) and the Casales (Gerald and Bob), along with Alan Myers. The band had a ...
—who mixed in parts of the "Banjo Sing-Along" disc on a later remix of Devo's 1981
single
Single may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
* Single (music), a song release
Songs
* "Single" (Natasha Bedingfield song), 2004
* "Single" (New Kids on the Block and Ne-Yo song), 2008
* "Single" (William Wei song), 2016
* "Single", by ...
, "Beautiful World".
Another early recording that used the Optigan was an album by European dance music pioneer
Alan Steward
Alan Steward is a Dutch producer who produced hits for the likes of Baha Men and five time Grammy winners Dennis Edwards and Eddie Kendricks both original members of The Temptations. Their single "Get it While It's Hot" (co-written by Jermaine ...
. On his 1976 live album release ''Just Listen'', Alan made extensive use of the Optigan. Six out of the nine tracks on the album including the title track "Just Listen" feature the Optigan. Alan also made extensive use of the "breakbeats" and the samples of the
Hammond B3 organ
The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert and first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding #Drawbars, drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, Hammond organs ...
that were part of the backing tracks found on many of the soul and R&B oriented Optigan discs. The European distributor of the Optigan used Alan Steward's album for promotion and in-store demos.
Steve Hackett has also made frequent use of the Optigan. Hackett's 1980 album, ''
Defector'', features an unusual number called "Sentimental Institution", recorded with a solo Optigan spinning the "Big Band Beat" disc behind singer Peter Hicks' vocals. Hackett made use of all five of that disc's vamps and its ending; that particular disc featured no percussion tracks. On his ''
Live Archive: 70s'' (2001), featuring a performance from 1979, he plays a surrealistically silly interlude on the instrument (introducing it as "the most tasteless thing I could possibly do"). His 2003 release, ''
To Watch the Storms
''To Watch the Storms'' is the 16th studio album by Steve Hackett. It was his first studio album in 4 years since '' Darktown'' in 1999. It was recorded with his then touring band including his brother John and producer and keyboardist Roger Kin ...
'', features sonically expanded samples of the Opsonar "Champagne Music" disc on the track, "Circus of Becoming".
Musician Jon Brion composed the soundtrack for the 2004 movie ''
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
''Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind'' (also simply known as ''Eternal Sunshine'') is a 2004 American romantic science fiction drama film written by Charlie Kaufman, directed by Michel Gondry, and starring Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet. P ...
'' (directed by
Michel Gondry
Michel Gondry (; born 8 May 1963) is a French filmmaker noted for his inventive visual style and distinctive manipulation of mise en scène. Along with Charlie Kaufman, he won an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay as one of the writers ...
), using the 'guitar' from a Talentmaker. "It's funny because you were talking about my grandfather inventing (sic) that keyboard," begins Gondry. "Jon has some old keyboards. My father, who is the son-in-law of my grandfather, took over his keyboard shop and he started to sell electronic synthesizers and organs and he had this very weird synthesizer called The Talentmaker. And I hadn't heard or seen one in 30 years. And when I went to see Jon he had this. So when you hear this very sad guitar that we use a lot
n the film,
N, or n, is the fourteenth letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''en'' (pronounced ), plural ''ens''.
History
...
that's
he Talentmaker
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' in ...
So you had the nostalgia of my grandfather's shop."
Film director and sound designer
David Lynch
David Keith Lynch (born January 20, 1946) is an American filmmaker, visual artist and actor. A recipient of an Academy Honorary Award in 2019, Lynch has received three Academy Award nominations for Best Director, and the César Award for Be ...
sampled "Big Band Beat" as part of his soundscape ''The Air is On Fire'', produced as ambience for a 2007 art exhibition. He then reused the song, redubbed "Slow 30s Room", in the
eighth episode of television series ''
Twin Peaks
''Twin Peaks'' is an American Mystery fiction, mystery serial drama television series created by Mark Frost and David Lynch. It premiered on American Broadcasting Company, ABC on April 8, 1990, and originally ran for two seasons until its cance ...
'' third season episode of ''
Twin Peaks
''Twin Peaks'' is an American Mystery fiction, mystery serial drama television series created by Mark Frost and David Lynch. It premiered on American Broadcasting Company, ABC on April 8, 1990, and originally ran for two seasons until its cance ...
'' broadcast in June 2017.
References
* Peter Donhauser, Elektrische Klangmaschinen, Boehlau Wien 2007
{{Reflist
External links
Grooving to the Sound of an Optigan from
NPR.org
National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from othe ...
.
Optigan.com- Resource for learning about the Optigan, Orchestron, and the similar Chilton Talentmaker.
Electric and electronic keyboard instruments
Mattel
Products introduced in 1971
Analogue samplers