Larry Fast/Synergy

Deeply saddened by the death of my long-time friend and fellow musician/bandmate Jesse Gress. A world-class talent and personality like no other. A man of eclectic tastes and champion of incorrect music. We toured so many countries together with gigs from Japan to Russia and a lot of what is in-between. I never would have imagined any of that when we first met in the Lehigh Valley of Pennsylvania exactly 50 years ago.

My condolences to the wonderful Mary Lou and Dee, and all who knew, worked and played with Jesse.

We lost Herb Deutsch this weekend. I was honored to have had him as a friend for many years. I always enjoyed when Herb would have me share my experiences with his classes at Hofstra University. And I appreciated that he let me badger him for information about the earliest iterations of the synthesizer working with Bob Moog from the summer of 1964 onward. He was a gentleman, a superb musician and had a firm grasp of the technologies that made the art of electronic music possible. I will miss him.

Photo 8/13/19 at the Moogseum, Asheville NC

It was announced yesterday that Dave Smith had died. If anyone has earned a place in the top echelon of electronic music innovators, it was Dave. Aside from being one of the nicest people in the business, his work advanced synthesizer design and production tools ahead of many of his contemporaries. Because his company didn’t feature his name, like Moog, Oberheim, Buchla and others, his impact was less personified to the general public. Dave’s visionary leadership changed the direction that music production took often without him being recognized for his outsized influence.

In 1978, preparing for an upcoming Peter Gabriel tour I had an opportunity to check out both the new CS-80 and the just introduced Prophet 5. For me, the Prophet won hands down. It mirrored the sound engine of Max Mathews Groove system at Bell Labs, a hybrid of analog synthesis and computer control with program memory, in a next generation synthesizer format. The Prophet 5 was scaled down from the mainframe computer and racks of Moog modules at Bell into a Zilog controlled, SSM chip synthesis instrument. It was exactly what I had been waiting for since 1975. The thoughtfulness in the firmware OS and “Moog-like” sonic architecture rewrote the book about what could be done in the emerging microprocessor world. I still have that original double digit serial number Rev 1 instrument, later modified to accept direct digital control from an outboard computer for polyphonic sequencing and algorithmic composition.

Dave was generous with his time and his technical savvy. I was in the audience for a paper he delivered at AES in 1981 describing a Universal Synthesizer Interface. Dave was so helpful to me by sending UARTs and other parts along with his USI code and documentation so that I could build interfaces for my Apple and PAiA computers to control the USI Prophet. USI was for all intents and purposes MIDI right out of the box. Dave’s USI opcodes and protocols survived nearly intact into MIDI, though somewhat scaled down in speed. It was progress that fundamentally changed how music would be made in the coming decades.

Dave’s move into all-software synthesizers in the late 1990s might have been a little early, but showed him to be appropriately prophetic in what was coming next. Dave’s legacy on several levels will be with us for a very long time.

I was proud to call Dave a friend and was always flattered that he and his crew from Sequential Circuits would come see us using their instruments with Peter Gabriel. I am so sorry that we have lost Dave, but we have the great music and classic designs that he made possible as a part of our technology arts culture.

Deepest condolences to Dave’s family, friends, co-developers and creative partners.

The photo is a snapshot from my collection taken at NAMM in Chicago, Summer 1980.

We’ve received sad news of the death of Ian McDonald, another icon of the progressive music movement. It was good getting to know Ian after his time as a founding member of King Crimson and subsequent move to New York. The photo here is from Ian’s stint producing the band Fireballet for Passport Records, late winter 1975, Broadway Recording Studios. I did some overdubs on that album where I shared with Ian how to create a synthesis texture using a rapidly clocked sequencer. That was a technique that Ian soon used on Foreigner’s “Feels Like The First Time.” Ian also came to visit in London during the Nektar “Recycled” sessions at Air Studios in London during July, 1975. Though we hadn’t been in touch for some time, we did see each other in and around the London and New York music scenes across the years. Rest in Peace, Ian.

Interviewer extraordinaire Anil Prasad has republished an upgraded Innerviews interview with me about the Synergy project and other electronic music topics. Still relevant today. Enjoy.

https://www.innerviews.org/inner/fast.html

Larry Fast - Evolutionary Snapshots Putting a human face on technology is electronic music pioneer Larry Fast’s specialty.

I worked on the first two Meat Loaf albums, Bat Out Of Hell and Dead Ringer at House of Music studios in West Orange, NJ. On Bat I was only doing studio assistant tasks, nothing creative. For Dead Ringer, though, I was a full on electronic session musician supporting Jim Steinman’s song production. Absolutely chaotic and fun sessions for both albums.

At around the same time and same studio, we “drafted” Meat to sing on The Intergalactic Touring Band space opera album then in production. Only one song from Meat, but a fantastic performance. I was an associate producer on that album.

After Meat and Steinman split, I stayed with team Steinman and worked on many other records with Jim; Bonnie Tyler, Air Supply, Streets of Fire and many others. At their core was Jim’s operatic writing which was first made massively popular by Meat Loaf.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWCzun4Oh-0

Meat Loaf - Keeper Keep Us This song was part of the 1977 compilation/concept album "Intergalactic Touring Band". Meat Loaf did lead vocals on this track, which was recorded in mid-197...