The Synthesizer: A Comprehensive Guide to Understanding, Programming, Playing, and Recording the Ultimate Electronic Music Instrument

Mark's book covers EVERY and I mean EVERY synth in the universe. Mark highlights all of the different synth techniques (subtractive, additive, FM, physical modeling, sampling, etc. etc.) as well and explains them nicely. Can you believe a synth can cost $500,000.00? Yikes - you'll just have to get the book to find out which one. I love the references to the really early synth pioneers in Russia, the UK and the states. The things they accomplished with early electron tube technology was amazing. Plenty for the virtual synth and DAW crowd too. Tons of photos and stories and lots of synth history. I'm glad I bought it and I highly recommend it.

I have always had a fascination with sound timbre. As a young boy in early high school music class (1971) we were taken to the Adelaide University Music Department and I saw for the first time a Moog synthesizer. This thing was four boxes just filled with a matrix of 1/4 inch jack holes and an amp. On the back of the door were about 40 jack leads all draped over a clothes hook. The Professor of Music there took us through some of the sounds that this "thing" could make; various noises like white and pink, stuff like that. This particular "instrument" at that time cost the same as a house???? To a young boy this was an amazing amount of money but I was impressed by the noises this instrument could make too.Fast forward about 45 years....I'm now retired and once again engaging in my passion for music and sounds. Of course synthesizers have come a LONG way since I was a boy and the instruments are now amazingly affordable and sound good too. As an interest, I'm immersing myself in, "all things "Synth"", so I bought a copy of this book from Amazon.com due to it's subject matter.This book is paper back and the pages are made of something akin to high quality "newspaper" paper. This is good because the pages don't gloss reflected light when you're trying to read it. There are many black and white images of the people important in the Synth industry like Bob Moog etc. and pictures of some of the most amazing Synths that you're ever going to see. Some of these things were worth $500,000 thirty years ago !!!! Consider how much they would be worth today??? One of these pictured synths is patched up with what looks to be about $10000 worth of patch cables alone. As some have mentioned about this book it is mainly about the gear that has been used over the last 80 years or so. This particular book I suppose is really about the culture of sound synthesis. If you want a book for actual guidance on how to make a patch this is not really the place to look; there are other books like, "Steal this Sound" and even that has its limitations. This book is an eye-opener into the amazing development of these machines over the last century and a tacit accolade to how fortunate we are today. The book also has a good bibliography in the back and a listing of lots and lots of "synth" sites on the internet.Of course the real thing with your Synthesizer is to get down in the weeds (the manual) and discover what makes it "tick" under the "hood" (data interface) and make some of your own sounds. You can gradually build your own home studio and have all this stuff plugged in together and make some "out-there" noises for your own music. This book will give some direction as to what to look for like a Moogerfooger which may lead you on to discovering a GSI Burn or other important "stuff". All great stuff to seek out, buy and plug in for your own personal music and sound appreciation. Have fun in the Synthesizer culture and this book will help you understand your place in the "Synthesizer Universe". Cheers!!!

I learned a lot from this book, though the tone is sort of boardwalk barker at times, which is understandable since the market for synths is niche and everyone in it appears to know everyone else.

Liked reading about synthesizer basics and obscure gear, much to digest. A little scattered in approach, but still a good read.

good

Mark Vail is as knowledgeable about synthesizers as he is a nice, warm, fun and generous guy and if you are fortunate enough to know him personally, you'd understand the magnitude of that statement! :-) The Synthesizer is an interesting read and would be a great resource of valuable information for keyboardists, electronic musicians and anyone generally curious about synthesizers.Disclaimer: It was a pleasure to chat with Mark V on the phone while he was working on the book and I am truly honored that he included a page or so of my ramblings in the book! ;-)John L Rice

According to the title, this book provides info on programming synthesizers which is why I purchased it. What this book provides is a long winded history of synthesizers, discussing numerous specific models, their origins in relation to other models, their creators and their architecture. While this is somewhat interesting to me, the narrative doesn't stick to any cohesive timeline and makes it hard to follow or, IMO, stay interested. The information I was hoping to get, instruction on programming synths, is only offered by way of short definitions of common terms (E.G. envelope / waveform / frequency) scattered throughout the books as if an afterthought. There is no hands on instruction for programming a synth anywhere I found. Honestly I gave up on the book halfway through. If you're interested in how to create and manipulate sounds in your synth, I recommend you look elsewhere.

The book is amazing. The only reason I didn't give it 5 stars is because the black and white only pages in the softcover edition are a let down. I wish I would've waited and purchased the hard cover edition - that is if it has a better paper stock and color photos. Other than that, it's so up to the minute I can't say a negative thing about it.

I have been a professional synth designer/engineer and programmer for most of my adult life, having worked at Yamaha R&D for almost 20 years, and now running a studio in Wiltshire. Having met many of the people mentioned in this superb book, it all rings so true. Vail's book is a must have for anyone in to synths

Well-written, and covering a a great deal of material.Not so much for playing or choosing an instrument, but a nice survey on the history of the synthesizer in its many (many) forms, with lots of references to bands & albums that use them.

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Wer Vintage Synthesizers von Mark Vail gelesen hat braucht dieses Buch hier meiner Meinung nicht. Viele Themen werden doppelt behandelt. Vielleicht liegt hier der Fokus eher auf der Technik und mehr auf "neueren" Entwicklungen - das Buch datiert ja auch schon wieder von 2014. Mir gefällt Vintage Synthesizers auf jeden Fall viel besser!

Not comprehensive by any stretch, doesn't offer any real advice or direction in the 'how to's' of synthesis. Goes into great detail for specific synthesisers, but the information is largely useless unless you have that particular synth. It feels almost like an advertisement catalogue rather than a book that'll give you any practical advice.