Comments 17

Instantly thought “harmonium” in the right hand, so #4 is my clear fave.

Leaning to 4 or 3. Where’s 5?

oops, sorry, there is no number 5. there WAS one, but i removed it and forgot to adjust the numbers.

3 or 4.

Hey Pea,

I had an idea… why not make an app for iTouch for iOptigan® program where you can select the rhythm section buttons and 5 effect buttons and change records or reverse the disc. you dont have to have a pitch control to make the app simple.

Pocket portable optigan… not a bad idea right?

I know you and your friend might be able to pull that off… Hell you made an optigan® disc!!!

yeah, we’ve bandied about the idea of an optigan® ipad app, definitely something i’d like to do, we’ll see if it gains any traction, though robert wouldn’t be the guy to do it.

Raga composer + harmonium please. Getting the string drones somewhere and somehow up in the proverbial mix would be incredible.

IMHO, if you’re going with a Sitar disc, there is another very important ingreedient that needs to be in the Special Effects section, and that’s at least two options for tabla solos- one upbeat & one that’s more folky and not upbeat.

As an optigan® owner and musician, #3 would be the most practical for my uses. But if you ever put out a series on disc or in software, I would buy #1 and #2 definitely! Particularly something downtempo and trip-hop loungish.

i’ll put in a vote for the #4 composer+harmonium too. i’d love for the chord keys to be the non-rythmic drones so if you wanted to go “off beat” you could. and having different tabla beats to choose from would be bliss! you’re coming up with some great ideas Pea!

Yeah Pea, where do you get those great ideas? 😉

why, from YOU, of course! 🙂

hi everyone, i recorded sitar and tabla loops yesterday, and got some really good stuff. at this time, my plan is:

SFX tabs: tamboura drones and other one-off effects
chord buttons: 15 different solo tabla loops
keyboard keys: 37 different sitar riffs in raga todi

this will be a DRONE based disc, NOT a western chord based disc.

i know some of you voted for the harmonium option (ie chromatic harmonium notes on part of the keyboard, sitar riffs on the other part of the keyboard), but i’m steering away from this option for a number of reasons:

1) there are already lots of optigan® discs with organ sounds on the keys, and a harmonium won’t sound significantly unique from them.

2) in order for a harmonium sound to be of much use, it’d have to take up at least half the keyboard (1.5 octaves), leaving much less room for the sitar sounds, which are more unique, interesting, and the main theme of the disc.

3) even if we use half the keyboard for harmonium, it’s physically awkward if not impossible to play tabla, harmonium and sitar all with two hands. at best, you’d be playing tabla with your left hand and trading off sitar riffs and (hand-played) harmonium riffs with your right.

4) in the indian tradition, harmonium is pretty much just used for vocal accompaniment, not sitar accompaniment.

if any of y’all have any thoughts or suggestions along these lines, i’m open to hearing them.

I still think harmonium is a good idea. You only need maybe 6 notes from the harmonium. Either way its awesome to think this is out there!

As a fascinated reader of your blog and the story you have experienced in your journey into the Optigan®, I can only say so little, but that I find the idea of a Sitar disc to be extremely cool.

Given the fact that the original Optigan® discs doubled some chords for lack of disk space (if I recall correctly) – a fact that made the instrument sound moody at times (which today is a reverred quality by its users in pop music), I’d like to suggest picking out ragas that go together with the lack of those particular chords and the resulting moods to pick the sitar patterns and especially the tamboura patterns on the new disc.

All the Optigan® then will need are classical Indian musicians interested in it.

c’mon someone just tell me, can I buy one of these discs from somewhere, or all they all gone?? I love the sound, personally peas choice #3 Raga composer would be my pick.

hi nick, currently we’re sold out of this title, but if demand is sufficient, we may do another run of these in the future.

Option for iPad please…

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