This site is dedicated to my DIY synthesizers projects. The first member of the family is called Heritage Modular, a dual 8-voice modular polyphonic synthesizer with MIDI MPE support.
The Heritage Modular synthesizer has been designed to mimic the typical look and feel of an early 1970s modular synthesizer but with full polyphonic capabilities. The feasibility is tightly linked to the usage of digital technologies available in 2020 to DIY enthusiasts.
From a musician perspective, the system should provide the illusion of using a classical analog modular synthesizer with knobs, switches and patch cables.
The core of the synthesizer is based on Pure Data: a powerful sound engine for the generation and processing of audio signal. The underlying algorithms has been chosen for faithful emulation of analog circuitry characteristics. As the goal is to provide with hardware user experience, the Pure Data GUI is only used during the software development phase.
A dedicated set of hardware modules has been designed to act as controllers for Pure Data. These modules are populated with knobs, switches, lights and jack sockets, as for any other classical modular synthesizer. The communication between Pure Data and these hardware modules is done via an I2C bus implemented over a standard 16-pin Eurorack connector.
This project has started in July 2020 as a DIY effort, with a first version up and running in July 2022.
