Something seems in the pipeline.

Trademark filed under classification numbers 9 and 15 (lowpass filter, ring modulator, musical keyboard, synthesizer)

Might be just to protect an hypothetical future instrument or something is already in the work, we'll see...

Are you a super sleuth? ?

Do u work for the Ministry of Sound ??

I'm a soldier, in the army, of uncle jam

I used to be skeptical about these finds, leaks etc, but the latest episodes (like the "Moog One affair") turned out to be pretty accurate. We'll see...

"using a multiple resonant filter array and animating those frequencies using a built-in pattern generator"????

link

Why would you be skeptic about a trademark filing?

Possibly the new Moogfest Engineer synth? I started another thread with the teaser photos from the 2019 Moogfest website.

This sounds more like the MuRF, or whatever that pedal was called. Similar language was used in the Moog Grandmother trademark filing:

GRANDMOTHER Trademark of Moog Music, Inc. - Registration Number 5613687 - Serial Number 87800344 :: Justia Trademarks

"Matriarch" seems to imply something in the modular universe (Grandmother, Mother-32, DFAM, BFAM). It isn't a certainty that the trademark will be used - see the Moog Matador.

My hope would be for an expanded Grandmother, but I don't think that my hopes get directly translated into products. Unlesss they are Valhalla products. That I also put a ton of work into. As opposed to pure hope power.

DISREGARD! I linked what is probably the Spectravox, not the Matriarch. Thanks to @ pppch for the clarification in #28.

That shoud be a t-shirt.

MATRIARCH

Electronic low pass filters for musical instruments; Electronic ring modulators for musical instruments; Electronic effects…

yawn

It's a quote from a Funkadelic song, so that shirt might already exist in the p-funk merchandising :-)

Whoa! That looks cool, and it sounds gritty as hell. Definitely looking forward to more details. Hopefully this isn’t limited just to Moogfest, but makes it to the mass market.

well as a (possibly) vocoder it sounds rather unintelligible in this example. maybe its just a proto.


however, as a fixed freq bandpass array, like 914 or 907 it might prove interesting for some sound shaping. tho i doubt it will have expensive coils like those vintage modules. more likely opamp design.



be it as it may, colour me interested. looks sexy with those sliders and mic pre gooseneck input.

This is gonna be a vocoder MONSTER! That bass was HEAVY.

A matriarch is the female head of the family or clan... and she could also be a grandmother. She speaks for everyone when it matters most, so she better be intelligible!

It looks like one hell of a cool looking, knob complimented, modularized, semi modular, analog vocoder rig from Moog. A whole vocoder station and processing center it would seem, replete with sequencer, tons of patch points and a microphone.

I’ve been looking for a new vocoder, but nothing’s doing the formant dance really well or catching my ears, although there are some cool options. Could this be thee ONE, er the other one, I mean?

Yep, this needs to be released after Moogfest!

Could the lack of clarity be due to the fact that all the levels on the sliders are cranked to max? As I understand, a vocoder is just a bunch of (parallel?) band pass filters over the frequency range of the human voice. I assume the sliders are the mixer levels for each filter, so maybe the output is getting overdriven and distorting (as Moogs are wont to do)?

For being a vocoder thats quite bad. Seams to be vocoder thats goes into a sampling delay that lops sample and then you can tweak it. A vocoder isnt just a blob of bandpass filters, there is lots of tweaking during engineering to get intelligible vocoders.

Nice vocoder, DIY!

@ cogsy maybe, but i dont feel its overdrive doing this,,,sounds rather clean actually.


imo its either its the choice of frequencies for the bands, the Q factor isnt as narrow, or maybe not all bands are working here - from what we heard that seems most likely to me. i mean, if you ever heard a vocoder work, any vocoder, they are much more intelligible than this.

btw, vocoder is little more complex than a bandpass network. it has two stages in order to work:


first you split the modulator input signal (like voice) into bands with bandpass filters, then you place a envelope follower on each of the bands. so they practically detect sound energy per band. this is often referred to as "analysis".

second half of vocoder design is "process": you have another bandpass filter network, but this one is processing the carrier signal (like synth or a string machine), and each of the bands is followed by a VCA.

now all you have to do is feed the control voltage created by each of the envelope followers to corresponding band's vca on the carrier side. basically you are "analysing" the signal energy per band of the modulator signal, and applying this to the carrier signal.

so for a 12 band vocoder you need 2x12 bandpass filters, 12 envelope followers and 12 vcas. and some summing vca.


the sliders are VCA output levels from the carrier. you can tilt and shape overall colour. in some ways it acts similar to a graphic equaliser. with all of them up, there should be intelligibility.


interesting things happen when you have a vocoder patched out (like bode or moog or ems) then you can play arround and mix and match the envelope follower outputs to the "wrong" bands on the carrier side. staple of many old scifi.

@ string6theory : almost any vocoder can create such huge bass. vocoder may impart some colour depending on the bandpass filter design, but result largely depends on the choice of carrier signal - if you happen to input an outrageously hefty moog bass as your carrier, result will most certainly have big bottom

Meh.

I'm kinda pissed they aren't making a regular version of the Subharmonicon for us folks who couldn't make it to Moogfest last year -- and you had no way of knowing this info beforehand. Apparently it's "too complex" to be a viable product -- Yet I've seen lots of experienced synth people who were baffled by the DFAM and they gave that a go as a product.

Whatever, it just seriously dampens my GAS for stuff like this. My wallet thanks me.

Wake me if they wanna actually make more than 20 of these.

Thanks CC... that makes perfect sense and I think that’s why the vox seem so equally heavy. The bit at the end sounded a little less so.

A tantalizing taste to be sure.

Just looking at what the gent has in front of him, and along with your reference to vocoders having graphic EQ type frequency shaping capabilities, I can’t imagine this rig being anything less than amazing. And, as you say, very dependent on the carrier, which opens up a universe of sonic possibilities.

I’m really digging the ergonomic form factor. It looks like a versatile and fun mad scientist vocoder system.

familiar 60HP, Eurorack-compatible format
monster is different for me ..

Yeah, I'd really like a Subharmonicon. Oh well, faking it with an O Coast isn't too bad.

I get the idea of doing exclusive Moogfest stuff but they should release it a few months later if it's a hit.

Release the Subharmonicon or GTFO, imo.

Matriarch would imply to me a SuperGrandmother - Like a Grandmother XL.
Absolutely in that family, but in charge of it.....

those were my thoughts as well. would be a smart move, IMO, as the GM has been a strong seller

First off, I have no inside information, but I'm sure Moog is aware of the fact that clearly, the synth named 'Matriarch' should be at least a 4-voice polysynth based upon either the Grandmother or Mother-32. And 'Matador' is the name of a fancy bass analog and tube drive pedal, or something else to goose the Minitaur.

I never would have guessed 'Subharmonicon' for the last one, though.

groundcontrol to major tom : did you read once what is registered under the Trademark ?

MATRIARCH Trademark Application of Moog Music, Inc. - Serial Number 88305351 :: Justia Trademarks
SPECTRAVOX Trademark Application of Moog Music, Inc. - Serial Number 88334331 :: Justia Trademarks

where too seriously one can not take these indications, model d is there also registered

If the Matriarch were a poly in the style of the Grandmother I would be all over that. Either that, or if they went even further into Moog modular territory with it. Given the description in the trademark (that it's a keyboard and has a ring modulator, specifically) I bet it's a 4 or 5 octave Grandmother-type semi-modular with more classic recreations of old Moog modules in it.

(Would be even better if it were a stringer, but that's crazy talk).

What would be kind of neat, if it's a new keyboard semi-modular, is if it were laid out kind of like a 2600 or a mini-Moog modular. A box with the synth in it and full, open patching with euro-compatible jacks, and then a separate keyboard that connected to it.

SPECTRAVOX! That's a new one!

Disregard my earlier post- the Moogfest vocoder is NOT the Matriarch.