There was an exhibition called Synth Fest 16 in Tokyo last weekend. A major highlight was a selection of Tomita's gear. Tomita's long time associate Hideki Matsutake (Logic System) was either willed or made executor of Tomita's synth collection and this is the first big public display since his death in May.



(Ishibashi is a music instrument retail chain reporting on the show as an event, I just used their link since I know people don't always want to deal with facebook)

Notice Tomita's CS80 has a CV and Gate ("T" for Trig?) mod for each voice. I also see he signed some of his instruments presumably to prove they were his in the future.

Tomita's main use of the CS80 was on the album "Daphnis et Chloe" (called "Bolero" in the US and "The Ravel Album" in parts of Europe) he also used it on "Grand Canyon" though not as obviously. I've not heard mention of his using the CS-80 as a controller for presumably his modulars. He definitely was always into looking into techniques in speeding up his painstaking multitracking process.

One of the more unusual items is what looks like a small trade show display of high quality synthesizer pots that I guess at some point Tomita was involved in the re-manufacture of. The other, more of digital fans is the Casio Cosmo prototype system. My understanding is Casio wanted to do a high end sampler and Tomita was hired as a consultant and endorser. They eventually did put out the prosumer level FZ-1 but by then other companies had carved up the sampler market.

nick

开云体育

The CS80 was also used on the 1984 "Dawn Chorus" album (also

known as "Canon of the three Stars"), in one of the renditions of
the Villa-Lobos pieces (some brass patch). Thanks for the
heads-up, nice to see some of Tomita's gear (although I'd rather
see him use this stuff for another great album).

Thanks, I was discounting that one because while it still sounds like Tomita, it's generally quite digital sounding.

I've always felt his 1992 "Storm from the East" OST was his most Vangelis-like performance though I've not listened to specifically ID CS80 or lack of it and it surely contains samples.



His Bach Fantasy (1996) was an intentional back to analog sounds album and his last mostly new classical realizations album though he told me he was sampling his own modular to create polyphony by then. It contains some (not yet released virtual analog) JP-8000 too



His last major work, a ballet featuring Hatsune Miku called "Dr. Coppelius" is being premiered on stage this week in Tokyo. It's inspired the 19th century Hoffmann tale about an inventor who builds a clockwork girl that inspired ballets by Delibes and Offenbach - though Tomita was composing rather than interpreting their works. As with most of his own composed work from the last few decades, it's a blend of synths and live orchestra and can be staged live.

Quite a few interesting classical fragments have been released officially in the last decade or so, like an unfinished but amazing opening of Rimsky's Schereazade (late 1970s?), Debussy's Nuage completed in the mid 1970s., a longer Tristan & Isolde, a half hour of partly finished pieces all from (Disney's) Fantasia with a fun and finished sounding Sorcerer's Apprentice and fragments of Nutcracker Suite with samples and vocoder singing. What sounds like a physically modeled Debussy's Arabesque 1 came out not long ago.

nick