Shut Up & Play: The Vintage Crumar Composer Synthesizer (1982)

Synthesist Aberto Napolioni shared this set of improvisations on the Crumar Composer, a vintage synthesizer from 1982.

The Crumar Composer is a hybrid design that features four different parts: Mono, Poly, String & Organ.

Timings:

00:00 Jazzy INTRO
00:21 Graffiti
00:36 Child Love
00:55 Magic Laziness
01:18 Pixel Falls
01:33 Plantasia
02:00 Gargoyle’s Bites
02:29 Pearls
02:48 Ennio’s Breath
03:35 Clubbing
03:49 Angry Wasp Bass (with Aftertouch)
04:15 New Game
04:31 Ascension (Filter)
05:15 Cloud’s Lullaby
05:39 Strings Hoodoo
06:09 The Owl (doubts)
06:33 Holy Grail Pad
07:23 Jazzy OUTRO

Here’s what Napolioni shared about the technical details of the demo:

FX used on some parts:

OTO Bam Reverb
OTO Bim Delay

14 thoughts on “Shut Up & Play: The Vintage Crumar Composer Synthesizer (1982)

  1. Crumar had a strange sensibility when it came to their synthesizers, but they were still lively fun. I’d love to see Crumar and Kawai do hardware synths again, although tooling up for that is no small thing. The competition is a lot more fierce and even weird now, when you include softsynths.

    In real-world terms, what we’d like to see, filtered through the Golden Age, would often look like that idiot car designed by Homer Simpson.

    1. My first synth was a Kawai SX240. It was a wonderfully weird introduction to the world of synthesis. I still have a soft spot for ugly ducklings.

      1. The SX240 was my first synthesizer as well. I still have it. It is an interesting synth on many different levels. Not the easiest synth to wrap my head around as a kid, mostly due to the paramter adjustment being a bit wonky, but a great synth nonetheless.

      2. My first synth was a Buchla Touché which i sadly lost in a card game in Reno, but then won a Kawai SX240 in a game of roulette, awesome synth

          1. Yes we had a private game that would include audio gear as cash, just like the vegas car games where you can bid your car and win a rolls royce

  2. I still had my Stringman when this came out. I lusted after it but never was able to pull the trigger and purchase one. Probably one of my worst “Should have done it” moves in by whole synth playing career.

  3. The good news is that Crumar still exists in some form. They are making great organs and stage pianos. Perhaps a synth by their history but updated for contemporary working methods would be kinda cool.

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