ARP Pro Soloist
Encyclopedia
The ARP Pro Soloist was one of the first commercially successful preset electronic music synthesizer
s. Introduced by ARP Instruments, Inc.
in 1972, it replaced the similar ARP Soloist in the company's lineup of portable performance instruments.
for studio work, released the Soloist as a light, portable, easy-to-use performance instrument that could be placed on top of an electric piano
or Hammond organ
. In contrast to the flexible modular design of the 2500, the Soloist had no patch panel
s or cables. A set of toggle switches allowed the performer to quickly choose one of 18 preset monophonic patches that were not modifiable. This lack of programmability was compensated by giving the performer control over the voice expression, adding "growl", "wow", "brilliance", portamento
, pitch bend, and/or vibrato
to the timbre
. A pressure-sensitive keyboard allowed players to use aftertouch
to control all of these effects.
While moderately successful in its niche, the Soloist was not regarded as a serious synthesizer by most professional musicians. The limited set of voices, combined with tuning stability problems, kept it from wider use. Nevertheless, it found a place on recordings by such artists as Quincy Jones
and Steely Dan
. During the recording of Steely Dan's Countdown to Ecstasy
, Donald Fagen
was so irritated with having to tune the Soloist so often, he threw it down the recording studio stairwell and jumped up and down on it. Shortly after, another musician joined in with some alcohol and they burned the ARP into a pile of melted plastic.
In 1972, ARP introduced the Pro Soloist, a revised and enhanced version of the Soloist. Expanding the number of voices to 30, and incorporating digital electronics for preset memory and keyboard control, it was much more reliable than the Soloist. A novel "digitized" tone generator eliminated tuning problems suffered by the Soloist. The voice selection tabs were now above the keyboard, instead of below as on the original Soloist.
Although initially marketed to home organists, it found its way into the hands of such famous musicians as Tony Banks
(from 1973 - Selling England by the Pound
- to 1977 - Seconds Out
; some famous solos are Firth of Fifth
, The Cinema Show
, In the Cage
, The Colony Of Slippermen, Robbery, Assault and Battery
and Los Endos
), Josef Zawinul, Billy Preston
, Gary Numan
(his number one album Telekon
is heavily built on the Pro Soloist), Anthony Phillips
(whose 1977 album The Geese And The Ghost
took its name from Phillips' nicknames for two sounds produced by the Pro Soloist), and John Entwistle
. It was also used by Funk
keyboardist like Junie Morrison on the Ohio Players
song Funky Worm and by Bernie Worrell
in the Parliament
Mothership Connection
album. Around the same time, the company released its ARP Odyssey
synthesizer, a powerful duophonic
instrument, as the flagship of its performance line. The Pro Soloist offered a cheaper and easier-to-use alternative which appealed to professionals as well as home users.
By the time the Pro Soloist caught on, many competitors such as Moog Music
, Korg
, Roland Corporation
, and Farfisa
had introduced similar keyboards, though, ironically, most of the competitors' clones had the voice selection tabs below the keyboard, like the original Soloist.
The ARP Pro Soloist would eventually be reintroduced as the updated Pro-DGX
featuring momentary digitally-latched push button voice selector switches with LED status indicators, rather than toggle switches. It would remain in production until the company's demise in 1981.
or Masonite
bottom cover.
The original Soloist was entirely analog. Voice selection, tuning, and expression control suffered from stability problems subject to the tolerances of the electronic components used to build the unit.
The Pro Soloist was significant in using digital read-only memory
chips to program all of its internal functional modules. The voice selection switches deliver unique digital codes to set the ROMs' digital outputs, setting the parameters required for each module to produce the sound of the selected voice. The expression controls, including aftertouch, remain under analog control.
There are four slider pots to the left of the keyboard to control volume, touch sensitivity, brilliance (VCF Cutoff), and portamento speed during live performance. A 3-position octave
switch allows "normal" or plus or minus one octave transposition of the 3-octave keyboard to extend the range of the instrument to five playable octaves; the total range of instrument across all presets covers 8 octaves. There is also a rotary pot which serves double duty to control both the rate of Vibrato or Tremolo (dependent upon preset) and Repeat, which causes the LFO to retrigger the envelopes of any selected voice upon key depression.
The monophonic Soloist and Pro Soloist each feature a single oscillator, which generates pulse
and sawtooth
waveforms. The sawtooth wave is not a separate oscillator circuit, but instead is derived from the sum of 5 pulse waves, generating a 64-step "staircase" waveform to emulate a sawtooth pattern.
Pulse waves are generated at a very high frequency, seven or eight octaves higher than the pitch of the note being played. A digital code from the octave selector is combined with the key code and sent to a frequency divider, which outputs the correct sub-octave waveforms from the oscillator. The pulse oscillator provides pulse-width ratios of 1/14, 1/9, 1/64, and 2/11. A dynamic pulse width output adds expression to the attack phase of some voices.
The output of the pulse and sawtooth waves can be directed through a saw/pulse mixer followed by a high-pass filter with four selectable settings. Additionally, the pulse output can be directed through one of three resonator
banks. These banks (with 2, 3, and 5 settings respectively) can tailor the filtering of the waveform to suit specific voices (such as cello, violin, flute, or oboe). All of these settings are determined by the factory programmed ROMs; they are not accessible by the user.
Once the audio signal is routed through the mixer and resonators, it passes through a low-pass filter and amplifier each under the control of an attack-release (AR) or ADSR envelope generator, or both. The envelope settings, like all of the voice settings, are selected by the voice ROMs. The 24dB/oct low-pass filter, ARP part no. 4034, was very similar to the Moog
ladder filter, and was eventually replaced due to a patent infringement claim by Moog.
The output of the voice circuitry is routed to high- and low-impedance outputs for amplification. Neither instrument featured internal speakers.
A later instrument, the ARP Explorer, was similar to the Pro Soloist, but allowed modification of the voices beyond the presets programmed into the memory. Though much more flexible, the Explorer lacked the aftertouch feature that made the Soloist and Pro Soloist such expressive instruments.
Synthesizer
A synthesizer is an electronic instrument capable of producing sounds by generating electrical signals of different frequencies. These electrical signals are played through a loudspeaker or set of headphones...
s. Introduced by ARP Instruments, Inc.
ARP Instruments, Inc.
ARP Instruments, Inc. was an American manufacturer of electronic musical instruments, founded by Alan Robert Pearlman in 1969. Best known for its line of synthesizers that emerged in the early 1970s, ARP closed its doors in 1981 due to financial difficulties...
in 1972, it replaced the similar ARP Soloist in the company's lineup of portable performance instruments.
History
ARP Instruments, having developed the large and powerful ARP 2500ARP 2500
The ARP 2500, built from 1970 through the mid-70's, was ARP's first product. A monophonic analog modular synthesizer equipped with a set of sliding matrix switches above each module. These were the primary method of interconnecting modules. There were also rows of 1/8" miniphone jacks at the end...
for studio work, released the Soloist as a light, portable, easy-to-use performance instrument that could be placed on top of an electric piano
Electric piano
An electric piano is an electric musical instrument.Electric pianos produce sounds mechanically and the sounds are turned into electrical signals by pickups. Unlike a synthesizer, the electric piano is not an electronic instrument, but electro-mechanical. The earliest electric pianos were invented...
or Hammond organ
Hammond organ
The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond in 1934 and manufactured by the Hammond Organ Company. While the Hammond organ was originally sold to churches as a lower-cost alternative to the wind-driven pipe organ, in the 1960s and 1970s it became a standard keyboard...
. In contrast to the flexible modular design of the 2500, the Soloist had no patch panel
Patch panel
A patch panel or patch bay is a panel, typically rackmounted, that houses cable connections. One typically shorter patch cable will plug into the front side, whereas the back holds the connection of a much longer and more permanent cable...
s or cables. A set of toggle switches allowed the performer to quickly choose one of 18 preset monophonic patches that were not modifiable. This lack of programmability was compensated by giving the performer control over the voice expression, adding "growl", "wow", "brilliance", portamento
Portamento
Portamento is a musical term originated from the Italian expression "portamento della voce" , denoting from the beginning of the 17th century a vocal slide between two pitches and its emulation by members of the violin family and certain wind instruments, and is sometimes used...
, pitch bend, and/or vibrato
Vibrato
Vibrato is a musical effect consisting of a regular, pulsating change of pitch. It is used to add expression to vocal and instrumental music. Vibrato is typically characterised in terms of two factors: the amount of pitch variation and the speed with which the pitch is varied .-Vibrato and...
to the timbre
Timbre
In music, timbre is the quality of a musical note or sound or tone that distinguishes different types of sound production, such as voices and musical instruments, such as string instruments, wind instruments, and percussion instruments. The physical characteristics of sound that determine the...
. A pressure-sensitive keyboard allowed players to use aftertouch
Keyboard expression
Keyboard expression often shortened to expression is the ability of a keyboard instrument to respond to the dynamics of the music or change the tone of the sound in response to the way that the performer depresses the keys of the musical keyboard...
to control all of these effects.
While moderately successful in its niche, the Soloist was not regarded as a serious synthesizer by most professional musicians. The limited set of voices, combined with tuning stability problems, kept it from wider use. Nevertheless, it found a place on recordings by such artists as Quincy Jones
Quincy Jones
Quincy Delightt Jones, Jr. is an American record producer and musician. A conductor, musical arranger, film composer, television producer, and trumpeter. His career spans five decades in the entertainment industry and a record 79 Grammy Award nominations, 27 Grammys, including a Grammy Legend...
and Steely Dan
Steely Dan
Steely Dan is an American rock band; its core members are Donald Fagen and Walter Becker. The band's popularity peaked in the late 1970s, with the release of seven albums blending elements of jazz, rock, funk, R&B, and pop...
. During the recording of Steely Dan's Countdown to Ecstasy
Countdown to Ecstasy
Countdown to Ecstasy is the second album by rock group Steely Dan, released in July 1973. The album was written and recorded in rushed sessions between live concerts and produced two Billboard Hot 100 hits, "Show Biz Kids" and "My Old School".-History:...
, Donald Fagen
Donald Fagen
Donald Jay Fagen is an American musician and songwriter, best known as the co-founder, lead singer, and the principal songwriter of the rock band Steely Dan ....
was so irritated with having to tune the Soloist so often, he threw it down the recording studio stairwell and jumped up and down on it. Shortly after, another musician joined in with some alcohol and they burned the ARP into a pile of melted plastic.
In 1972, ARP introduced the Pro Soloist, a revised and enhanced version of the Soloist. Expanding the number of voices to 30, and incorporating digital electronics for preset memory and keyboard control, it was much more reliable than the Soloist. A novel "digitized" tone generator eliminated tuning problems suffered by the Soloist. The voice selection tabs were now above the keyboard, instead of below as on the original Soloist.
Although initially marketed to home organists, it found its way into the hands of such famous musicians as Tony Banks
Tony Banks (musician)
This article is about the musician. For other people named Tony Banks, see Tony BanksAnthony George "Tony" Banks is a British composer, and multi-instrumentalist, who performs as a keyboardist and a guitarist...
(from 1973 - Selling England by the Pound
Selling England by the Pound
- Sound and live performance :The piano introduction to "Firth of Fifth" has not been included in a performance since 1974, in a Drury Lane Theatre concert, when Banks misplayed and Collins covered by starting the song from after the intro...
- to 1977 - Seconds Out
Seconds Out
Seconds Out is a live double album by Genesis, released in October 1977. It reached No.4 in the UK, remaining in the charts for 17 weeks. The performances were recorded in Paris in 1976 and 1977 on their tours in support of A Trick of the Tail and Wind & Wuthering...
; some famous solos are Firth of Fifth
Firth of Fifth
"Firth of Fifth" is a progressive rock song by progressive rock band Genesis, from their 1973 album Selling England by the Pound. The title is a pun on the estuary of the River Forth in Scotland, commonly known as the Firth of Forth....
, The Cinema Show
The Cinema Show
"The Cinema Show" is an epic rock song by British progressive rock band Genesis from their 1973 album, Selling England by the Pound.Musically, the song is divided into two main sections: The first section is a gentle 12-string guitar-based piece, featuring vocal harmonies between Peter Gabriel and...
, In the Cage
In the Cage (song)
"In the Cage" is a song by progressive rock band Genesis on their 1974 double-album The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. Along with the title track and "The Carpet Crawlers," it is one of the few songs from the album to remain in Genesis's live repertoire after the Lamb tour.The lyrics describe the...
, The Colony Of Slippermen, Robbery, Assault and Battery
Robbery, Assault and Battery
"Robbery, Assault and Battery" is a song by the band Genesis, appearing on their 1976 album A Trick of the Tail. It was written by Tony Banks and Phil Collins...
and Los Endos
Los Endos
"Los Endos" is an instrumental piece by English progressive rock band Genesis from their 1976 album A Trick of the Tail. It is one of the band's few forays into the world of jazz fusion and reflects drummer Phil Collins's involvement in the instrumental band Brand X...
), Josef Zawinul, Billy Preston
Billy Preston
William Everett "Billy" Preston was a musician who gained notoriety and fame, first as a session musician for the likes of Sam Cooke, Ray Charles and The Beatles, and later finding fame as a solo artist with hits such as "Space Race", "Will It Go Round in Circles" and "Nothing from...
, Gary Numan
Gary Numan
Gary Numan is an English singer, composer, and musician, most widely known for his chart-topping 1979 hits "Are 'Friends' Electric?" and "Cars". His signature sound consisted of heavy synthesizer hooks fed through guitar effects pedals.Numan is considered a pioneer of commercial electronic music...
(his number one album Telekon
Telekon
Released in 1980, Telekon is the fourth studio album, and second album under his own name, by the British musician Gary Numan. It debuted at the top of the UK charts in September 1980, making it his third and consecutive no.1 album....
is heavily built on the Pro Soloist), Anthony Phillips
Anthony Phillips
Anthony Edwin "Ant" Phillips is an English multi instrumentalist, best known as a founding member of the band Genesis. He played guitar and sang backing vocals until leaving in 1970, following the recording of their second album, Trespass...
(whose 1977 album The Geese And The Ghost
The Geese and the Ghost
The Geese and the Ghost is the debut solo album from former Genesis guitarist Anthony Phillips Featuring Mike Rutherford and Phil Collins. It was released in 1977 on Passport Records in the US and Hit & Run Music in the UK.-Production:...
took its name from Phillips' nicknames for two sounds produced by the Pro Soloist), and John Entwistle
John Entwistle
John Alec Entwistle was an English bass guitarist, songwriter, singer, horn player, and film and record producer who was best known as the bass player for the rock band The Who. His aggressive lead sound influenced many rock bass players...
. It was also used by Funk
Funk
Funk is a music genre that originated in the mid-late 1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music. Funk de-emphasizes melody and harmony and brings a strong rhythmic groove of electric bass and drums to the foreground...
keyboardist like Junie Morrison on the Ohio Players
Ohio Players
The Ohio Players were an American funk and R&B band, most popular in the 1970s. They are best known for their double #1 hit songs "Fire" and "Love Rollercoaster".- Biography :...
song Funky Worm and by Bernie Worrell
Bernie Worrell
George Bernard "Bernie" Worrell, Jr. is an American keyboardist and composer best known as a founding member of Parliament-Funkadelic and for his work with Talking Heads. He is a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, inducted in 1997 with fifteen other members of Parliament-Funkadelic...
in the Parliament
Parliament
A parliament is a legislature, especially in those countries whose system of government is based on the Westminster system modeled after that of the United Kingdom. The name is derived from the French , the action of parler : a parlement is a discussion. The term came to mean a meeting at which...
Mothership Connection
Mothership Connection
In 2003 the TV network VH1 named Mothership Connection the 55th greatest album of all time.In 2003, the album was ranked number 274 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time....
album. Around the same time, the company released its ARP Odyssey
ARP Odyssey
The ARP Odyssey was an analog synthesizer introduced in 1972. Responding to pressure from Moog Music to create a portable, affordable "performance" synthesizer, ARP scaled down its popular 2600 synthesizer and created the Odyssey, which became the best-selling synthesizer they made.The Odyssey is...
synthesizer, a powerful duophonic
Duophonic
*In synthesizers, capable of sounding two voices, or notes, at a time. Compare: monophonic, polyphonic.*Duophonic is also a term used to refer to a sound process by which a monaural recording is turned into a kind of "fake stereo" by splitting the signal into two channels, delaying the left and the...
instrument, as the flagship of its performance line. The Pro Soloist offered a cheaper and easier-to-use alternative which appealed to professionals as well as home users.
By the time the Pro Soloist caught on, many competitors such as Moog Music
Moog Music
Moog Music is an American company based in Asheville, North Carolina which manufactures electronic musical instruments. The current Moog Music is the second company to trade under that name.-R.A. Moog Co. and the original Moog Music:...
, Korg
Korg
is a Japanese multinational corporation that manufactures electronic musical instruments, audio processors and guitar pedals, recording equipment, and electronic tuners...
, Roland Corporation
Roland Corporation
is a Japanese manufacturer of electronic musical instruments, electronic equipment and software. It was founded by Ikutaro Kakehashi in Osaka on April 18, 1972, with ¥33 million in capital. In 2005 Roland's headquarters relocated to Hamamatsu in Shizuoka Prefecture. Today it has factories in Japan,...
, and Farfisa
Farfisa
Farfisa is a manufacturer of electronics based in Osimo, Italy.The Farfisa brand name is commonly associated with a series of compact electronic organs, and later, a series of multi-timbral synthesizers. At the height of its production, Farfisa operated three factories to produce instruments, in...
had introduced similar keyboards, though, ironically, most of the competitors' clones had the voice selection tabs below the keyboard, like the original Soloist.
The ARP Pro Soloist would eventually be reintroduced as the updated Pro-DGX
ARP Pro-DGX
The ARP Pro/DGX is a preset-based monophonic electronic music synthesizer manufactured by ARP Instruments, Inc. from 1977 until the company's demise in 1981....
featuring momentary digitally-latched push button voice selector switches with LED status indicators, rather than toggle switches. It would remain in production until the company's demise in 1981.
Features
The Soloist and Pro Soloist both featured a 37-key three-octave keyboard with aftertouch (i.e., pressure) sensitivity. The cases are sheet metal with wooden side panels, and a fiberboardFiberboard
Fiberboard is known as low density fiberboard is a type of engineered wood product that is made out of wood fibers. Types of fiberboard include particle board, medium-density fiberboard, and hardboard. Fiberboard is sometimes used as a synonym for particle board, but particle board usually refers...
or Masonite
Masonite
Masonite is a type of hardboard invented by William H. Mason.-History:Masonite was invented in 1924 in Laurel, Mississippi, by William H. Mason. Mass production started in 1929. In the 1930s and 1940s Masonite was used for many applications including doors, roofing, walls, desktops, and canoes...
bottom cover.
The original Soloist was entirely analog. Voice selection, tuning, and expression control suffered from stability problems subject to the tolerances of the electronic components used to build the unit.
The Pro Soloist was significant in using digital read-only memory
Read-only memory
Read-only memory is a class of storage medium used in computers and other electronic devices. Data stored in ROM cannot be modified, or can be modified only slowly or with difficulty, so it is mainly used to distribute firmware .In its strictest sense, ROM refers only...
chips to program all of its internal functional modules. The voice selection switches deliver unique digital codes to set the ROMs' digital outputs, setting the parameters required for each module to produce the sound of the selected voice. The expression controls, including aftertouch, remain under analog control.
There are four slider pots to the left of the keyboard to control volume, touch sensitivity, brilliance (VCF Cutoff), and portamento speed during live performance. A 3-position octave
Octave
In music, an octave is the interval between one musical pitch and another with half or double its frequency. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon that has been referred to as the "basic miracle of music", the use of which is "common in most musical systems"...
switch allows "normal" or plus or minus one octave transposition of the 3-octave keyboard to extend the range of the instrument to five playable octaves; the total range of instrument across all presets covers 8 octaves. There is also a rotary pot which serves double duty to control both the rate of Vibrato or Tremolo (dependent upon preset) and Repeat, which causes the LFO to retrigger the envelopes of any selected voice upon key depression.
The monophonic Soloist and Pro Soloist each feature a single oscillator, which generates pulse
Pulse wave
A pulse wave or pulse train is a kind of non-sinusoidal waveform that is similar to a square wave, but does not have the symmetrical shape associated with a perfect square wave. It is a term common to synthesizer programming, and is a typical waveform available on many synths. The exact shape of...
and sawtooth
Sawtooth wave
The sawtooth wave is a kind of non-sinusoidal waveform. It is named a sawtooth based on its resemblance to the teeth on the blade of a saw....
waveforms. The sawtooth wave is not a separate oscillator circuit, but instead is derived from the sum of 5 pulse waves, generating a 64-step "staircase" waveform to emulate a sawtooth pattern.
Pulse waves are generated at a very high frequency, seven or eight octaves higher than the pitch of the note being played. A digital code from the octave selector is combined with the key code and sent to a frequency divider, which outputs the correct sub-octave waveforms from the oscillator. The pulse oscillator provides pulse-width ratios of 1/14, 1/9, 1/64, and 2/11. A dynamic pulse width output adds expression to the attack phase of some voices.
The output of the pulse and sawtooth waves can be directed through a saw/pulse mixer followed by a high-pass filter with four selectable settings. Additionally, the pulse output can be directed through one of three resonator
Resonator
A resonator is a device or system that exhibits resonance or resonant behavior, that is, it naturally oscillates at some frequencies, called its resonant frequencies, with greater amplitude than at others. The oscillations in a resonator can be either electromagnetic or mechanical...
banks. These banks (with 2, 3, and 5 settings respectively) can tailor the filtering of the waveform to suit specific voices (such as cello, violin, flute, or oboe). All of these settings are determined by the factory programmed ROMs; they are not accessible by the user.
Once the audio signal is routed through the mixer and resonators, it passes through a low-pass filter and amplifier each under the control of an attack-release (AR) or ADSR envelope generator, or both. The envelope settings, like all of the voice settings, are selected by the voice ROMs. The 24dB/oct low-pass filter, ARP part no. 4034, was very similar to the Moog
Moog Music
Moog Music is an American company based in Asheville, North Carolina which manufactures electronic musical instruments. The current Moog Music is the second company to trade under that name.-R.A. Moog Co. and the original Moog Music:...
ladder filter, and was eventually replaced due to a patent infringement claim by Moog.
The output of the voice circuitry is routed to high- and low-impedance outputs for amplification. Neither instrument featured internal speakers.
A later instrument, the ARP Explorer, was similar to the Pro Soloist, but allowed modification of the voices beyond the presets programmed into the memory. Though much more flexible, the Explorer lacked the aftertouch feature that made the Soloist and Pro Soloist such expressive instruments.