I'd like to offer a couple of thought from an eye-witness observation of this synth in 1969. It was quite a thrill to see this article. I had often wondered what happened to the instrument, if it was a one-off special, or if it was an item Moog produced in some quantity. That seemed unlikely as I had not seen or heard anything of it again until now and I was at least slightly aware of the Moog products from their literature and commercial use.

I can't remember how I was introduced to David Rothenberg. I had an interest in electronic music then (and now) and, while far from an active participant, I did have some communications with others in the field. Perhaps one of them made the introduction. I'm also not sure why I contacted him. It may have been just curiosity but more likely I was hoping to work with him as I believe that we discussed that possibility though I vaguely think he was looking for a volunteer. Whatever the source and purpose I have a vivid recollection of meeting him, the inside of his studio/lab, and, of course, this synthesizer.

I found an entry in my notebook from the time at a point in the book that implies I made the entry in 1969. The note includes David's name and an address on West 113th Street in Manhattan, which is where I suspect I met him. I remember only one floor of the building, a studio or lab, quite spartan, just white walls, and two components of the synth - the keyboard, and the electronics modules. I can remember nothing indicating it was also his residence though this would be plausible or it might just have been his place of business.

The keyboard - from seeing it in person and from my conversation with David my recollection is that he wanted to explore micro-tonality, that is, intervals smaller than a semitone. My recollection of the keyboard differs a bit from what is shown in the video here. After 54 years it is entirely plausible that my memory is hazy but I also wonder if the keys in the restoration are not original. I don't remember the gray keys. What I remember is an ordinary piano-type keyboard - one row of white keys & black keys in the usual horizontal configuration and with the standard pitches of the chromatic scale. But then, this horizontal row was reproduced many times vertically, that is, moving from front to back. The video here shows eleven rows total but I have no recollection of the actual count, just that there were many. The pitch of each of the rows was offset slightly from the one below it to obtain the micro-tonal spacing. Playing horizontally on any one row of keys would produce the same pitch intervals as a piano. But playing vertically (front to back) would produce micro-tonal intervals. While I have no recollection to support this I suspect that the interval going up would be a semitone divided by the number of rows on a logarithmic scale. That is, for eleven rows the vertical spacing would be the (11*12)th root of 2. I find it a bit strange that there are eleven rows and not twelve as twelve would make it symmetric with a spacing of the 144th root of 2. No matter, the video shows eleven rows and I have no recollection to dispute that.

The electronics - here I'm less clear but I have an image of a tall wooden box, much like a grandfather clock, with many rows of electronic circuit boards, which I presume were the oscillators, filters, envelope generators, etc. I have absolutely no memory of any sort of control panel of the type seen on commercial Moog (or other) synths with lots of pots and patch cords. And this memory is very specifically not of a standard metal 19" electronics rack but something smaller and made of wood. There would have to have been some mechanism for controlling the electronics, perhaps some controls above the keyboard, but I cannot recall it.

Well, that's my story of a brief meeting with David Rothenberg 54 years ago. I might not know what I had for breakfast today but the studio, keyboard, and electronics are still vivid in my mind. I'm glad to learn that the keyboard survived, where it has been all these years, and now that it has been restored.