Moog Subharmonicon demo video drops before official announcement.
Pressure has been building this past week for an official announcement from Moog Music about a full release of the Subharmonicon, with a few leaked images, but it appears that US-based retailer Perfect Circuit has beat Moog to the punch with a YouTube demo video. The instrument has also been listed on its website at a retail price of $699.
The Subharmonicon first debuted as part of Moogfest 2018 as a limited edition project kit that a lucky few put together at the annual event held in Asheville, North Carolina, the company’s home base. While the original version sported a silver front panel, the new one is all black, putting it very much inline with other Moog instruments like the Mother-32 and DFAM.
The Subharmonicon was inspired by early electronic instruments the Trautonium and Rhythmicon, and so has a number of rather unusual features. As you might guess from the name, the Subharmonicon is designed for bass, and uses four subharmonic generators in tandem with two oscillators to create deep, harmonically related tones, including chords of up to six notes. This then passes through a Moog ladder filter, with one envelope each for the VCA and VCF.
There is also a sequencer, actually two of them, each with four steps. Sequencer rate can be controlled by tempo knob and subharmonic divisions, and these can then be divider by an integer (1 to 16), enabling users to create unusual and complicated sequences.
Like the Mother-32, the Subharmonicon is semi-modular and has a 32-point patchbay. It is Eurorack compatible and has MIDI in.
Moog has yet to officially announce the Subharmonicon but we imagine it’s only a matter of time.