THE LOST KEYS OF CHINA: A $15 Analog Keyboard That Never Left the Country
Vložit
- čas přidán 23. 07. 2024
- In an effort to contribute to the zeitgeist of weird and wonderful cheap instruments of yesteryear, I’ve bought one of the hundreds of cheap, forgotten keyboards manufactured in Shanghai in the late 70’s / early 80’s and wanted to give it a breath of new life.
The Yema YM-8501 "Wild Horse" is one of the earliest electric organs made in China after a Moog synth was introduced to Chinese officials during one Nixon’s exchange visits. It hasn’t got quite the functionality of the synthesizers of that era, but it’s an instrument manufactured for the masses, with a timbre that could make a Rockstar cover his ears. It’s vividly terrible but not unworthy of some rescuing.
In addition to the history of electronic instruments in China, I conclude the video with a look at the present and potential future of what gear is being developed here. I hope it’s of interest to you all.
If you’re at all interested in finding a cheap Chinese synth to call your own, don’t hesitate to reach out.
0:00 Intro
2:03 Keys 'round the world
2:50 Moog visits China
4:30 The Chinese synth Maverick
7:10 An Instrument for the People
8:30 Buying the YeMa in 2022
11:00 Device overview, sound and keybed
15:18 Speaker
18:06 Yīnsè - Timbre
21:37 Jíezòu - Rhythm (deep dive)
29:34 line-out fx demo
30:34 a retrospective
32:55 the synth scene in China today
35:00 The fate of the Yema
36:14 Outro / If you want one - Hudba
Neat, as for that "messy triangle wave" : this looks like it's using a single square monophonic VCO, and using at least one divider for sub-octaves. By mixing the various levels you can get different waveforms, e.g. if you have the raw VCO output at 2x frequency and the level set to 100% ,and the sub frequency (-1 octave) at 50% mixed, you'll get a sawtooth "staircase" waveform that has 4 steps. Do the same with 3 octaves (not frequency multiples, but octaves - 4x frequency 25%, 2x frequency 50% and 1x frequency 100% etc), and you'll get an even finer staircase "sawtooth" waveform with 8 steps.
The "EDP wasp synth" if you look, is that same 4 level staircase waveform but through a high pass filter (though likely just a straightforward passive series capacitor / parallel resistor etc), hence the 1 up 3 down pulses....
A lot of divider organs used this technique to get different waveforms from the basic raw squarewave sources they had from their master oscillators / frequency dividers, only here, it's just a VCO as the upper frequency source.
Fantastic analysis~ I gotta hit the synth cookbook!
Someone on Reddit mentioned the wasp synth-esque one is likely a dried-up cap as even through a high pass it shouldn't be so quiet. We have more coming in and I'm looking forward to hearing what it's meant to sound like.
Most people would overlook this instrument as a cheap plastic insignificant POS. You went at it from a historical, cultural, sociological, and technological perspective that just shows how analysis from another angle can transform the ordinary into extraordinary, and how much depth there is and interesting knowledge there is out there if we just open our eyes and our minds to pay deeper attention.
Well said, maestro.
You are a great reviewer! I was smiling throughout your understated but humorous (and, I can't forget, really informative!) review of this Yama instrument.
I appreciate your viewing! So happy to cultivate a smile.
Woah! Super entertaining watch, mate! Enjoyed every minute of it!!! Amazing!!!
Happy to entertain! More a'comin
That’s awesome! Thanks for sharing those sounds 🎹🎛
This is so weird and so cool! Thank you for sharing. This is the kind of content I love.
谢谢你玉刻！视频做得太好了，我向你学到了很多❤❤
This was so amazingly interesting and well made. I really hope this gets the attention it should get in the music sphere. I'm so glad someone is out there highlighting these hidden histories, thank you
Hope so! I'll be sharing it far and wide.
What a beautifully made documentary!
superb video and channel. big respect.
Wonderful video. Thanks for investigating.
So rad. Both the documentation and the synth(s). Oh my these are all so cool. The coolest is obviously the guy who made the first Chinese synth influenced instruments and still is. What a badass.
Thank u again.
Yes! Great film and channel. We're really happy to have found you. Hello from Chongqing!
Hey, i was in Chongqing yesterday! We're in Guiyang now. Happy to meet you. Not too many foreigners in this stretch of the country
@@yukesmusic Just missed you. Drat. We're making films and compose our own scores so really looking forward to following what your up to. Studio nerds and all. 😁
really nice work!
This is a gem! what a find!
Excellent stuff man. Watching from Singapore. Love the kitty too.
I really hope to visit soon!
@@yukesmusic Please do! Just to add also that you're totally putting people a Chinese-speaking person like me to shame 'cos I would've been too lazy to get onto Chinese social media to find out all this stuff, so big props for the video.
As an earlier commenter said, the video was just excellent and covered so many things I didn't expect it to, with great production quality to boot.
Fascinating. Btw, absolutely love the synth erhu of the elderly gentleman. There should be a market for that.
I imagine it's insanely intricate and delicately made. But if I do manage to meet him, I'll tell him there's a lot of westerners eager to try it
Fascinating!
Just wanted to say I like the stuff you make. 🤘😀🤘
Thank you 🙏 wait til you see the sequel I'm in the middle of shooting!
The cynic in me wanted to write this off as a Yamaha name mimicry to try to fool unsuspecting buyers, but I'm glad you quickly put down my pessimistic thoughts just a few minutes into the video
Hi great video! I repair vintage synths and even CASIOs and I feel like some of the more wonky behavior with your Yema here is due to either a failed or out of spec component. I feel like that red light downbeat 'tone' was at one point a transistor white noise circuit used to emulate a snare. Just speculation but after 50 years or so components can do some very strange things. thanks for this amazing glimpse into a nearly unknown chapter of electronic music production.
Thanks so much for the insight! Yes, I'm really surprised it works after so many years without care. It's really voice #2 that has an issue, but the rest of it sounds completely manageable.
@@yukesmusic absolutely! it's very raw and sounds great fun. the unruly nature reminds me a bit of the Realistic (Radio Shack) MG-1 made by Moog where they attempted to blend this additive organ with a monophonic synth.. hijinks ensue.
@@theNetWt @theNetWt mg1 is still my favorite free synth vst out there. What a powerful thing, and such a charming bit of synth history.
好棒 谢谢你！THANK YOU!
没关系♥️ it was a pleasure
i'd suggest everyone watching this video look up Gong Gong Gong. Not very synth related but great contemporary chinese band
Making and releasing a Soundfont, VST, or even just a Sample Pack would be awesome.
Genuinely considered doing a Kontakt but I just wasn't sure if there'd be enough interest. I reckon with enough round robins though it could really be something unique!
@@yukesmusic I'm personally not big into Kontakt, but I'm down for any kind of digital version of the Yema as I think that there is a lot of potential here for genres like Chiptune, Electro, and Techno.
For once MusicRadar provided a truly useful link :)
A big thanks for this rare information and footage !
What really struck me that, despite the "lack of cultural bias" of synthesizers, the Chinese produced very interesting & idiomatic interfaces to drive the synths.
Hopefully, "new" developments like MPE will remove some of that bias again...
Woah! MusicRadar shared it? Would you mind sending a link? They never reached out 😂 [EDIT:: Found it!]
You're right, and that's what the fans in China are talking about right now. It's just electricity, it can be accepted by everyone!
@@yukesmusic
Somehow my answer was lost, glad you already found it !
Cool! There are some local indie artists that sometimes play on-air here on this tiny radio station, that would love to get their hands on that. Maybe one will get in touch. 😉 Probably the note glitch you experience is nothing more than dirty contact, a bit of deoxidisation of the copper, would cure it. The potentiometers for the volume were probably linear taper instead of audio-taper. They probably just got what was available. It looks really well-made, as per the parts inside. Older electronic gear usually tends to be built better.
I'll hopefully be bringing one stateside next year. Maybe I can bring it for a demo~
很棒！
Hi there really cool video! just wondering where did u find this synth in China? i wanna get one too thank you!:))
Hey! I found them deep in the bowels of xianyu. But the video went a little viral on Weibo so they're almost gone, gotta look hard!
Nice！
Hey man, saw your comment on the Bandsplaining vid about China. Was wondering if we could link up?
Sure! Hit me on insta. Meet_yukes
The clips appear to be from a Chinese documentary entitled "Dianzi Qin"《电子琴》(1980).
Here are some more clips:
v=t31IoRkIn7Y
********I would LOVE one of Tinjin Chin's Ruan looking Electro Erhu's!! I would so add this to my Sonic Arsenal! XiXi!!!********
I feel so much better, after seeing this for modding my 24string Guzheng! lol
What are those sample clips you show of Chinese musicians/instruments at 32:00 to 32:30
?
They're various cheap electronic instruments intended for playing folk music in China. I just did a random search on taobao and that's what I found!
that a tonal sound situation reminds me of auto tune gone wrong
Now i want one! Any links?
They're only on the Chinese internet; if you're really interested I can help arrange the international shipping of one, though the cost may not be so reasonable. Send me a DM if you're interested and I'll help you set it up
@@yukesmusic how much do they go for?
@@timothysan we bought a few to help try and export them to the west! If you'd like I can add you to the queue
Can anyone help me find any Mandarin documentaries/articles about electronic music in China?
Great watch!
Do you happen to know the inventor's name in Chinese characters? Also, the links to the videos he's performing in? I am more than ready to dive in this rabbit hole now haha.
Mr. 田进勤, and the film's name is 电子琴 (1980). Enjoy your rabbit hole!
@@yukesmusic awesome!! Thanks so much!!!
在b站来的，视频做的很牛。
欢迎来到河的另一边！
can we get a behringer clone of this
Lemme hit Uli up
1970s yama ym 8501
Hi! It's very interesting!
Do somebody (in China) plans to make a Microfreak's clone? This type has a great potential IMHO. Just need to be a little wider (37 "keys" at least) and maybe to have separate analog voices (with the same wavetable stucture). I would buy even ONLY a MIDI controller with 37+ "keys" with features which Microfreak gives! This controller is almost an MPE keyboard. Very sensetive and nice to use IMHO.
Yemaha DX10
💯
I had to delete my comment because I scrolled down and found the same joke.. you win, sir!
OT: at 3:04, the plane is fake, like a Hollywood set. You can see trees through the door and windows.