A new synth from Hammond? What are they up to?
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Hammond, famous for their organs, posted an intriguing video on the 1st January teasing us with something “coming soon”.
New synth?
Not sure Hammond has released anything resembling a synthesizer since the 1974 catchily named 102200 Preset Synth. Before that, they practically invented synthesis with the 1939 Novachord polyphonic synthesizer. But in the more recent Suzuki owned era of Hammond, their business has been all about honouring the sound and soul of that legendary organ sound and drawbar interface. Maybe that’s about to change.
This new video shows a different sort of keyboard instrument. Something very synth-like which is making a remarkably interesting and manipulable sound.
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What are they up to?
The Hammond logo that comes up appears to be from the editing screen you can see on the keyboard. The other thing of note is the words “MONO SYNTH” above the section the player is playing with. No sign of any drawbars but we do have a bunch of sliders and knobs in this section and a lot of buttons elsewhere on the front panel.
Could this be a return to synthesizers for Hammond? Would it be some kind of hybrid which merges an organ or something like their SK-1 with an analog monosynth section? The SK-1 already comes with a bunch of synthesizer sounds along with the organs and wide selection of electric pianos. Maybe it’s an evolution of that? None of their current product line has a screen of this type so this is definitely something new.
I’m quite thrilled by the idea. Maybe they are waiting for virtual NAMM to do the big reveal, we’ll have to wait and see.
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