Magic Smoke's Thomas Henry Mankato Filter Samples

Scott Stites

Tonight, I took a nap after getting home from work, and woke up at 1:00 AM. Wide awake.

Late at night I get to thinking about things, and one of those things tonight happens to be the Mankato filter, soon to be offered from Magic Smoke, who obtained the rights of the design from Thomas Henry, the designer of the filter.

Anyway, a lot has been said about this filter, it's been reviewed in EM by Gino Robair, but it occurs to me that but a hand-full of peope have actually heard the thing. So consider this an electro-music exclusive - the first publicly posted samples of the Mankato filter, as heard through the second one ever breadboarded.

Yes, these sounds come from a filter that's been breadboarded since July or August of 2004. They were recorded in October of 2005 for the entities that would soon become Magic Smoke (Tim Parkhurst and John Mahoney).

The story, highly condensed, is that in the summer of 2004 Thomas Henry designed this filter, asked me to breadboard it as confirmation, and it literally rocked my world. It's a very simple build, highly accurate, very clean, and sounds just out of this world. On top of that, the freaking thing can be DC coupled. It not only is one helluva nice sounding filter, but it can process DC voltages as a voltage controlled slew. And that's not all - Thomas' original design has a 12 dB output that, when the filter is placed in self oscillation, provides a quadrature output. The filter has an incredible range, and will go extremely low in frequency in self oscillation - creating a quadrature LFO that will go through a cycle as slowly as you want it to go (very, very, very low frequency). Of course, it will oscillate as a normal sine/quarature sine VCO as well. Tim Parkhurst has completed the quadrature portion of it and given full 0, 90, 180 and 270 degree outputs, and, as I understand, has an Octal version of it as well(?).

It gets better in one more regard - back to the voltage controlled slew - it will slew CV's, and on the 12 dB output (and the other outputs) will offset a copy of that slew just as a quadrature oscillator is offset (sorry, that's the best way I have to describe it). This is a very East Coast sounding filter that will do West Coast CV tricks.

So, shortly after it was designed, Thomas got his present teaching gig, and things just pretty well stopped. On April 1, 2005, he folded MAP up. So, here I am, sitting on this design that is driving me nuts, because it's a killer app, but needed properly release to the public. Flash forward to last fall, I couldn't stands it no more, and emailed Thomas and mentioned that it would be really, really nice if we could find an outlet for it. He agreed, and I thought of Tim Parkhurst, a very nice, sharp competent guy from the Synth DIY list and he expressed interest. I sent him these samples, plus a few more, and that eventually led to Magic Smoke.

So, enough talk - this is what it sounds like, at least from my breadboard with my ugly KS-Synth.

mankato_filter_sample.mp3 is a sequence of two VCO's through the Mankato with low resonance. The first part is from the 24 dB output, the second part is from the 12 dB output. Though larger in size, this is my favorite of the two short samples. It's 2.28 MB.

http://mypeoplepc.com/members/scottnoanh/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/mankato_filter_sample.mp3

res_notes_e.mp3 is just me noodling two VCO's along with a keyboard, through the filter with more resonance. It gives one a general idea of how the resonance sounds on the filter. The first part of this sample is taken from the 12 dB output. The second part is from the 24 dB output. This one really demonstrates the difference in response between the two outputs. It's 1.4 MB.

http://mypeoplepc.com/members/scottnoanh/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/res_notes_e.mp3

Th_filt_cont.mp3 is a long, windy composition I made with the Mankato back in the summer of 2004. This is before I had the D8, so it was recorded in Audacity. Not the best recording in the world - at the time I was using an unfiltered PT2399, which put in a bit of noise at some spots. At the same time, I'd have say I've never gotten such cool filter sounds before - if you do download it, listen to the background filter sweeps in the middle part and you'll see what I mean. The only filter used in the piece was the Mankato. The neat thing about this sample is that the sequence in it is powered by another of Tom's creations from that period. It's a very large download - around 7.5 MB.

http://mypeoplepc.com/members/scottnoanh/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/th_filt_cont.mp3

Cheers,
Scott

mosc · Posted: Sat Jul 01, 2006 7:39 am Post subject:

I really like your composition - the last one. Very nice - music that breathes. Wow, it is so rare to hear new music with silence in it. Excellent.

The filter sounds good from these examples but it's hard to understand a filter unless one has a chance to play with it for a while.

Oh, what exactly is Magic Smoke? I know of the myth of the gas in ICs, but is this a musical group, a web site, a collective, or somthing else?

Scott Stites · Posted: Sat Jul 01, 2006 8:41 am Post subject:

Thanks, Howard!

Agreed about filters - for the same reason it's also difficult to make samples representative of what they're like.

Magic Smoke is the company (comprised of Tim Parkhurst and John Mahoney) that is licensed to distribute Tom's publications, and they'll be selling PCB's or full-up Mankato filters. Eventually..........

http://www.magsmoke.com/magsmoke.asp

Now I'm off with the kid to start shooting off fireworks. Crack of dawn he was there, ready........

Take care,
Scott

Uncle Krunkus · Posted: Sat Jul 01, 2006 8:35 pm Post subject:

I'm sitting here wiring in the new board for the SL and listening to Fripp/Eno, Portishead etc. I just downloaded that 7.5M file and it just slotted right in there. Beautiful, you could easily have written a better soundtrack for ALIEN. In fact all these samples sound great. My interest in building a modular is growing every day.
One great thing about committing to finish one project is the renewed enthusiasm for what will be next on the list.
There are so many invaluable lessons I've learned just by following along with what all the rest of you are doing. I actually feel quite priviledged to have access to this great resource of knowledge and inspiration. Cool

Scott Stites · Posted: Sun Jul 02, 2006 9:41 am Post subject:

Thanks for the kind words, Uncle K. Like you, I find the dangerous side of this forum is that it breeds ideas for even more projects Very Happy

The true Kudos go to Howard and the gang for establishing such an all-encompassing environment for Electronic Music. That's an accomplishment in itself, but to do be able to do it so well is a wonder to me. There's simply nothing like it anywhere. Period.

Take care,
Scott

mosc · Posted: Sun Jul 02, 2006 8:57 pm Post subject:

zipzap · Posted: Wed Jul 05, 2006 1:15 am Post subject:

I have nothing to add. It´s simply true.

Just downloaded the cool song. Aliens....

bigtex · Posted: Wed Jul 12, 2006 3:05 am Post subject:

Oh my. That is an incredible sounding filter. I want one!

Also: big time agreement on electro-music being a fantastic site. Finally! A place to share enthusiasm and ideas about synthesisers.

And there was much rejoicing!

Uncle Krunkus · Posted: Wed Jul 12, 2006 3:18 am Post subject:

And loe the oscillators did squeal,
and the filters did sweep,
and responding to gates was the order of the day for envelope generators far and wide.
The sample and hold modules had no idea what they were going to do next,
and tempcos did sit and warm themselves before the fire of silicon junctions,
an undercurrent of, well,.... about 80mA swept through the congregation,
and there was a great noise!!

zipzap · Posted: Wed Jul 12, 2006 3:23 am Post subject:

see you later oscillator

Scott Stites · Posted: Thu Jul 13, 2006 4:03 pm Post subject:

See you in a while, audiophile Very Happy

v-un-v

bigtex · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 6:00 pm Post subject:

...listening again...

Yes. Very very nice. Still waiting for an announcement from Magic Smoke about the Mankato Filter. Any word on that? I still really want one!

v-un-v · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 6:26 pm Post subject:

MeeToo!!!

Oh yes, Scott, when are you going to release an LP? Wink

23isgood · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 7:07 pm Post subject:

Great sounds Scott. Now I must have a Mankato filter. I can think of so many ways to use it, especially with the quadrature feature. Very nice. I still need to get the SN voice pcb. Geez so many great projects so little money. I think I like the idea of a TH modular!

Scott Stites · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 9:46 pm Post subject:

Aaahhh, shucks, guys.. Smile

bigtex · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 11:26 pm Post subject:

v-un-v · Posted: Wed Dec 20, 2006 2:52 am Post subject:

bigtex · Posted: Wed Dec 20, 2006 3:01 am Post subject:

Uhm... not what I meant. I like the existing stuff as well. Artifacts do not always detract from a recording. By "serious" I didn't mean abandon the old recordings and obsess over perfection... I guess I just meant I thought he should give himself more credit for his ability to record quality sounds.

Uncle Krunkus · Posted: Wed Dec 20, 2006 3:02 am Post subject:

I second that! (Tom) (Bang! Bang!) Smile

I second that too! (Tex) Cool

v-un-v · Posted: Wed Dec 20, 2006 5:57 am Post subject:

v-un-v · Posted: Wed Dec 20, 2006 6:14 am Post subject:

v-un-v · Posted: Wed Dec 20, 2006 1:07 pm Post subject:

Scott, I noticed that there are prices for Mankato PCBs on MSE's website. Are they available yet?

Wild Zebra · Posted: Wed Dec 20, 2006 1:38 pm Post subject:

Thanks for diggin this post back up. Good ole dose of Scott Stites! Thats a great track. I'm embar assed. I finished my sequencer about two weeks ago and haven't recorded anything on it. I've put more time into The Ocarina of Time than my DIY synths in the past month. Somebody slap me.

Word up Tom!

v-un-v · Posted: Wed Dec 20, 2006 4:21 pm Post subject: