Summary: Polyphonic 8-voice Analog Synthesizer
Creator: Mr. Mario MAGGI
Manufacturer: ELKA/Orla
Production: 1982-1985
History
The Elka Synthex story starts with a rather less known Italian organ brand Elka-Orla. Its ambition to conquer the synthesizer market failed in a certain sense. Besides their slightly successful organ and accordion production they were the makers of the Elka Rhapsody 610 - a sort of budget string synth (but used by e.g. Jean-Michel Jarre and Supertramp) – and the Elka Solist 505 - pretending to be a synth but actually less more than an elevated organ.
In the early 80ies they put their heads together with Mr. Mario Maggi, an Italian synthesizer wizard and electronic designer who made some modular stuff in the 70ies (without ever going in mass production), and the Synthex project was born ! Mr. Maggi designed the whole Synthex concept while Elka prepared the announcement of a great polyphonic synth - which the Synthex finally would be…
But the expected mass success didn’t come… Was it the less known brand name ? The success of competing polyphonic monster synths from worldfamous synth brands like the MOOG Memorymoog and Oberheim OB-Xa ? The phenomenal rise of the Yamaha DX-7 and the digital era ? That last one was definitely one of the main causes, as the DX-7 was the flagship of the upcoming digital synthesizer era. Analog synths became outdated…
Anyway halfway production the Synthex was a disaster; there came a huge price drop (see below), and 1985 was the last year of production. A last Synthex was made – some say on request – for Stevie Wonder (see a.o. the bass sound in “Skeletons”, on his 1987 album “Characters”).
But then came the unexpected counterpart - the success story of the Synthex (unfortunately it was out of production at the time)…
Due to some indirect promotion by the use of the Synthex by some of the greatest synthesizer artists like Jean-Michel Jarre and Keith Emerson the Synthex still became a success story. Jean-Michel Jarre astonished the world with his laser harp acts in 1986 in Houston (USA) and Lyon (F) – with a laser harp working as trigger or controller (Note On/Off) for his Elka Synthex. So the infamous laser harp sound is ‘”nothing more” than a slightly tweaked Synthex patch – but it roars like hell !!
And for his live gigs Keith Emerson is using his Synthex for a layered sound very similar to the original brass/string patch of his old legendary GX1 (the huge and priceless Yamaha ancestor of the CS-80) in ELP’s “Fanfare for the Common Man”.
And finally now the Elka Synthex is generally accepted to be one of thé best polyphonic analog monster synths ever (with a.o. the MOOG Memorymoog, Yamaha CS-80, and SCI Prophet-10). It is an honour to own one, a hell to find one for sale, and last but not least a pleasure to play with and to hear its sound.
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