Moog Grandmother Dark Semi-Modular Analog Synthesizer

Grandmother Dark offers a sleek finish for Moog Grandmother. Grandmother Dark presents the same great features, sounds and specs as the original colorful Grandmother. In this all-black color scheme, it invokes the timeless look of Moog's classic modular control panels.

Harkening back to the early years of analog synthesizers, Moog's Grandmother Dark has the characteristic style of a vintage synthesizer from the past. But this all-analog semi-modular instrument is ready for the future. With a design focused on pure synthesis, you'll appreciate the immediacy of getting on and designing sounds. There are no presets and no recall. What you see is what you get, leading to a lifetime of creative sound exploration. Grandmother Dark's sound engine, modulation engine and onboard spring reverb tank are 100% analog. There are no menus, and nothing to get in your way of creating your own unique sounds.

Grandmother Dark’s semi-modular design means you can start playing immediately without the need to manually patch and route any signals. Should you want dive deeper into creating more complex sounds, Grandmother Dark features 41 individual patch points that will override the internal wiring. The expansion possibilities that are only limited by your imagination. Even if you’re only familiar with the basic building blocks of an analog synthesizer, the Grandmother Dark welcomes an experimental approach that can turn into incredibly inspiring sounds. In addition, the 21 inputs, 16 outputs and a parallel-wired 4-jack mult can be used to expand the Grandmother Dark into a larger Eurorack ecosystem. It's also the perfect patch point to integrate with Moog Mother-32 or DFAM semi-modular synthesizers.

All analog, start to finish
Grandmother Dark has the essential tools you need to get started, with some added extras. There are two analog oscillators built-into Grandmother Dark, each with selectable triangle, sawtooth, square and pulse waveforms, and a hard sync button capable of creating complex timbres. The analog LFO is capable of reaching audio rates, acting as a third oscillator that can develop into some really aggressive tones. Also onboard is a classic Moog Ladder filter with a range of 10Hz–20kHz, a patchable 1-pole high-pass filter, and an analog ADSR envelope generator ready to sculpt your sound.

Diving deeper
The team at Moog thought of everything here. Knowing that most sound designers would use a spring reverb effect on a synth of this nature, they’ve gone ahead and added an onboard analog spring reverb tank capable of processing internal and external sounds. It’s a welcomed addition, with the ability to add some darker tones or tame any intense frequencies. Grandmother Dark also features a built-in arpeggiator and an onboard sequencer that can store up to 3 sequences with up to 256 notes each. Add this to your Eurorack ecosystem, and you’ll have full control over all of your modules.

Classic feel, current mood
Even though Grandmother Dark is retro in design, it features some modern-era additions that take this synth from a thing of the past into an instrument for the future. As for connectivity, the Grandmother Dark has everything needed for today’s production environment including a 5-pin MIDI In/Out/Thru as well as MIDI over USB for instant integration with your host computer. There’s also both a 1/4” main output and a 1/4” external audio input that’s capable of taking in signals from guitars, drum machines and more. Grandmother Dark can route these audio sources through its signal chain, imparting classic Moog character at every step along the way, including its spring reverb tank, and spit them back out again. Grandmother Dark's 32-note Fatar keybed makes this a premium standalone synth. It will also work perfectly as the front end to an existing modular system. No matter how you decide to use it, Grandmother Dark will give you a lifetime of sound exploration.