Having been interested in the Moog matriarch for a long time, I decided to book some studio time to delve into some of the possibilities that semi-modular patching can offer. I have a little experience in using semi-modular synths like the Moog grandmother and eurorack cases but never owned or sat with instruments like this for long periods of time. I stripped the previous settings down to a basic initialised patch of saw tooth waveforms on the oscillators, removing all modulation and envelope settings. I instantly started jamming on they keys the way I would a piano to get a feel for the basic sound of the instrument before quickly moving into a more sound design approach. With the help of Rory, I patched an fx loop from the matriarch to the electro-harmonix eventide eclipse and scrolled through the preset settings until I heard something I liked. Having muted the fx and focusing on the raw sound from the synth, I started to explore cable patching and felt quite at home with the process coming from the perspective of a working live sound engineer and home studio nerd! Being able to reroute the LFOs to modulate oscillator pitches, high pass filter, oscillator volume and more allowed me to hear sounds that I wouldn’t be capable at home with my desktop synths. I especially loved the random LFO waveform as it held a unique water like quality that was smoother than some of the more clippy or angular noise LFO settings on my Rolands. The digital stereo delay is also very stable with a tape like quality that I enjoyed very much, especially pushed into the feedback realm.

I continued to sound design in a way where the patch could be played across the keys in a more performative way, evolving over time, in order to get more expression from the sound rather than a straight forward one note individual sound object.

After this one session, I really fell in love with the sonic character of the Moog matriarch and would love to own one in the future, but until then I will surely continue to work with the one in the studio. Please see below for my patch settings.