Product Code Database
The Novachord is the world's first commercial polyphonic synthesizer. Incorporating many circuit and control elements found in modern synthesizers, and using subtractive synthesis to generate tones, it was designed by John M. Hanert, Laurens Hammond and C. N. Williams, and was manufactured by the Hammond organ company. See also site's 'History' page Only 1,069 Novachords were built over a period from 1939 to 1942. It was one of very few electronic products released by Hammond that was not intended to emulate the sound of an organ.
The Novachord was not well-suited to the technique of organists or pianists and required frequent adjustments to controls on the front panel to create new sounds. Like many later analog synthesizers, it was much better-suited to producing "otherworldly" timbres. The instrument found its niche some years after production, shaping the sound of many science fiction film and television scores.
Production stopped because of a shortage of parts in 1942 and poor sales kept it from being built after the war. 120 Years of Electronic Music, The Hammond Novachord (1939) It is estimated that fewer than 200 Novachords are still in existence and considerably fewer are still in operation. The vast majority of surviving examples are in North America, although one is known to be in the United Kingdom. As of November 2017, there is one in Australia.
The Novachord featured an early implementation of envelope generators, with seven attack/decay/sustain envelope shapes selectable by a rotary switch and release time controlled by the sustain pedal. It also utilized three parallel band-pass filter, one lowpass filter, and one highpass filter with fixed cutoff frequencies per voice and an electro-mechanical 6-channel vibrato unit operating on pairs of adjacent oscillators. Each channel's vibrato frequency (~7 Hz) differed slightly. The oscillator inductors used cores mounted on flat springs.
The resulting sonic palette ranged from dense, sustained string- and vocal-like timbres to the sharp attack transients of a harpsichord or piano.
Despite its historical importance, the Novachord did not enjoy commercial success. That was partly due to instability problems, as well as the onset of World War II limiting the availability of parts and decreasing demand. The poor reliability was mainly the result of the tight tolerances of the operating parameters of hundreds of custom components. Hammond soon offered a special upgrade to improve stability, which was no more than a low-power heater bolted inside the enclosure to reduce the effects of humidity. The instrument was not known for vacuum tube failure perhaps because the heater voltage was reduced from the typical 6.3 volts to 5 volts.
The Novachord can be heard on many recordings of the era. Many songs sung by Vera Lynn, including the original 1939 version of "We'll Meet Again", were accompanied by Arthur Young on the Novachord. One of the most notable recordings to feature the Novachord is Brother Bones' 1949 recording of "Sweet Georgia Brown" on Tempo Records. The Novachord is used for the bass line on that track, but can be more prominently heard on the B side of the record playing the melody on "Margie"
American jazz musician Slim Gaillard and his Quartette also recorded with the instrument on their 1947 instrumental release "Novachord Boogie" (Parlophone R 3035) YouTube - Slim Gaillard Quartette - Novachord Boogie.
|
|
