John Bowen Solaris – a life’s work
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Solaris review. A life’s work: Three views on the John Bowen Solaris …
First: “The Solaris is a fusion of the most important synthesizer
designs of the past 40 years”
It may sound presumptuous: the John Bowen Solaris is in some ways the epitome of synthesizer design since the 70s.
Let’s see … there are various oscillators to choose from: Minimoog, CEM, Microwave, Prophet-VS, Wav (samples). Or
consider the filters: Moog, Oberheim, SSM, multimode filter, comb filter, vocal filter … The modules are a journey
through synthesizer history. Sure, it’s all purely digital, but the sound quality is excellent. Impressive.
Second: “The Solaris is the life work of a synthesizer enthusiast and
musician”
The Solaris’ enormous musical potential is no accident. As the first ‘official’ demonstrator for Moog, as co-founder of
the Prophet-5, as part of the team that developed vector synthesis (the actual concept for VS came from Chris
Meyer) and due to his decades of experience in playing instruments and programming factory sounds – Bowen has
been able to contribute his vast knowledge to the development of the Solaris. Above all, Bowen is a real musician. All
this is reflected in many details and in the user-friendly Solaris concept.
Third: “The king is dead, long live the king!”
Many years ago I realized that the polyphonic analog synthesizers of the late 70s and early 80s had ushered in their
own demise. Polymoog, OB-X, ARP Quadra, Prophet-5, Rhodes Chroma, Memorymoog, Yamaha CS-80 and PPG Wave
2.2 … many of those instruments never left the prototype status, strictly speaking (you’ll pardon my slight
exaggeration). Only a few instruments were actually “very” reliable, such as the Roland Jupiter-8 or Oberheim OB-8.
Well-to-do musicians often had several units of the same instrument with them on tour, a prophylactic measure
against the all-too-common technical failures. Vintage polyphonic synthesizers were (and are!) simply unreliable …
