Are classic electronic instruments doomed to exist only virtually?
I saw a Farfisa combo organ at a guitar store two months ago and was blasted by its low price. I plugged it into an amp and was in great awe, up until I heard the first note. It was like meeting your childhood hero when both of you are older, and your childhood hero is now old, grey-haired, wispy in voice and soft in hand and handshake. I did not buy the organ. If I want a Farfisa sound, I can just synthesize it; it's just a chorus-y sawtooth. I can get a Yamaha Reface YC. I can download a VST.
The thrust of the above is: for specific hardware electronic and electric instruments, can there be a future? Vintage instruments won't last forever. No individual physical instrument will last forever. Mozart's pianoforte, though preserved, probably isn't playable anymore. But new pianos, and even pianofortes, are still being produced. But Farfisa has been bought out by Bontempi, and nobody knows who Bontempi is anymore. How many Yamaha GX-1's are still in existence; is it even ten? Did anyone in Yamaha even keep the production spec? Could they even make another, if some fresa slipped Yamaha a million dollar bribe to recreate the thing?
Are all Farfisas, Magnus chord organs, Echo-Recs, and the like destined to only be reproduced digitally, not manufactured?
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In order for an instrument to be manufactured on a commercial basis, there needs to be a market for it. The reason those electronic instruments are no longer produced is that technology has advanced and created a more profitable method of creating the sound of the music we love to hear. Some of the old instruments are still in pretty good repair and can still make that music, but as age takes its toll and parts become less available, the new technology will likely replace the old technology. I have a friend who has a Hammond B3, but when he plays a gig, he gets his B3 sound on his digital keyboard. That Hammond is just to much to haul around and set up. It seems that most folks view the situation the same way and there is little or no demand for the old technology anymore.
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