Thirty-three years ago, in 1982, mass production began of the Polivoks, the classic Russian synthesizer, designed by circuit designer Vladimir Kuzmin, with hardware design by his wife Olimpiada.

To celebrate the 33-year history of the Polivoks, organizer Andrew Startsev has created a campaign to produce a CD of music that explores the capabilities of the Polivoks. Polivoks 33 is a collection of tracks, featuring the Polivoks, created by electronic musicians from around the world.

Here’s a video introduction to the project, featuring Polivoks creator Vladimir Kuzmin:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYOZG-_VQ40

Some little-known facts about the Polivoks:

• Polivoks was manufactured at the “Vector” military plant, from 1982
  until 1991; A total of about 20,000 units were made.
• The retail price was 600 rubels (around $850).
• Polivoks was never exported from the USSR, and it only achieved its popularity abroad only after the “Iron Curtain” came down.
• One of colour variants of the synthesizer was supposed to be “khaki,” but it was never produced in this color.
• All the knobs on the front panel have dots marked with white paint. Some of the first batch of Polivoks has knobs marked with fluorescent white paint, which was used for military equipment. They were not changed, so several Polivokses have knobs that glow in the dark.

Here’s a demo of the Polivoks by Kuzmin:

Polivoks 33 is available to project backers starting at $10 for a digital download or $20 for a signed CD.