In his latest video, synthesist Alex Ball takes an in-depth look at the Moog Liberation and the rise of the keytar.
Ball discusses keytar history, the precursors to the keytar and offers a lot of musical demonstrations of the Liberation. Ball argues that the keytar is in equal parts “intriguing and silly”, and that’s definitely true. But the physicality and performance technique of the keytar is arguably an important part of the music, too.
In the early ’70s, there was a lot of interest in this, and in turning the synthesizer into a live performance instrument. Check out this 1973 performance of Frankenstein, by The Edgar Winter Group:
With Frankenstein, Winter singlehandedly turned the synth into a live performance instrument that could hold its own as part of a rock band.
Check out the videos and share your thoughts on the Moog Liberation and the keytar in the comments!
It sounded great, except it had that one small issue: it was so heavy, you needed to tour with a chiropractor. I think it did interested players one major service, because every keytar that came afterwards was NOT affixed to a dense chunk of wood. Yamaha was also bad about that. The infamous CS-80 and several of their early EPs were hernias looking for a place to happen.