I'm Andy. I make software synths in Wales, and I think about the glory of audible maths a lot.
I'm also really bored of analog hardware emulation.
Free for Apple Silicon Macs (M1 or later) as AU, VST3 and Standalone. Intel Macs follow soon after launch. One form, three synths; I email you the links.
When I design sounds, the synthesis method used has a huge impact on the sound. But so does the interface I'm touching.
Much of the magick and wonder of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop was conjured via physical arrangements that, whilst on a clear journey to instrumenthood, had yet to be fully realised.
Incomplete as they were, these instruments delivered the first human/synth interfaces, and those very interfaces helped define the nature of those interactions and, by extension, the very sounds themselves.
The pin matrix is a classic analog interface. Maybe the classic analog interface. Many older enthusiasts grew up visualising patches that way, and many younger explorers are returning to x/y patching to help visualise complex intermodulation relationships.
So I brought all of these to my instruments.
But it's not just that I'm not pretending they are analog. They are proudly digital. If you want analog sounds, use analog gear! There are many, many things that analog does better than digital, and I am strongly of the opinion that using digital to model them is like painting portraits with a decorating roller. It's possible, and may have limited useful applications, but it is almost always inferior to using a more appropriate tool.
What I'm about is building digital instruments, with the sound engines that digital does best, behind interfaces that recall the classic synths of the 60s and 70s. The interface matters. Bizarrely, those early interfaces are more easily taken to their natural conclusion in digital than in their original voltage-controlled glory. There simply wasn't room for 2,000-plus matrix pins on a VCS3! In addition, you couldn't save and reuse a set of joystick-derived x/y coordinates in 1969. It's trivially easy in 2026.
I have three synths: an FM one, a Karplus-Strong one and a wavetable one. These were the first places that digital really shone.
Mellt, Tant and Tonnau are thought experiments baked into life with engineering.
And I've pushed the opportunity that gives me.
One thing digital does better than analog is supporting huge modulation complexity: 2,299 pins on Mellt, and two complete pin sets you can morph between on Tant and Tonnau. People who know their way around a pin matrix also find FM, in particular, far easier to picture as a matrix than through a DX7's parameter slider.
Every envelope switches through six modes, from AD to that trapezoid, and each phase of each shape can be synced to tempo individually. Mellt adds eleven LFOs. Tant and Tonnau don't need any: a looping trapezoid does the job, and on Tonnau any oscillator can run at LFO rate.
In the two synths with built-in effects, eighteen effect controls are matrix destinations, so the effects are deeply integrated into the sound design process rather than bolted on after it.
The limiter, the flanger's through-zero mode and the harmonic tremolo's crossover and scan look ahead, which makes effects possible that analog can't do. LIVE mode removes the latency while you play; switch it off and the plug-in reports its delay to your DAW.
Digital technology has evolved over the whole life of digital synthesis. Era starts at today's technology and dials back through earlier eras, so you dial in a sound, then dial in the era whose version of it you like best.
Each synth has an Input and a Sidechain bus feeding three envelope followers, so the kick drum can play the synth. On Tant and Tonnau the same inputs feed Ext In: your audio as a modulation source.
Each one is named in Welsh after the sound it makes. Apple Silicon Macs at launch, universal build to follow. AU, VST3 and Standalone.
FM synthesis
mellt · lightning
7 operators · 23 voices · 12 algorithms · 2,299 pins
FM made hands-on. Operator routing is shown on a pin board, so you choose an algorithm by reaching for the connection you want, not by number. Every operator reads a wavetable.
Karplus-Strong string synthesis
tant · harp string
23 strings · 2 filters per voice · 6 effects · A/B matrix
Plucked and struck strings from one of digital synthesis's most elegant tricks. Pluck it with a noise burst. Six effects, with their controls in the matrix.
Wavetable synthesis
tonnau · waves
3 oscillators · 16 voices · Era per oscillator · 6 effects
Wavetables with Sync, Bend, Mirror and FM warps, an Era control that scrolls back through the past, and any oscillator able to become an LFO.
| Feature | Mellt FM-1 | Tant KS-2 | Tonnau WT-3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Engine | 7-operator FM, each operator reads a wavetable | Karplus-Strong string, noise-burst exciter | 3 wavetable oscillators plus noise, 4 warps |
| Voices | 23 | 23 | 16 |
| Filters | None on the audio path; one per follower | 2 per voice, 4 types, Filter Era | 2 per voice, 4 types, Filter Era |
| Envelopes | 11 (7 operator + 4 modulation) | 4, six modes | 4, six modes |
| LFOs | 11 | None: looping trapezoids | None: looping trapezoids, or an oscillator at LFO rate |
| Era | — | Filter Era | Per oscillator, global offset, Filter Era |
| Effects | None, no latency | 6, look-ahead, LIVE mode | 6, look-ahead, LIVE mode |
| Matrix | 21 × 111, 2,299 pins, all automatable | 22 × 81, two sets, A/B morph | 23 × 93, two sets, A/B morph |
| Presets | 49 | 28 | 27 |
| Download | Free | Free | Free |
Silicon Antiques is me, Andrew White, working from a studio in Wales. The three synths are free because I want them in as many hands as possible. The planned releases come after, and they'll be better for everything you tell me about these.
So tell me. What's wrong, what's missing, what you'd like next. Every email gets read and most get a reply the same day: [email protected]. There's a running log of what I'm doing and deciding on the Workbench page.
Andy
Silicon Antiques, Wales. Updated 9 October 2026.
Mellt FM-1, Tant KS-2 and Tonnau WT-3, free for Apple Silicon Macs as AU, VST3 and Standalone, with a universal build to follow. Tell me which you want and I'll email you the links.