Vintage Synth Explorer

Yamaha • CS-15

This synth really has its own sound. The CS-15's got style. Built like a tank with a lot of nice knobs and best of all, not one but two of those funny sounding multimode filters. It's actually a duophonic / bitimbral synth but you have to connect it to CV (Hz/V like Korg not V/Oct) to get the extra voice. Each of the two VCOs has its own CV/Gate control.

The best things about it are the flexibility of the VCFs and the routings to the filters and envelopes. You can rout VCO 1 to both VCFs and the VCFs to any of the envelopes positive or negative voltage. The VCFs are 12 dB/Oct and are switchable between low, band or high-pass. They are the key to the nice sound of the Yamaha CS family. Other nice features are noise, external-in for processing other sounds, LFO with Sample & Hold for those bubbling sounds and an individual auto-bend for the VCOs.

The CS-15 is great for strange blips, bass and tiny highpass sounds. The ADSRs aren't as fast as the CS-10 but they are ok. A nice feature is the 'brilliance' slider that can control either or both VCFs. At their extremely low prices, the CS-15 is an analog that's definitely worth checking out for yourself. It has been used by Astral Projection, Somatic Responses, Moog Cookbook, The Human League, and Vince Clarke.

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MartinL

Posted 233 days ago

I try the CS15 with friends composers in french :" Taper 1 boeufs." 1980/83...
Very interesting analogic synthetiser Very simple to use.
Good sound for bass & solo.
I like first faders design.( like Roland juno 106 after ) ...
Good synthetiser for NOVICE...
Sorry for my bad english! Bye!...

Goofy

Posted 251 days ago

CS is back at my home. Some years before I had a CS-10, but I had to sell it some years later. All the time I missed the sound, now I got a CS-15! And it's great! I love the clean sound - to my ears. OK you cant compare it to the Minimoog or the Korg MS-20 - but who will sound like all the rest? Yes, I have a Waldorf Pulse and a Novation BassStation (Keys). But the CS is happy knobbing. No menues you have to step through to get a good sound! For me the CS is one of the best Synths! I will never sell it!

racer

Posted 252 days ago

I've been feverishly playing a CS-15 for two years now. It's a sharp sounding, thick and bubbly box of awesome. The best part is probably the flexibility of the ADSR envelope, but they told you all about that above. But just for the sake of curious newbies (as I was when i happened upon mine) I played this thing for a good year (with no manual) before I even figured out how to use the ADSR envelope, and I had a blast. This machine isn't the warmest or fattest sounding 80s synth you can find, but it's as versatile as they come, and just plain fun!

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