Behringer CAT

The 1970s spawned the first truly portable analog synthesizer, and while it was quickly adopted by lots of renowned musical artists including Jan Hammer, Chick Corea, Rick Wakeman, Jean-Michel Jarre, Isao Tomita and Keith Emerson to name a few, it was somewhat temperamental and very expensive.

In 1975, a new synth strolled into town. The Cat as it was called was an analog, duophonic, three octave synthesizer that was very similar to the ARP Odyssey. Its keyboard would produce two control voltages that were routed into its two VCOs. An ultra-affordable and even more feature-packed homage to that iconic synthesizer comes in the form of the Behringer CAT. Conjure up the virtually any sound imaginable with incredible finesse and ease. The pure analog signal path is based on authentic VCO, VCF and VCA designs in conjunction with 4 variable and simultaneous oscillator shapes and Duophonic/Paraphonic capabilities. Owning a CAT is like having your own personal time machine, enabling you to freely embrace the past – or shape the future. And the best of all, it doesn’t scratch.

True to the Original

Great care has been taken in engineering the CAT, including the true to the original analog circuitry, legendary VCO, VCF and VCA designs that come together to recreate classic tones that are evocative of classic electronic music. This highly-focused attention to detail is what gives the CAT its ultra-flexible sound shaping capability. It gives you the ability to cover a lot of amazing tones from super-fat bass, tasty leads – and all the way to full on dreamy ambience from the far reaches of your imagination.

Big, Fat Tones

The synthesizer tracks laid down in the 1970s and 80s in progressive rock, wave and synth-pop have become classics and have inspired many other artists. The CAT lets you recreate all that magic – or design some incredible and original sounds that will make you a legend in your own right!

Keyboard Control

The CAT has the ability to accept any keyboard controller via MIDI. The signals generated can be tweaked via the Pitch Bend slider which can bend a note up or down one octave. Bump this up to two octaves by flipping the Octave Shift switch up or down. Use the Glide slider to change how fast a note transitions to another; up is faster, down is slower. Combine that with the LFO Freq slider to control the LFO and ADSR repeat tempo and you can create some amazing pulsating portamentos.

Two VCOs are Better

The very heart of the CAT’s sound is its two VCOs. The Duophonic/Paraphonic nature of the CAT allows both oscillators to be controlled independently. Use the Fine and Coarse Frequency controls to tune VCO1 to VCO2. Keyboard control on the CAT can be set to either Mono or Poly. Poly mode lets VCO1 generate the highest note played on the keyboard while VCO2 handles the lowest allowing two notes to be played simultaneously. Setting the switch to Mono mode makes VCO1 generate the lowest note depressed on the keyboard.