Our little outdoor space at CatSynth HQ
Tag: Personal
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CatSynth 20th Anniversary!
Today, July 19, 2026, is our 20th Blogoversary! It’s hard to believe that we’ve done this for 20 years now, but time doesn’t lie, and so we shall celebrate this milestone.
The CatSynth blog started on July 19, 2006, with this photo of Luna and a Novation keyboard.
And this was the banner on the original incarnation of the blog.
Things certainly have changed a lot since then! Consider this banner compared to the current blog design, for example. Luna, sadly, left us almost ten years ago, though she lives on as the logo of all things CatSynth, including the blog and CatSynth TV. Sam Sam and Big Merp have joined us. Life has taken a variety of twists and turns, adventures and directions that 20 years ago I wouldn’t have imagined, and this site has come along for the ride.
Over 20 years, we’ve logged:
- 5240 published posts (including this one)
- 18,289 published comments (not including any on this post)
From the beginning, I envisioned it not as exclusively about cats and synthesizers, but rather more of a series of articles anchored by them. It wasn’t long before I started featuring “Fun with Highways” – initially interesting interchanges on maps and highway photos, later on full-fledged essays and articles. We joined a couple of cross-blog weekly events such as Weekend Cat Blogging and Wordless Wednesday, the latter continues to this day. I started writing about my own live shows, then other live shows I went to, then art shows, and the blog sort of became a place for reviews. And of course, all sorts of other things, like mathematics posts and random thoughts.
What sustained it then and now was an endless supply of ideas (not to mention cat and synth pictures online) and seeing how others enjoyed and were touched by the things I share. The process of creating continues to be its is its own reward. And keeping things loose and open, not sticking to a rigid formula but allowing curiosity and ideas to go in any and all directions, is also an important part of what makes it rewarding.
By around 2016 or so, I started to notice a decline in readership, especially for the long-form reviews. This led to the launching of CatSynth TV in 2017. It was originally a “companion vlog” that chronicled live shows and other items of interest in video form rather than written form. Synth demos were just a small part of it, but it didn’t take long before those became the most popular posts and the primary focus of the channel. Our “fun with highways” also migrated to the blog, with written articles morphing into wordless music videos. Math, science, and the strange and weird random thoughts and curiosities have largely migrated to the video domain as well.
In many ways, the video channel has largely eclipsed the blog, but the blog continues, sharing cat-and-synthesizers every week, and a “Wordless Wednesday” photo most weeks. As long as people enjoy these posts, I will keep doing them.
It’s amusing to think if we will be back here in 10 years celebrating the 30th anniversary…
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Sunday Newsletter: Contemplating Shapes
Consider this image for a moment.
It’s something one may encounter in passing, as part of the design of a larger object. Or it could be a work of art standing on its own. The “is it art?” question is unimportant. What is important is to take time to observe it on its own.
We have two basic shapes. A small circle inside a larger square. The circle is off-center. It makes the white space inside the square seem larger than it would be if the circle were centered, even though the area of the space is exactly the same.
What makes this so captivating, at least to me? It is the simplicity, it’s just enough, and not too much, to arrest the mind and focus on the geometric components. It could be a word in a language I don’t understand. It could also be music, either mostly silence or mostly a continuous, nearly pure tone.
Once one starts looking for these simple components, they can be found anywhere. This was a Wordless Wednesday from last year:
Once again, the relative emptiness other than the sphere and cube holds the focus, and indeed works as an object for a contemplation meditation. The texture of the sphere and the bit of shmutz on the surface of the cube provide one level of additional qualities to observe.
So if one were to add another single object either to the two-dimensional illustration or the three-dimensional photo, what would it be? Please share your thoughts in the comments below.
[Also on Substack]
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Farewell to 2025: Brightness from Darkness
2025 is drawing to a close, so it is time for our traditional end-of-year collage and post, a year that was “the best of times, the worst of times.” It was simultaneously one of the darkest and one of the brightest. If I focus on the personal and professional, it was a great year. If we look at the country and the world as a whole, the story is completely different. Our collage focuses entirely on the bright, even as our minds and souls are pulled by both poles simultaneously.
For CatSynth TV, it was another year of strong growth, 50% again in views, and strong growth in subscribers. But it’s not just the raw numbers. I am especially proud that this growth came on my own terms, rather than by “following the crowd” so to speak, maintaining the quality, diversity, and uniqueness of what we do on the channel. We’ve done more interviews with more people, explored more highways, enjoyed the cats’ antics on Caturdays, and of course, reviewed a lot of great synthesizers and music. Indeed, I think of the channel as being more of a TV channel with lots of shows than the single “show” that is typical of YouTube. The blog has found some new energy as well, where we have drawn in more regular viewers to our tried-and-true photos of cats and synthesizers, as well as our long-running Wordless Wednesday series.
We found community at NAMM, at Buchla and Friends, and Knobcon. We traveled not only to New York and Los Angeles, but also to Chicago, San Diego, all through the southern California desert, and to India. And many new friends and new connections along the way. And close to home, the cats are doing great, as are the humans at HQ. I am grateful for the companionship, both human and feline, for family, friends, and community that have sustained me throughout the year.
But one cannot ignore what is happening beyond our bubble. On day one of the new regime (it feels more appropriate to call it that than an “administration”), they chose to cruelly target people like me in one of the first executive orders, and it has cast a dark and stressful pall over all the bright and exciting things that happened. And it was far, far worse for many other people. It was also disheartening to see so many institutions, in media, in business, and even academia, seem to cave so quickly. If there has been a bright spot, it has been the way ordinary people are standing up and resisting, on the streets, in the courts, and in their work, with more strength than I would have expected given those dark days in the early part of the year. And as strange as it seems to say it, the regime’s own incompetence gives me a modicum of hope.
What comes in 2026 remains to be seen. We will hopefully be adding more travel, including to Superbooth this coming year! There are so many videos in the queue as we speak that we are excited to share with all of you. At the same time, I want to find more time to focus on music, both recording and performing. Oh, and the perennial goal of de-cluttering both our physical and metaphorical space. On the larger front, I do hope the world can find a bit more peace, and the regime here in the United States continues to fray at the edges and perhaps even crumble.
We at CatSynth wish you all a Happy New Year and all the best for 2026!
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Sunday Newsletter: The Final Night of Hanukkah
Tonight marks the final night of Hanukkah. A particularly poignant one given the tragedy that unfolded in Australia just one week ago, as people gathered on a beach to celebrate the first night of the Festival of Light.
Honestly, I was not feeling it at all last Sunday. In addition to the many tragic events one after another, I was still recovering from a nasty ailment that had me completely down for the previous week. I was just drained. But I was reminded that it was ultimately important to light the candles, maybe even more so to symbolize both resilience and defiance. It’s a difficult time to be Jewish, just as it’s a difficult time to be queer or trans. Which makes it all the more important to be openly and defiantly Jewish and light these candles for eight nights. No matter how much some people hate us, or kill us, or try to co-opt us for their own nefarious purposes, we are still here, and we are ourselves.
As always, I brought out my somewhat idiosyncratic menorah with musicians fashioned from metal hardware. I think it perfectly characterizes both the music and modernism here at CatSynth. And it seems to be a hit with friends online.
The Hanukkah origin story is itself one of Jewish defiance, but in some ways, a very uncomfortable kind. It celebrates the triumph of religious fundamentalists over the more cosmopolitan Greek/Syrian/Jewish state. If anything, my own celebration in this time is the opposite of the original legend, i.e., as a more cosmopolitan Jew against the more fundamentalist and nationalist forces casting darkness over the United States and other parts of the world at this time.
As the holiday draws to a close, just as we pass the winter solstice, we can look forward to the days once again growing longer and a couple of quiet weeks of calm, care, music, and, of course, cats.
We at CatSynth wish everyone a happy holiday season, however you choose to celebrate!
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Sunday Newsletter: Beauty & Curiosity
Our most recent video, “Beauty and the Beast”, explored the surprising and fascinating collaboration between Debbie Harry (of Blondie) and horror-surrealist artist H.R. Giger, perhaps best known for his work on the alien in the Alien films.
It got me thinking about the “beauty” in general. I think of beauty as one of my core values, along with curiosity, and these permeate what I choose to share with the world in my music, in videos, even perhaps in writing. Beauty comes in many forms beyond what we conventionally think of with the word. I find it in the faces of my cats, modernist art and architecture, the music I listen to, and yes, sometimes even in fashion magazines marketing “conventional beauty”.
It “arrests the mind”, to use James Joyce’s term from A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, specifically in a way that pushes away other thoughts and emotions and leaves one with positive focus, even if just for a fleeting moment. To bring it back to H.R. Giger for a moment, there is a beauty in some of his work, even as it remains deeply unsettling. The image that I used as the backdrop in the video, which was taken from the set of the KooKoo music videos, would be an example. It reminded me of the bodies of woodwind instruments (clarinets, bassoons, etc.).
Beauty’s counterpart for me is curiosity. Always being curious about things, exploring, and sharing what I find with others. Sometimes the reward for curiosity is beauty. This is something I try to bring across in my math videos, like the recent Henon Map video.
One does not need mathematical expertise, just curiosity and openness to it, rather than a pat dismissal of “oh, math is too hard,” and the imagination to see where it might go. For the Henon Map, the reward is indeed the beauty of the three-dimensional map, an unreal terrain.
This is even at play in the highway videos, where music and curiosity come together as we follow the road wherever it might lead.
But highways are really a story for another time.
If you enjoy these Sunday posts, please come back here for more. You can also subscribe to these newsletters on Substack.
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Our First Sunday Newsletter
Also published to Substack.
It’s been a while since I’ve written an essay or such. It used to be a regular occurrence on the CatSynth blog. Between the photos, I wrote music and art reports, “fun with highways” articles, and the occasional opinion piece. Music, art, and highways all migrated to CatSynth TV, and slowly after that, writing dried up altogether, other than the year-end post and the occasional other short piece.
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I’ve wanted to reverse that trend for a while, as there are ideas that don’t lend themselves to videos, music, or the highly compressed bits of communication on social media. But writing always took a back seat to CatSynth TV, to music, and to living life in general.
So what is finally getting me off my tuchus, firing up the ancient Tandy m102 laptop and assembling these words that you are reading now? A few factors stand out. One, I am finally starting to observe free time amidst my usual busyness, given a few external commitments this month. Another is that I have started reading *How to Do Nothing* by Jenny Odell, and resonated with her thesis and examples on how to step back from the ever-toxic milieu we find ourselves in. And finally, there is the toxic milieu itself, which lends a sense of urgency to anything that resists it without running away from it entirely. I have my escapes, and we will talk plenty about them in the coming weeks and months. But for now, I think this is sufficient, being present in this moment outside on the patio at CatSynth HQ, typing on my cute little retro computer while my cat Sam Sam enjoys the cool, fresh air.
Please join me here on most Sundays for more wordy thoughts.
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Farewell to 2023
As is our tradition here at CatSynth, we look back on the year that draws to a close with a collage and stats. It’s always a challenge to pick photos to represent the year, these were just a few that covered some of the themes. We made more music than ever (mostly in the studio here at CatSynth HQ). We had many explorations and adventures. It was the first time attending the NAMM show since the pandemic. It was our first time going back to New York since the pandemic, and we went twice! In some ways, the year was divided into three sections based on different day jobs (or lack thereof), but the images and memories connected to them transcend these divisions. And as always, the arbitrary ending of a year leaves us with a full queue of things not yet done and still to do – and in this particular passing of the year a sense of dread, not so much for us at CatSynth but for the world around us. Again, the images and memories anchor to what is important.
And now, some stats. Here on the CatSynth blog:
- 195 Posts (including this one)
- Top 5 commenters:
- Ellen Pilch (15andmeowing)
- meowmeowmans (Animal Shelter Volunteer)
- Sandee (Comedy Plus)
- Keith’s Ramblings
- Patrick Weseman
And on CatSynth TV, it’s been a banner year. 35% increase in views, 30% increase in watch hours (that’s the big one they care about over at YouTube), double as many new subscribers as 2022. We launched “shorts” to complement our full-length numbered episodes. A few other stats for the year.
Most Viewed Videos
- California Highway 160: Antioch Bridge to Rio Vista
- Arturia Vocoder V: Demo and Tutorial
- Ea Nasir, the Oldest Known Complaint Letter, and Copper Ingots
- Yamaha RX5 Drum Machine – a detailed demo and tutorial
- Introduction to the KOMA Field Kit
Most Popular new videos of 2023
- Yamaha RX5 Drum Machine – a detailed demo and tutorial
- NAMM 2023: Polyend Tracker Mini
- Arturia MicroFreak v5 firmware – A detailed overview
- Arturia Acid V: An Acid and Techno legend reborn! (Demo and tutorial)
- Cherry Audio PS-3300 – a massive demo and tutorial for a massive synth
It’s interesting that some of the most watched overall were not new this year. I like to think of that as representing that there is enduring interest in our videos from previous years over a longer period of time.
And that is the final thought heading into the new year, enduring and being resilient even has chaos, difficulties, and challenges abound. As always, we’ll keep doing what we do.
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Farewell to 2022
It’s that time when we at CatSynth post our traditional end-of-year image, along with a few stats and thoughts on the year that is coming to an end. It was a bit harder to settle on a set of images to represent this year given how much has happened. First, a few quick stats.
On the blog:
- 207 posts
- 142 “cat-and-synth” posts
On CatSynth TV
- 61 new videos
- Most watched video made in 2022: Klaus Schulze: A tribute to his music and legacy
- Second-most watched made in 2022: The Logistic Map: Attractors, Bifurcation, and Chaos (Part 1 of 2)
Although there were fewer videos produced this year, there were some ambitious ones, like the two “Red Robot Show” videos. We emphasized quality over quantity.
Compared to the previous two years, 2022 was active and busy. Even a bit chaotic and over-committed at times. Perhaps this is a form of “return to normalcy” after the deepest parts of the pandemic. We did continue the new tradition from last year of releasing at least one EP or album by the end of the year – I am quite proud of the way Merp Friend came out. I also traveled farther and more frequently than in previous years, reconnected in person with more friends, and will be off to visit New York at the start 2023 for the first time in 3 years (the longest I’ve ever been away in my lifetime).
For this coming year, I already have a new album in the works and lots of ideas for the video channel. I would like to see CatSynth TV grow – and this website could use some serious updates. The challenge is sustainability between music, videos, my personal life, and my “day job”. Finding that balance has been at a time challenging this past year, and continuing to develop my new organization and meditation techniques will play a part. And I of course look forward to spending as much time with my cat family – Sam Sam and Big Merp – as I have these past two years. Working from home has truly been a blessing that came out of the challenges since 2020. As my good friend G Calvin Weston says, forward motion.
Wishing you all the best for 2023 – and we’ll keep doing what we do.
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CatSynth 16th Anniversary
Today marks 16 years since our first post on CatSynth. And of course here is the photo of our beloved Luna that started it all.
Although I still miss her dearly, I love being able to see her through my hundreds (maybe more than hundreds) of photos.
With everything that has been happening in the world and personally, I haven’t marked the anniversaries as much as in the past. But this year seems like a good time to do so, as at least some things from the past are beginning to re-emerge.
And with that, let’s look at some stats. The viewership for the blog continues to be down from its heights in the early 2010s. But we do still get a lot of visitors from all over the world.
According to our Google analytics, the greatest number of visits from July 2021 to July 2020 came from the United States, the United Kingdom, China (glad to see we’re not blocked by the “Great Firewall”), Ireland, France, Canada, Germany, and Sweden.
Our most popular blog post over the past year was NoiseKick FX Meme Screamer Plus (TS/Klon/Boost). And of course, we ended up buying that Meme Screamer pedal and presented it on CatSynth TV.
Speaking of CatSynth TV, the channel has continued to grow. We gained almost 1,500 subscribers and had well over 150,000 views. Perhaps small by YouTube standards, but I am proud of the work we have done and look forward to more growth. Our most popular videos were mostly old favorites including our many Arturia V Collection reviews and demos. Our tributes to electronic-music heroes also were among the most viewed, especially our tribute to the great Klaus Shulze. Again we welcomed viewers from around the world, with the largest viewership in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Canada, and Japan.
We at CatSynth are looking forward to another year of cats, synthesizers, music, art, and so much more. And thank you for all your support from myself, Sam Sam, and Big Merp.