Digital Combo & Tonewheel Organ

Clavia brings you the very best of those classic setups in a single package. A classical tonewheel, Vox* Continental and Farfisa* Compact Deluxe, all carefully modeled from their originals.

The dual manual Nord C1 Combo Organ comprises three types of vintage organs as well as our famous tube style overdrive, rotating speaker simulation, delay, reverb and 3-band EQ effects, the Nord C1 will tailor sounds for your body, mind and soul.

UNDER THE HOOD

The original mechanical tonewheel design as well as the Vox* and Farfisa* transistor designs result in diverse interactions between the different parts involved in the sound generating process.

Modern sampling technology is able to play back the result of these interactions, but cannot duplicate the dynamic and random processes involved. Without these crucial steps represented, the response and feel of actually playing the instrument is inevitably lost.

The solution is a real-time, DSP-based model describing the construction and interaction between each part involved. The Nord C1 Combo Organ offers three different organs – all carefully modeled from vintage originals – with the sonic result of each part of the tonewheel and transistor designs recreated faithfully.

ON THE ROAD

Having three vintage organs in your studio is fun, but it’s even better when you can easily carry them with you to a gig. That is why the Nord C1 Combo Organ is lightweight and portable. With the optional gig bag, you can carry the massive power of three vintage monster organs in one hand; weighing in at merely 15kg (33lb) you will save energy for your performance.

APPEARANCE

The Nord C1 Organ is not just about smart design and gorgeous sound; it is about stage presence. Its bright red panel and red varnished birch side panels give the organ a classic style with a modern approach.

DIGITAL DRAWBARS AND SWITCHES

The fabulous sound aside, some areas of the original instruments design were up for improvement. For instance, the ability to store your favorite sounds and quickly recall them as you play.
This gets hard, as the original switches and drawbar levers physical position will not match the stored sound setting.
The Nord C1’s digital drawbars features LED segments that instantly light up to show the current setting. The digital drawbars are just as fast as their physical counterparts, and setting up your sound from scratch – even live – is done in no time at all.

3RD SET OF DRAWBARS

No two manual organ would be complete without the ability to play bass notes on a pedal board. The Nord C1 includes two additional bass register drawbars with selectable timbre from either vintage tonewheels or a synth bass. The bass can be controlled with any MIDI-enabled bass pedal board, or by splitting the lower manual.

LIVING EFFECTS

The built-in 3-band equalizer along with three types of speaker simulations and an extremely powerful overdrive offers you total tonal control of your sound. Add a feedback-delay with tap-tempo functionality, and several types of reverberation and you truly have an all-in-one effect section with stunning sound right out of the box.

ROUND AND AROUND

The rotary speaker simulation from Clavia’s award winning Nord Stage and Nord Electro series has been further improved, and now features an even more life-like experience. The Nord C1’s rotary speaker sim incorporates the acoustic variations that occur as a physical rotating speaker spreads the sound around in a room, providing the full experience of moving the air around.

BEST FRIENDS

Even though our rotary simulation is nothing less than amazing, we are the first to acknowledge that the C1:s best friend in the pursuit of sonic excellence is an external rotary cabinet. Connect the C1 to a quality cabinet with the standard 11-pin Leslie* connector and use the Half Moon switch or the C1 panel buttons to control the rotary speed.
The Leslie*interface on the C1 uses a high voltage output which is vital to experience the true soul of a screaming, or for that matter, a whispering organ. This high level output is also available on a ¼” jack on the C1 back panel.

PERCEPTIONAL PERCUSSION

The Vintage Percussion’s mono-polyphonic character creates an intuitive feedback as you play, and is a defining characteristic of a classic tonewheel organ. All components involved – filter, distortion, and envelope characteristics – have been carefully and faithfully replicated.

THE CHORUS/VIBRATO EXPERIENCE

The Nord C1’s chorus and vibrato were created in the same manner as the tonewheel models – analyzing and replicating the physical components involved in their mechanical ancestors.

More than a mere simulation of these effects, the C1’s chorus and vibrato are as alive as the tonewheels themselves. The rotating design of the vintage scanner has a deep impact on the organ’s sound. Matching the correct speed is easy – the life is in the characteristics of the analog circuitry scanned by the turning capacitive plates.

TRANSISTOR MANIA

The Nord C1 includes models of the two most popular transistor organs of the 1960s, offering you that massive savage sound created by their 12-top oscillator frequency-divider designs. This is a nosample zone; you have the same behavior and unique response as the original instruments.

The Farfisa* Compact Deluxe, considered by many to be the mother of transistor organs, involves routing matrixes and complex filter combinations that offer a tailored sound with massive energy and high-end.

As with the tonewheel organ, both transistor organs have their own unique, irreplaceable personalities. Combine them with any of the Nord C1’s speaker simulations, add some distortion, adjust EQ and they will definitely light your fire.

The Vox* Continental’s brute design brings you a more hollow tone, but still with a very intense character.

AMPLIFY AND TESTIFY

You can divide the stereo line output to separate tonewheel and transistor organ outputs, and connect them to separate amplifier set-ups.

SUPERIOR RESPONSE

An ultra low trigger-to-sound response time in the Nord C1 Combo Organ offers superior performance compared to any hardware and especially software products. Also, like the vintage original, the sound generation is started the very instant a key is pressed, not like conventional digital keyboard action, where the sound begins when the key has hit bottom.

MORE THAT VOLUME

One type of input from the player is often neglected, and yet it plays a vital part of your performance; the swell pedal.
Without the proper response of the pedal you can easily lose focus when expression is called for. It is more than just volume control – the frequency response characteristics are also modeled. Furthermore, a wide array of expression pedal manufacturers are supported to give you the perfect volume swell in every situation.

Nord C1 Combo Organ – Specification

GENERAL

• Master Level Control
• 100 Program Locations
• 2 Live Buffers

ORGAN SECTION

• Classic Tone Wheel Organ-, Vox Continental- and Farfisa-models with full polyphony
• 20 Digitally Controlled Drawbars
• 6 Drawbar Presets per Program Location
• Percussion Controls
• Vibrato / Chorus Control

EFFECT SECTION

• 3-band Equalizer
• Overdrive
• 3 types of Speaker Simulations – including Rotary Speaker with selectable speed (slow – stop – fast)
• Delay – with feedback and tap-tempo function
• Reverb – 5 algorithms

KEYBOARD

• 2 x 61 Medium Weighted Waterfall Keys