ARP Odyssey

The Odyssey was released in 1972, designed as a cut-down version of the Arp 2600 for touring musicians & competing with the Minimoog with a three-octave keyboard. It's a 2 oscillator analog synth and one of the first to offer Duo-phonic ability (can play 2 notes at the same time).

The Odyssey was released in 1972. It was designed as a cut-down version of the 2600 for touring musicians, competing with the Minimoog with a three-octave keyboard. It's a 2 oscillator analog synth and one of the first to offer Duo-phonic ability (can play 2 notes at the same time). Continued with various versions until 1981. The Odyssey was re-released by Korg in 2015, but for real value Behringer make an all analog emulations of both the Odyssey & the ARP 2600 for a really cheap price.

The ARP Odyssey was an analog synthesizer introduced in 1972. Responding to pressure from Moog Music to create a portable, affordable (the Minimoog was US$1,495 upon release) "performance" synthesizer, ARP scaled down its popular 2600 synthesizer and created the Odyssey, which became the best-selling synthesizer they made.

The Odyssey is a two-oscillator analog synth (the Minimoog has 3 oscillators and its sound is considered "fatter"). The Odyssey was the first synthesizer with duophonic capabilities (the ability to play two notes at the same time). Many cite ARP's semi-modular 2600 as the first duophonic synthesizer; however, the 2600 was originally shipped with a monophonic controller keyboard, with a duophonic keyboard not being released until after the Odyssey's release. One potential appeal of the Odyssey is the fact that all parameters, including a resonant low-pass filter, a non-resonant high-pass filter, ADSR and AR envelopes, triangle (not sine) and square wave LFO, and a sample-and-hold function are editable with sliders and buttons on the front panel.

There were many versions of the Odyssey over the years.

Odyssey Mk I (Model 2800) was produced between 1972 and 1974 - These original white-faced Odysseys used a 2-pole VCF filter design similar to old Oberheim SEM modules - Later Mark Is were made with the black and gold color scheme, and some may also have the CV/Gate/Trigger interface jacks installed (ARP mod kit #6800101).

(From Wikipedia)

Arp Odyssey synths secondhand are rare to find now and demand high prices like all the old classics, but in hardware form you can pickup either a Korg or Behringer emulation from as little as £350 GBP secondhand or £450 new for the Behringer emulation or around £1600 for the Korg.

In software form the Odyssey sound can be had from the likes of Korg (who also do the synth in software form) or the Gforce software's highly respected Oddity3, and others.