Crumar Performer

When Crumar released the Performer in 1979, they solved a problem that plagued most string machines of the era: the ability to play every key simultaneously without running out of voices. Built by the Italian company founded by Mario Crucianelli, the Performer became a workhorse for everyone from Duran Duran's Nick Rhodes to Klaus Schulze, delivering lush ensemble textures in a surprisingly compact 49-key format.

The heart of the Performer splits into two distinct sonic territories. The Strings section uses two oscillators per voice with 8' and 16' settings, shaped by a straightforward Attack and Sustain envelope and a three-band equalizer that lets you dial in everything from shimmering brightness to moody darkness. The Brass section offers its own character with a single envelope generator and a gentle low-pass filter, though it's the Strings that really define the instrument's personality. Both sections sit under an LFO that can modulate either the filter or frequency, and there's an analog delay available for the String section to add depth and movement. The control layout is refreshingly simple: just 15 sliders and a handful of buttons handle all the shaping, with dedicated volume controls for each section and a transpose switch for octave shifting. The chassis is solid and built to last, finished in black with wood end-cheeks that give it a classic, understated presence.

The Performer earned its reputation honestly. Musicians consistently praised the String section's ability to produce those distinctive, shape-shifting timbres that sit somewhere between orchestral warmth and electronic shimmer, especially when run through external effects like chorus and reverb. The fully polyphonic architecture means you can layer complex chord voicings without compromise, and the straightforward interface means you're tweaking sounds rather than hunting through menus. Two hardware revisions appeared during its production run, with Revision B adding a transpose switch and refining the brass section.