Back in 1973, this little beast became Korg's very first synthesizer, kicking off an entire legacy with its compact size and bold, quirky personality that squeezed big analog attitude into a portable package.
A single VCO pumps out waveforms like sine, square, sawtooth, and those funky Chorus I/II PWM modes across footages from 32' to 2', feeding into dual 12dB/oct lowpass and highpass filters controlled by the signature Traveler sliders below the 37-key keyboard—molded so they can't cross, letting you sculpt wah-wah sweeps or that classic "traveling" filter motion on the fly. Controls cluster under the keys for a sheet-music-stand-friendly layout, with big colorful knobs handling attack envelopes, Percussion/Singing decay modes, LFO vibrato, portamento, auto-bender, and auto-repeat effects, plus a mono 1/4" output, audio input, and headphone jack. Wood side panels and that vintage wood-and-metal vibe give it a sturdy, collectible feel at just a couple feet wide.
Over the decades, players from Stevie Wonder to The Cure have squeezed thudding basses, squealing leads, and weird ring-mod growls out of it in studios, praising its raw stability and character despite the monophonic limits—though some note the sparse performance controls keep it more studio-bound than stage-ready.
