Who is Absolute Deviation?

Absolute Deviation was founded by long-time Buchla technician, Joel Davel. Joel has worked for Don Buchla since 1993. In Don's words: "Coordinating hardware development and helping with sound design, Joel Davel contributed his talents to just about every aspect of the project, including printed circuit design, beta testing, and sound design." Joel is a percussionist. The flexibility of the Marimba Lumina has allowed him to make the instrument his primary tool of expression. It only makes sense for Joel to continue supporting his own primary instrument. See www.isproductions.com/joel for more info.

What happened to Nearfield Multimedia?

Nearfield Systems continues to be a successful company in the field of antenna measurements. Its investment in the Marimba Lumina was a key to its development into a robust professional instrument. Unfortunately, the financial returns were not as robust as they hoped and it didn't make good business sense to continue production. They support this endeavor.

What about Don Buchla?

Don is the designer of the Marimba Lumina. While the support team of Mark Goldstein and Joel Davel (not to mention help from Brian Rice and Chuck Carlson) were necessary, the principle design is Don Buchla's. He had his hand in every aspect of the project.

The infamous Don Buchla is the only maker of unusual and innovative controllers that has had the guts to fly in the face of market forces, and make what he wants. He is one of the few with the physics background to understand what is necessary to make them work too.

Don continues to design new modular 200e designs and refine Lightning. Don supports this endeavor. Joel continues to work for Don on various projects.

Will the prices be the same?

The 3.5 models will be available first, with an adjusted pricing scheme: $3600 with the old CPU, $3850 with the reccomended CPU upgrade. Prices subject to change if production costs continue to climb.

The 2.5 models will come late and the price may deviate upwards from its original price of $2500. The $1000 price differential between the two models represented more of a marketing incentive than true costs. The price was artificially low in order to generate interest. Still, there is some savings and that will be reflected in the price once these are available.

Will my Lumina be repairable in the future?

Absolute Deviation seeks to keep up the legacy of the Marimba Lumina. All that good work should not be for naught.

Both Nearfield and Don Buchla seem to be happy to have the worthwhile endeavor kept alive. Read more about the future of the Marimba Lumina...