Introduction to Analog Synthesizers (Simulation OK)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYk8r3QlNi8&list=PLOunECWxEL...

THis guy is my favorite professor from my school. He has posted online lectures because of COVID and decided to put it up on his youtube channel so people can watch.

back in the day this course had like 25 official seats but like 40 people would show up every day to "unofficially" audit the course.

Everyone else has covered some good places to get started reading and learning, but eventually you'll have to twist some knobs on your own. Assuming you do go down this path, I want to throw out a suggestion.

If you get into synthesizers and music production, I highly recommend picking up a couple of Korg Volcas. They're not fancy, you won't impress any synth musicians with them, but their design is wonderfully fun. They often get overlooked by "serious" bloopmakers; they're a bit limited in capability, inexpensive, and the sound quality (noise floor especially) is not that of a high end synth. But their immediacy, learning curve, and common design makes it very easy and fun to play with. I can get someone who's never played any music in their life to start making beats and dance rhythms with me in under an hour. Elektron has some similar devices in the Models line, but their learning curve (and capabilities) are greater.

If I had $800 to spend on gear, I would much rather have 3 volcas covering rhythm, bass, and lead, and a mixer and recorder, than a single mid-range synth. I'd be able to make more professional sounding tunes with just a license for a major DAW (and maybe one piece of hardware with the leftover cash), but the fun factor and joy of beat crafting would be far greater.

Basically I'm a huge fanboy of Tatsuya Takahashi, a man who went to Korg with a home-built synth from his engineering degree's final year, got a job, and ended up causing a relatively large shift in the industry. There's an interview with him here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xb_-q5GKxK4

One thing not mentioned in the comments here so far is that in general, almost all analog synthesis uses subtractive models. That's perfectly fine, but you should be aware that there are other synthesis models too. Frequency Modulation (FM) is one, famously used by the Yamaha DX-7. Additive synthesis is another, and rarely if ever found on actual analog synth equipment. There are a few more that were developed in the digital realm and will never (or likely never) appear in analog form.

There's a whole world to explore in subtractive synthesis, but you may find yourself at some point wanting to go outside that paradigm, and if so, it's easier to explore in the digital realm.

I highly recommend Syntorial: https://www.syntorial.com/

I'll have to find the site, but someone posted an awesome site here, some time ago, that taught synthesizers, using a cool JavaScript tool.

[UPDATE] Here we go: https://learningsynths.ableton.com

I would recommend VCVRack, a mostly free virtual Eurorack system.

https://vcvrack.com/

Not a book, but I found the Underdog Electronic Music School to be pretty helpful [0] [1], though I have yet to feel comfortable enough to design any sound "with intention".

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfJ9Dbjz6cs

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNk-lIFq7ms&t=1301s

There are a bunch of different ways that one could approach this, depending on if you want to learn to play a synth vs. understand synthesis (which obviously have some overlap).

Neither of the books that I'll recommend here are specifically about learning to play analog synths, but they both give a bunch of background to understanding analog and digital synthesis:

I read an earlier edition of this when I was getting into working in electronic music, and found the background very useful and a pleasure to read.

https://www.amazon.com/Electronic-Experimental-Music-Thom-Ho...

This one is specifically not about analog synthesis (but rather digital synthesis and sound processing), but is kind of a classic in the field:

https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/computer-music-tutorial

The most common physical analog synths have two to three oscillators and a resonating filter. The first book would give you enough info to know what that means and begin to explore the space a little more intelligently.

Assuming you're a programmer, you can also do a lot of things by creating synths using either a visual or code-based synths on your own. I'm partial to ChucK, but there's also Supercolider, CSound, Max, Pd, Reaktor, ...

The basics of modular synthesis with VCV Rack

https://omricohen-music.com/index.php/2019/09/05/new-to-modu...

https://www.youtube.com/c/MoritzKlein0

This guy has a channel where he builds up analog synths from basic components. He does a great job explaining the intuition.

I teach music technology and have a YouTube channel. I'm doing a series on exactly this subject, so hopefully you'll find it useful. [1] I have a book on music tech which I wrote that covers subtractive synthesis basics as well [2]

[1] https://youtu.be/l1B7ym59VJs [2] https://tinyurl.com/cubase11book

It depends on whether you're more interested in the theory of how things work or how to make nice sounds (two things that are correlated, but not 100% correlated).

It sounds more like the former; in that case Puckette's book is a classic (and free) http://msp.ucsd.edu/techniques/latest/book.pdf

This is an odd one and is a bit of an acquired taste, but some sound designers swear by the original 1971 manual for the ARP 2600, of which you can find a PDF here: http://guitarfool.com/ARP2600/Arp%202600%20Owners%20Manual.p...

If you want to follow along with your own synthesizer, there's a breadth of options ranging from software recreations of the 2600 to a licensed hardware reissue, but for $25 you can get Cherry Audio's respected CA2600: https://cherryaudio.com/instruments/ca2600

> But I'd really like to have some basic idea of how to put together rudimentary sounds with intent.

There are really only 4 main waves: Sine, Square, Triangle, and Sawtooth. The "complexity" comes from using these waves to modulate and transform each other. Apply Volume: labeled as Attack, Sustain, Decay, and Release; and you have yourself a patch! Find any synthesizer plugin, load up some of the patches, and start twiddling knobs: Disable things and break each patch down to it's individual components. You can get a feel for how complex sounds are built with "digital VCO's".

Music isn't an exact science: You just have to play with it until it sounds good to you. Have fun =)

Here is a tutorial [1] that shows how to simulate a simple MiniMoog-inspired analog synthesizer in Pure Data [2].

It teaches the basic building blocks of subtractive synthesis like oscillators, filters, envelope generators and how to combine them into a working synthesizer.

You have to navigate through the tutorial using the sidebar on the left, current page is not highlighted, the page i linked to is called SIMPLE SYNTH...

[1] http://write.flossmanuals.net/pure-data/simple-synth/

[2] https://puredata.info/

Step 1 Go through this process

https://learningsynths.ableton.com/

Step 2 Learn what is possible with an easy to follow advanced tutorial

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gipTFNhniMo

Step 3 use the sound on sound inside synthesis as a reference

https://www.soundonsound.com/series/synth-secrets

Step 4 Do it yourself.

vcvrack.com can be a good start once you understand the fundamentals.

Learning synthesis (from your browser):

https://learningsynths.ableton.com/

I was the same! I saw synthesizers in the mid-70's and heard some Wendy Carlos tunes and Rich Wakeman and said "Now THAT is a pretty cool instrument!" That lead to me taking an electronic music class in college to get access to a Moog Model 15, and then to buy Hal Chamberin's book Digital Music Synthesis, and eventually to buy a synth from Roger Arrick who runs synthesizers.com and basically hand builds modular analog synths.

Designing those "fat" analog sounds from the 70's requires a subtractive synth which starts with a harmonic rich waveform (like a sawtooth) and then applies filters to it that are modulated by an ADSR envelope.

Dr. Chowning over at Stanford invented (or at least documented) using FM modulation (mixing) of multiple sinusoids to achieve interesting sounds. That was the basis for the Yamaha DX-7 and you can hear it on a lot of 80's and 90's band tracks. His book is somewhat dry but it goes over the theory well and with something like the Yamaha TX81z sound module you can put his ideas into action and hear the results.

Later synthesizers went full on DSP which allows you to effectively emulate that other forms and also to do things that they can not (like phase coherent modulation schemes).

All said, for me at least, playing with the model 15 in college and playing with my Arrick 22-slot modular synth since, has been the only way for me to internalize the connection between the sound I wanted to hear in my head with how to set things up to produce it.

Great recommendations in here, and I'm happy to see this thread getting such attention!

This is totally a shameless self-plug, but I think it could be interesting for you:

I'm working on a project called Elementary Audio [1] which is a javascript runtime + framework for writing native audio software. It's like the Web Audio API in that it's javascript+audio, but unlike Web Audio in that it aims to target true native audio apps, like plugins for your DAW or hardware projects.

The API that it offers feels to me very much like thinking and working in analog synths, which is why I think you might find it interesting. You can describe and wire up signals and just see what they sound like without having to worry about what needs to happen under the hood for you to hear it.

I put together a guide for dipping your toes into making sound [2] and you'll find there a bunch of other resources that I recommend for getting into the topic.

I should note too that it's currently in beta and only supports macos and linux (windows coming soon!)

[1]: https://www.elementary.audio/ [2]: https://docs.elementary.audio/guides/making_sound

Ableton's guide and Syntorial, both mentioned elsewhere here, are great introductions. Subtractive synthesis (which is the style of synthesizer your probably have in mind implicitly when you say "analog") is fairly straightforward in practice and decomposes into separately understandable components really well. It's a good fit for programmer brains that think in terms of composing smaller units together. It's literally just oscillators, envelopes, filters, and LFOs. Everything else is secondary.

Once you get the basics down, when it comes to real sound design I've found the best tool is to get on YouTube and search for " sound design" where is the kind of sound you want to make: spacey pads, EDM pluck, dub techno stab, 90s synth bass, etc.

Over time, your ear will get better at hearing a sound and understanding how to build it in a synth. You'll learn to hear the difference between a sawtooth and square, what different filters sound like, and how detuning, unison, PWM, etc. all affect a sound. Tutorials are a good way to build up that knowledge.

Also, just like programming, there is absolutely no substitute for just sitting down and noodling with it yourself and trying to make sounds. Like cooking, much of the learning happens in the intuitive non-verbal part of your brain. You don't just need to learn the words for things, you need to develop a deep auditory intuition around sound. You need to feel it. Books will only get you so far with this. Making sounds yourself is key.

You can do this all on a computer using software synths if you want. You can get a free or cheap DAW like Reaper or Ableton Lite and then a free soft synth like Tytel's Helm.

But, personally, I think it's more fun and easier to learn on hardware. That lets you engage your sense of touch and muscle memory, which helps really lock in the learning. The Korg Monologue is a great analog subtractive synth to start with, or a Minilogue if you want to play chords. Hardware holds its value really well, so you can always sell it and recoup most of your investment if you lose interest.

Note that subtractive synthesis is just one way that machines can make sound (but it happens to be one of my favorites). Over time, you'll want to explore FM, wavetable, additive, granular, etc. There's a ton of fun to have.

You really should just buy a synth and play with it. The Elektron Analog 4 can be found cheaply and has a huge breadth of parameters.

If you’d like a no-setup, no-tools, no-cost way to just start messing around, the WebAudio API[0] isn’t a bad place to start.

It has its shortcomings, but in many ways mimics the logic of a real synth. They’ve got a synth[1] tutorial that works and if you search “webaudio synth” a bit, there are other helpful write-ups to start learning or playing with concepts you learn about from other resources.

0: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Web_Audio_A... 1: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Web_Audio_A...

One of my favorite resources I find myself going back to time and again is Synth Secrets a 63 part article series by Gordon Reid:

https://www.soundonsound.com/synthesizers/synth-secrets

I found this series of articles from Sound On Sound to be fantastic, covers a lot of ground at reasonably technical level: https://www.soundonsound.com/series/synth-secrets

This link came up in a synthesizer based topic thread a while ago and was real informative to me:

https://modwiggler.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=2858814#p285881...

Intro to synthesis parts 1 and 2

https://youtu.be/atvtBE6t48M

https://youtu.be/gJkxGvhOS-M

Syntorial is a little bit expensive, but awesome for showing you how to actually use a synth. It shows you what you need to know as a musician, not as an electrical engineer.

I think it is superior to any book.

The very very basics of classic analog 'subtractive' synths are that you have a wave generator (oscillator), usually these generate Sine, Square, Triangle or Saw waves. You then pass that through a Low Pass Filter. The Low Pass Filter has a cutoff set, frequencies lower than the cutoff pass through unaffected, higher than the cutoff gets attenuated and monkeyed around with. Thats the classic synth sound basically. But there's loads of other stuff on top of that - multiple oscillators slightly detuned from each other, attack/decay/sustain/release of the volume, using an LFO (low frequency osciallator) to modify the cutoff of the low pass filter, etc etc

If you play with a wave generator and a Low Pass Filter and try the different wave types (Sine, Saw, Triangle, Square) you will quickly recognise all kinds of synths sounds that you already know, e.g. you'll recognise the distinctive sound of a square wave bassline. Or the pure sound of a sine wave (think classic Doctor Who theme)

In Propellerheads Reason, there's a device called 'Subtractor' which is basically a classic synth. This page explaining how the use the Subtractor covers a lot of the different things that analog synths do.

https://www.reasonexperts.com/subtractor-basics.html

I cannot recommend Syntorial enough. It builds up your knowledge of subtractive synthesis knob by knob, starting just with an oscillator and working up to the whole shebang (filters, envelopes, modulation, legato, mono vs polyphonic, etc). For every single step, you're given a typical softsynth interface (with only the settings you've unlocked so far), given a short melody played with the target configuration, and you have to duplicate the configuration by ear from scratch (the intent is that this is the most direct way for you to learn to dial in sounds you hear in your head). You'll also be shown which knobs you got wrong when you make a mistake so you can intuitively see which settings you need to focus on better hearing.

On top of all this, the license includes free add-ons for popular softsynths like Massive and Serum that go into specific detail about applying what you learn to those synths if you're interested in that.

And there's a hands-on demo! https://www.syntorial.com/

It is pretty expensive, but the combination of brilliant hands-on implementation and sheer volume (no pun intended) of learning content warrants it IMO if you're invested in learning the topic.

Also, not directly related to this, but they have a forum as well where people will share sounds they hear in popular songs and ask each other for tips on programming what they're hearing, which can be a neat resource as well, though I've personally not got as involved in that.

Andrew Huang has a really good intro video on modular synthesis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWslSTTkiFU

Warning that modular synths are typically not cheap. However, most of the physical standalone synths that exist today use the same principles.

Physical hardware can be really fun if you don't end up going with VCV rack or syntorial as mentioned in this thread.

Good pieces of hardware for a n00b:

- arturia microfreak

- korg minilogue

- any of the korg volca lines

There are many ways to approach the synths. Books and tutorials often do this methodically - waves, harmonics, modulation, etc. This is the way to learn the mechanics of the sound synthesis and ideally should let one figure out how to design 'new' sounds.

However, a lot of musicians prefer the practical way of using synths by getting familiar with the presets which often accompany the synths. Sure, someone had to design those presets somehow. Well, it's also possible to learn that from these presets created by the pros.

Meanwhile for the purposes of music production the presets could be tweaked to better blend with the intended soundscape.

So the question is what's the driving reasons for getting into synths.

As for the resources, there's a nice collection of vintage synths emulators - Bristol https://sourceforge.net/projects/bristol/

Bristol runs on Linux, and supports MIDI. The filters are not very true to original hardware, but good enough for synth explorers.

Also there's a nice set of original manuals that were accompanying the classic ARP synths. They give a theory intro and then detail the presets, mostly how to synthesize acoustic instruments.

There's also a dub of ARP Odyssey original audio tapes by Roger Powell which follow the construction of the described patches https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Pu2JwwG3bjA

Lots of good resources here already, so I’ll share an opinion and an open question instead.

IME the key concept while learning analog synthesis is understanding control signals. For most synthesizers, this mainly means envelopes (for one-shot changes), LFOs (for cyclic changes), and maybe the mod wheel (for help with learning how amplitude affects the control signal). Tying the control signals to “what you hear” is the big idea.

You mentioned that you have an iPhone. I’m assuming you have a computer that you can use to watch/read some of these suggestions with, and I encourage you to get the simplest analog-modeling synth app that you can find on the iPhone in order to “play along” and exercise each concept you’re learning. That live exploration and immediate feedback is very important, whether you’re using physical knobs or not. A simpler synth will cut away all the extra stuff and help you grasp the fundamentals more clearly.

Someone recommended Synth One. It is free and quite capable. I just fired up my copy and tried and failed to find an init patch to start building from. Its envelopes are not clearly labeled or intuitively tied to the things they modulate. I think it has multiple screens to navigate through. So I don’t think that’s the best option for your purposes.

This leads to the question: does anyone know of a simple stripped-down synth engine, preferably one that fits all on one screen, that brudgers can use along with a guide to dig into the basics? Asking for that on a phone might be too much; you may be better off using the phone to read/watch and the PC to play with a simple JS synth. If you have multiple screens, that would work just as well.

Key features:

  1 or 2 voice oscillators (the available waveforms don’t matter)
  Keyboard- or mouse- or touch-triggered note input option (sequencers muddy the waters)
  Amp tied to an ADSR Envelope
  Filter tied to an ADSR Envelope
  LFO tied to something (pitch or filter cutoff)

The simpler the better, I cannot stress this enough! Brudgers doesn’t need a patch bay or customized routing to learn about filter cutoff and LFOs and ADSR envelopes. Cut out the noise, save it for later. It’s okay if those things are present, as long as it’s easy to get to an init patch and ignore them. “Subtractor from Reason as a web app” is a good upper bound of what I have in mind here.

The Intro to Synthesis video series put out by Reverb's Justin DeLay is really excellent: https://reverb.com/news/intro-to-synthesis-our-6-part-video-...

As mention previously, Reverb.com is an excellent place to find a great deal on a used synth.

using some several times a week, used to design some and built many

to be fully pedantic, simulation is often called virtual analog :)

random thoughts:

- ableton had some synthesis lessons with interactive demos.

- modular is great to learn cv/patching basics

- moog werkstat is cheap and patchable

- you can certainly find old second hand doepffer modules for a bargain (modular is very expensive)

- VCV rack will give you the same experience, on your computer, for free

- not exactly the same experience actually, turning a knob and having 1000 dancing and shooting in front of u is always a nice experience, try that sweep with a mouse cursor

- similarly, having a failed cable, among many, in front of same audience is nicely terrifying:)

- if you're ready to spend nights burning yourself with a soldering iron, there's a lot of ressources for "synth diy".

- analog used to sound better due to non-linearities and harmonics, nowadays good (and expensive) plugins achieve impressive results but requires massive cpu

- it's much funnier to travel with suitcases full of very expensive gear rather than just a computer. who doesn't dream of TSA destroying your most valuable belongings:)

Some great resources have already been posted that I'd second such as the Ableton website and Syntorial. I'd add the course by Sean Luke out of GMU [0] if you'd like something after and possibly a little more academic. His ebook is free on his site. If you're able to find a copy of The Roland Synthesizer Book [1] I found it incredibly interesting reading. They have pictures of patches for specific sounds. I'm not sure if anyone would be able to find a print version though and I've assumed they're collector's items.

[0]: https://cs.gmu.edu/~sean/book/synthesis/

[1]: https://www.amazon.com/Synthesizer-Four-Volumes-Roland-Corpo...

On the software side, Reason is a really fun program to work/play with. It has about half a dozen virtual instrument synths, and they are all first class. Particularly: Maelstrom, Thor, and Europa. They're now on a subscription model, and give a few months of free trial, so that could be a great place to start.

On the hardware side, it depends a lot on what you're looking for. If you want to take some time to explore the theory, and do so with premium gear, Moog has some great options. Their Subsequent 25 could be a good entry point.

If you see yourself progressing from crafting sounds to arranging them into songs/sketches, the Elektron Digitone is really a blast to work with. Great synth engine, workflow, effects, and build quality. I picked up one earlier this year, and I reach for it now more than any other gear or instrument.

As others have mentioned, Bjørn and Meyer and the Ableton tutorials are excellent.

I have an old copy of this book, which you can find for about $20, and it’s excellent!

https://encyclotronic.com/books/theory/synthesizer-basics-th...

I can highly recommend Reaktor 6 by native instruments! A full virtual DSP program for creating things at different levels of abstraction. It’s the backend they use for a lot of their products and sounds phenomenal. Heaps of tutorials on YouTube and plenty of space to explore and learn.

https://learningsynths.ableton.com/

Ableton have excellent learning resources all online for free. They have web based demos for most things.

This covers synths but they have other sections for more general music creation too!

Get Vital[0].

It has been exceptionally difficult to teach modern sound design to people without forcing them to buy expensive digital (or physical) synthesizers to learn on. Vital changed that. It democratized nearly every feature you might come across in a modern synth, and it does so better than the industry leaders (Vital kicks Massive's ass, same for Serum). If you only download one synth, make it Vital. If you're downloading two synths, you should also grab Helm[1], the creator's other freeware synthesizer.

[0] https://vital.audio/ [1] https://tytel.org/helm/

I bought a Korg Monologue recently, which is a very decently priced (~260 EUR) analog mono synth.

This was my first classic hardware synth and compared to a software synthesizer I really like that I can feel how my hand movements change the sound and that I can use both hands to adjust parameters. It has an unusually good sequencer for a synth, so I can either record a series of notes live or take my time punching them in and then once I start the sequencer I can focus on tweaking the sound.

Now this synth is a classic subtractive synth which is great because it makes a lot of sense for beginners, while at the same time offering many possibilities for those that are more experienced. The interface is clear and simple - you have your two oscillators with switches for selecting the waves, then the mixer/volume section with one knob per oscillator and of course the low pass filter with resonance. The envelope section is a simplified attack + decay, but you have a switch which allows you to select between no or full sustain. And this is all you need to be able to put together sounds! But the monologue offers more: the oscillators waves can be shaped, there's a drive knob and it also has an LFO. And the sequencer can record automation, so that all your tweaks are stored with the pattern.

Now there's also other interesting features that I didn't mention, but one thing that I think is unique (some other Korgs aside) is the oscilloscope, which shows you how your sound looks like and how it changes as you adjust the various knobs and switches. Seeing the effect of resonance, oscillator shape and even different oscillator mixes live was particularly interesting to me.

This is probably the best beginner synth on the market right now and it's also a good synth in general at an unbeatable price. I can recommend this series (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5ReoNK_0eI) which explains every parameter of the Monologue in detail.

And once you have a synth and know how the parameters work, you should probably experiment until you think you've exhausted your possibilities before touching a book on sound design...

I don’t know if someone already posted this : https://www.soundonsound.com/series/synth-secrets

I love synths so much I have basically banned myself from them.

I started with Generator in 1999, the precursor to Reaktor. I want to say it was on a 150mhz Pentium.

Reaktor is so much fun but when I think of all the time I spent on it, something more productive would have been better.

If I was going to start right now I would get a Waldorf Blofeld. Just hard to beat that synth for the price, sound and features.

I search for the latest Blofeld videos some times on youtube to get a little synth fix but that is the closest I will let myself get. If I bought a Blofeld I would do nothing all day but make weird sounds for the next 5 years.

I'm knee deep into complex modular synthesis patches these days, but started like you a few years ago. I would say: ignore the software stuff and treat yourself to a great analog hardware synth. You will learn a lot more, have a real instrument to play with, listen to its amazing sounds -- and if you don't like it, you will be able to resell it with a tiny loss.

In order to learn things, I would recommend a semi-modular synth like the Moog Grandmother. It's great for learning all the basics and sounds absolutely phenomenal.

A pretty specific and weird, but interesting alternative is PureData, a sort of visual programming language where you can build your own "analog" synths and effects.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7Gv7SR0Nrk

It's very easy to get started, and extremely powerful. Not sure how well it covers your use case, but it's fun.

There's a great introduction to PureData called Designing Sound by Andy Farnell.

This may not be the level of detail you are looking for, but I found this short tutorial to be effective at explaining the basics: https://learningsynths.ableton.com/

Ultimately, I think using synthesizers does entail a lot of exploratory knob turning, even if understanding the effect of different components can help guide you to the sound you are looking for.

I am not sure why they use the word 'analog'. If it is in a browser it definitely isn't, it is digital, though the one you saw in 1970 probably was analog. In operation though the difference is subtle, like a real piano vs a digital one.

There is a lot of science behind audio and if you are that way inclined, learning about it is really worthwhile. All those effects create the sound they do for a reason.

Even though its about webaudio, webaudio uses virtual analog so this book isn't just great for learning webaudio but great for learning the details of analog subtractive synthesis in the browser. https://webaudioapi.com/book/

Nothing beats just getting your hands dirty. This video actually does a great job of covering the basics that are common to 99% of synths, physical or virtual: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfJ9Dbjz6cs

Loopop is frequently updating his "In-Complete Book of Electronic Music Ideas, Tips and Tricks", which covers the basics of analog synthesizers and way beyond. https://www.patreon.com/loopop

If you've access to a virtual reality headset, you might enjoy SynthVR: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1517890/SynthVR/

This is also a good source of enjoyable online synths : https://synth.playtronica.com/

Hardware-wise the Yamaha Reface CS is a very stripped down beginner friendly but versatile instrument with which to understand subtractive analog synthesis better.

Patch & Tweak by Bjørn and Meyer is well worth the money from both a practical technical PoV, and an inspirational one too

- Buy a Korg MS-20 (or anything, ideally pure analog)

- Learn some music theory

- Learn some signal / information theory

- Synthesize!