An interesting insight into what’s going on in the Chinese synthesizer market. The first 5 minutes are kinda junk because it’s a general intro to synthesizers for an uninformed audience, but it gets good once he gets to Meng Qi. It’s still annoyingly shallow because TedX, but I thought it might have some useful leads for people here.
ADDED : I see this video got clawed down already !
Personal opinion – this presenter misses it and gets it wrong more than right, and his content is a gloss. Kudos though for him deciding it’s a topic worth discussion.
Good on you Anigbrowl for starting this thread !
Some more stuff.
( Is renaissance the word for it ?
It’s smaller at the moment.
Nascent is a word that comes to me. )
Makers :
Definitely – Meng Qi
Smaller startups, indies, most often modular :
( Use translate if necessary. )
Mad Kids Empire
Modular Khiat
Ear Modular
Coding Inspire Modular
Synso
63 Studio
Tin Man Synths
There is quite a bit of activity with people sharing information with each other.
Moderate sized companies, that are innovating :
Medeli and Ashun Sound Machines
Donner
Synido
There are also moderate size and larger companies but they are largely derivative, or manufacturers for companies outside of China. Lots of digital pianos, electronic drums, and wind synths.
Shows :
There are at least two trade shows in China :
The big one – Music China - Shanghai, which is more or less the NAMM show of China.
And something much smaller ( for now ) and with the gear and performances E’nauts would like – Modular Commune - Beijing.
Performers :
There are many and the list is growing fast, i will only list a few.
Apologies for my enormous ignorance. Would be interested to see more posts.
Removed Wavy Industries from list of indie manufacturers.
They should have invited you instead!
I’d love to see an industry overview from someone that actually lives the Chinese electronic synth market and scene, and has the technical savvy.
I bet someone like Dominic Au could give a great insight into the current status.
Or maybe even better someone at Midifan Magazine ( use translate ), that does a better job than a lot of the western tech press in covering electronic music tech news in general. It’s worth reading all on it’s own right.
ADDED : BTW : Midifan was founded by tamiX.
MORE ADDED : Turns out that tamiX actually did an interview with four people from the Chinese electronic music community a year ago at NAMM for the Midi Association exactly on this topic. I actually posted about that at the time ( and i surprised myself now finding that ).
Unfortunately i can find no recording or transcript of this interview.
https://www.m-vave.com too, right?
And I didn’t know ASM was a Chinese company! Cool.
Nice, thanks for sharing, I’ve had the tab opened for a few days and am seeing this posted here now too. Your link appears to point to a video that’s been taken offline, I guess it’s probably the same as the one that I’ve been having in my YT history:
(Making an offline copy now just to be safe) … 
That’s what the person said in the now hidden video in the first post. They are after all, an offshoot of Medeli. The engineering, the industrial design, the manufacture, is all done in ( more than one part of ) China. Looking through the “About” section on their website, or the “Special Thanks” part of any of their product manuals shows personnel also from the US. I’d consider them international.
But so what – that’s all possible now days, and many companies draw their talent from where ever they find it, and form a diverse pool of talent, with backgrounds from many places.
Most companies benefit from such an approach, and i think most of the companies of a moderate size listed out in this thread could benefit from having staff of a diverse background too.
I think Music Tribe is a good example of an international company ( i count at least six countries ) with a strong Chinese component.
The influence flows both ways.
I think 203 Systems (@203Null) can be added to the list.
?
Says they’re Norwegian in their website and Insta
There’s also MIDIplus - they’re in Taiwan, so whether they are part of China’s gear renaissance is a political question, but I think dedication to engineering quality and musical exploration takes priority.
They also have a mini-biography of Tian JinQin, the engineer mentioned int he Ted talk who was designing electronic instruments in China in isolation from the rest of the world for many years.
https://midiplus.com/author_html_20220108/Tianen.html
I removed this from the list. I worked in part from the exhibitor list at the Modular Commune show which also has some non-Chinese companies, that i had to sort out.
BTW : The Modular Commune show web-site is a good place to find a list of many other electronic music performers.
