The Roland Juno-106 is a synthesizer released by Roland Corporation in February 1984.

Features

The Juno-106 is a polyphonic synthesizer with six voices. It is an analog synthesizer but with digitally controlled oscillators and chorus effects. Whereas its predecessor, the Juno-60, has 56 patches, the Juno-106 has 128. It introduced Roland's performance lever for pitch bends and modulation, which became a standard feature of Roland instruments. William Orbit, Paul Frick from Tangerine Dream, Underworld, Reel 2 Real, Jam & Spoon, and Vangelis.

The Juno-106 was Roland's bestselling synthesizer until the release of the Roland D-50 later in the decade. It remains one of the bestselling synthesizers. Daft Punk, Calvin Harris, Armin van Buuren, Mark Ronson, and Caribou among many others.

Hardware re-issues and recreations

The Roland MKS-7 Super Quartet, a multi-timbral synth module with dedicated sections for each part, used the same 80017 filter chip as the Juno-106 for the bass section.

In 2015, Roland released the JU-06 sound module, a digital recreation of the Juno-106 using Roland's digital Analog Circuit Behaviour (ACB) technology. It is battery powered, has 4-voices and 23 parameters controlled from the front panel. It cost $299 at the time of the release.

in 2016, Behringer released the Deepmind-12, an analog synthesizer inspired by the Juno-106 which features 12 voices. It was priced at $999 at the time of release. In 2020, developer Momo Müller released an unofficial PC MIDI editor with the interface of June-106, called the Deepmind - Juno-106 Editor.

In 2019, Roland released the JU-06A, which is a digitally based synthesizer combining the JUNO-60 and JUNO-106. It has the continuous high-pass filter of the 106, the envelope-controllable pulse-width-modulation of the 60, and the filter of both switchable from the front panel.

Roland released the Juno-X in 2022, a modern synth featuring digital emulations of the Juno-60 and Juno-106 as well as an additional Juno-X model that features a supersaw waveform, velocity sensitivity and an Alpha-Juno style pitch envelope control. The Juno X's control panel design directly references the controls of the Juno-106 while the sound engine follows on from the Jupiter-X and Jupiter-Xm modern digital synths.

In June 2020, Roland released Zenology plugins for Roland synths, which includes a Juno-106 emulator.

In 2020, Cherry Audio released the DCO-106 plugin, a juiced up version of the Juno-106 which was priced at $39 USD in 2020.

The Kayrock KR-106 project has code and documentation for an open-source virtual analogue synthesizer inspired by the Roland Juno-106. It provides technical details on the instrument’s design, including oscillator, filter, and modulation implementation, along with development notes and supporting material.

References

  • Juno Series history
  • The Juno-106 Connection