Roland TB-303

Roland TB-303 Bass Line
TB-303 front panel
Manufacturer	Roland
Dates	1982-1984
Price	£238 UK, $395 US
Technical specifications
Polyphony	monophonic
Timbrality	none
Oscillator	Sawtooth and square wave
LFO	none
Synthesis type	Analog Subtractive
Filter	24dB low pass resonant filter, non self oscillating
Aftertouch expression	No
Velocity expression	No
Storage memory	64 patterns, 7 songs, 1 track
Effects	No internal effects.
Input/output
Keyboard	No

The Roland TB-303 Bass Line is a bass synthesizer with built-in sequencer manufactured by the Roland Corporation from 1982 to 1984 that had a defining role in the development of contemporary electronic dance music.

The TB-303 played an important role in the development of house music, influencing Chicago house and forming the basis for acid house. It is also commonly used in related dance genres such as acid techno and acid trance.

The TB-303 (short for "Transistor Bass") was originally marketed to guitarists for bass accompaniment while practicing alone. Production lasted approximately 18 months, resulting in only 10,000 units. It was not until the mid- to late-1980s that DJs and electronic musicians in Chicago found a use for the machine in the context of the newly developing house music genre.

The TB-303 has a single audio oscillator, which may be configured to produce either a sawtooth wave or a square wave. The square wave is derived from the sawtooth waveform using a simple, single-transistor waveshaping circuit. This produces a sound that is subtly different from the square waveform created by the dedicated hardware found in most analog synthesizers. It also includes a simple envelope generator, with a decay control only. A lowpass filter is also included, with -24dB per octave attenuation, and controls for cutoff frequency, resonance, and envelope modulation parameters. It is a common misconception that the filter is a 3 pole 18 dB per octave design when in fact it is 4-pole 24 dB per octave.