Roland RS-505 Paraphonic

The Roland RS-505 Paraphonic was a polyphonic synthesizer released in 1978 by Roland. It was owned by Stewart Copeland and Andy Summers.

Stewart Copeland's Roland RS-505 Paraphonic
The Roland RS-505 Paraphonic was Stewart Copeland's favourite synth before he got the Fairlight CMI.

Although his beginnings with the synth are unknown, it can be speculated that it was amongst the Roland gear he and The Police had acquired from Manny's Music Store on 48th Street, New York during one of the band's many trips to the store, probably in 1979.

Stewart had played the Paraphonic mainly to provide simple synthesizer textures to augment the band's sound. He brought it over to Wisseloord Studios to record the Zenyatta Mondatta record - for example, it appears as the organ sound on "Bombs Away". He noticeably played it a lot more on the Ghost In The Machine album, appearing as background synth string textures on some of the album tracks. "Darkness" and "Rehumanize Yourself" are where the Roland Paraphonic is most prominent, having been used for virtually all the keyboard sounds on those songs.

In addition to those albums, he also worked with it on the Rumblefish soundtrack, released in 1984.

Andy Summers' Roland RS-505 Paraphonic
Andy Summers was also known to have a Roland RS-505 Paraphonic synthesizer - it's listed in the Ghost In The Machine tour program. He had it as part of his demoing setup in Ireland in Spring 1981. He probably used it previously on the Zenyatta Mondatta record, on the string sounds on "Behind My Camel" for example.

He also used the Roland Paraphonic for string sounds on the I Advance Masked album with Robert Fripp in 1982 - the album credits state 'Moog and Roland synths', so this synth was likely one of those referred to.