Founded by Mike Beigel and Aaron Newman, the company's products provided filtering and processing effects and were derived from synthesizer components.
[1] The Musitronics Corporation of Rosemont, New Jersey was formed in 1972 by Mike Beigel[2] and Aaron Newman, an engineer who worked at Guild Guitar Company.
The new president was less interested in the synthesizer project,[3] and Beigel teamed up with a former Guild engineer, Aaron Newman, to save what he could, and formed Musitronics.
[4] They extracted sections from the synthesizer to make a stand-alone audio effect out of it; the result was an envelope filter, the Mu-tron III, built in the summer of 1972,[3] which proved popular and viable enough with major music instrument retailers to build the company on.
By 2014 Beigel returned to making effects with his new company Mu-FX, producing a "modified and miniaturized version" of the Mu-Tron III, renamed the Tru-Tron 3X.
Features include an extreme reduction of size (along the lines of a tube screamer or phase 90), a second foot switch for selecting the sweep up or down and the ability to run off a standard 9v adapter.
Beigel said he chose the envelope-controlled filter over other synthesizer elements, such as ring modulation, because it sounded more musical; it was a more general effect that would lend itself to a variety of applications, and it was easy to use.
It used technology from the old Uni-Vibe, with lamps and photo cells, and featuring two independent sweep generators which could be coupled, each with individual rate controls and the option to choose square or sine waves.
A dual volume and wah foot-operated rocking pedal with photo-electric controls, and a gain boost flat screw potentiometer on the side of the chassis.