I must have been 13 years old, or so.  Sometime in junior high.  In music class, some guest speaker came in with this really huge thing.  It was like a piano — I recognized the black and white keys.  But it had buttons and dials and lights.  He demonstrated it for the class, and we were all bowled over.

He had a Moog synthesizer, and it was as revolutionary as the electric guitar.  We now take electronic keyboards for granted, but back when I was in my early teens, it was a sight to behold.

Robert Moog, the man behind the Moog synthesizer, died yesterday in Asheville, N.C. at the age of 71 from brain cancer.

UPDATE: CNN obit here.