Frap Tools is an Italian brand based in the province of Modena founded by Simone Fabbri in 2015. Over the last decade, Frap Tools have made a name for themselves with their unique take on circuit and interface design seen in Eurorack modules like the Brenso oscillator and Fumana filterbank.
Expanding on their work in the modular world, Frap Tools recently announced their first-ever keyboard instrument at this year’s SuperBooth25 — the Magnolia, an upcoming eight-voice analog “West Coast polysynth” that has already already generated a lot of excitement as one of the most interesting recent developments in the analog polysynth space.
Intrigued by this new announcement and Frap Tools’ overall design ethos we sat down with the brand’s Giovanni Grandi to chat about the history and evolution of Frap Tools over the last decade, their unique approach to interface design, and of course the Magnolia.
What were the origins of Frap Tools as a brand?
Giovanni Grandi: The company was started by Simone [Fabbri] ten years ago. He initially started out building modular cases, because he couldn’t find a case that suited his own needs and aesthetic taste. From that starting point, he ended up meeting more people, the company grew, and eventually it started building actual Eurorack modules.
I think an important part of what defines Frap Tools as a brand is that there is a huge visual-aesthetic component to all of our modules that we express through an approach to user interface design that can be deliberately cryptic (laughs), insofar as we employ a consistent system of symbols as a way to avoid written labels.
We are also generally very fond of original analog circuit designs. So we develop circuits that may belong to a common family such as “West Coast synthesis” — complex oscillators, wavefolders and so on — but we always develop our circuits from scratch, and we try to take advantage of techniques and technology that are available in the 2025 that just weren’t available in the past.
I find it funny that you say “ten years ago”, because Verbos Electronics for example also started around that same time — maybe there was just something “in the air” at that moment (laughs).
There was definitely something “in the air” — it was meant to happen (laughs).
What was Simone working on before starting Frap Tools?
He worked on various audio plugins, for example he made some Max devices for a company called K-Devices. He also collaborated with Stefan Schmidt on the mechanical design of the Nonlinear Labs C15. So he came from both the digital Max/MSP world and the world of mechanical design, and I suppose Eurorack in a way was a halfway point between those two worlds.
Was there already a strong modular community in Italy around the time Frap Tools was starting?
There are actually multiple modular communities in Italy, as if there was some sort of “Federal Republic” of modular (laughs). And of course, within the world of keyboard synths, there are many enthusiasts for vintage Italian polysynths here — Elka, Crumar, and so on. But I think Eurorack as a phenomenon is generally a bit more global. I don’t know if there would be a big difference between an Italian and a German community of Eurorack users, for example.
But do you think there is perhaps some kind of “Italian Vibe” (laughs) to your modules ?
Hmm! You know, Simone was really heavily influenced by the design language of Lamborghini, because we come from the province of Modena, which is where all of the Italian sports car manufacturers are based — Ferrari, Lamborghini, Maserati and so on. So that is something you encounter very often, basically daily, and it naturally becomes a part of your language and approach to design. Also, the names of our modules are drawn from our local Modenese dialect, which is a dialect that very few Italian people speak today.
Gael from TouellSkouarn does a similar thing where all the names of his modules are from the Breton language of Brittany.
That’s true — I guess that was also in the air ten or fifteen years ago (laughs)!
When did you [Giovanni] join the company?
I myself first joined in 2018, after my first time visiting SuperBooth. I initially came just to help him [Simone] set up the booth and demo the Falistri, which was new at the time. I then joined the company full time after finishing up my PhD in late 2018.
What was your PhD in?
Latin textual criticism.
That’s very fitting (laughs)!
Yes!
Can you say something about how the rather unique design language of the Frap Tools modules came about?
I think like every language, it evolved naturally. We started with just a few concepts and then as our module line grew and called for new symbols, the language grew accordingly. So for example with our first module, the CGM mixer, we required only a few symbols because a mixer only requires a few basic concepts. But then with Bagài, we were suddenly dealing with the “West Coast” heritage of Don Buchla and all these new concepts, so we included a lot of new symbols and design elements. And then it evolved over time, from module to module, where for example we used a lot of the concepts we had first developed for Falistri when it came to making the Brenso oscillator, so we also tried to make the connection between the two modules somewhat apparent visually.
What do you think the advantages of your symbol-based panel design language are compared to more traditional approaches relying on text-labels?
I see that many people complain about our approach, and they are right —
(laughs)
— you know, I don’t want to say that our approach is the perfect approach for everything. There are of course excellent examples of module designs with a more traditional approach …
Doepfer!
Right! So with a brand like Doepfer, that approach definitely makes sense, because their modules are more educational, utilitarian, almost scientific, and almost every module of theirs has a very specific function. There are also some good examples of more esoteric modules with that kind of traditional label-interface, like the Rob Hordijk modules. And Hordijk modules are interesting as an example, because they always have the knobs at the top and the jacks at the bottom, which makes for a very tidy interface, but there is no immediate visual correspondence between knobs and jacks – that is, which knobs are related to which jacks. You have to “lose time” reading the labels to establish that connection.
And I think this is where a more symbol-oriented approach has the upper hand, because it really hones in on that connection and makes it immediately visible once you understand the language. And you know, before we even begin thinking about the symbols, we always spend a lot of time designing the “topography” of the module, the way the knobs and jacks are spaced and arranged. So it’s really the topography of the module and the use of symbols together that we think allows for this very immediate, muscle-memory style of navigating the module once you get used to the symbols.
Take the example of road signs — if I had to explain to you how to behave during a specific road intersection, that would take me maybe a minute. But once you are familiar with the symbolic language of road signs, you can “read” two signs at once and then immediately deduce what information that combination of symbols is relaying to you. As the linguist Ferdinand de Saussure said, language is “linear”, because when it comes to words, you always process one piece of information at a time, you can’t really understand two people speaking to you at the same time. But with symbols, you can combine many different symbols, shapes, and colors that can be processed as one complex, unified piece of information.
I remember when I was interviewing Mark Verbos for Stromkult, he mentioned that he always designs the module panel interface before he starts working on the actual circuit — do you approach module design the same way?
Yes! We might change a few things if the panel doesn’t physically fit with the circuit, but the concept and interface of the module always comes first. But it is also a very iterative process for us, because what looks good on your screen during the design phase doesn’t always end up working when you actually have your hands on the module, so there are often various adjustments along the way.
I was also curious about the use of colors in your panel designs.
I wouldn’t say our use of colors is necessarily fundamental to our panel designs, but it does make it easier to understand and navigate our modules, and to see where similarities between different modules lie. So for example, we tend to use the color red for VCAs, and so whenever there is some kind of audio or CV multiplication, there will be red. And once you’ve learnt that from one of our modules, you can apply it to the other modules and deduce that there is a VCA there from the use of that color.
I think it’s also interesting how colors can evoke certain emotions in a way that isn’t necessarily related to audio, but can inform our perception of it — like red evoking a sense of excitement or danger, for example. Of course, we usually don’t really consciously think about these things, but if you see a blue module or a red module, your brain will always subconsciously make certain associations based on those colors.
Yes, that is true! Colors are very primordial, in a certain sense. They are also very social, because the meaning of different colors changes across times and cultures. So for example, if you read an ancient text like the Odyssey, the sea is not conceived of as being blue, but as black, because the very idea of there being a discrete color called “blue” didn’t yet exist. And in that sense, colors are just like sounds, in that we isolate certain categories, certain “notes”, from a large continuous spectrum, but these are always arbitrary distinctions — there is no fixed objective point where “orange” ends and “red” begins.
Just like how with analog circuits, it’s really not clear where a “filter” ends and an “oscillator” begins, for example.
Exactly.
How would you describe your approach to analog circuit design?
We definitely take inspiration from the likes of Don Buchla, even if just in terms of what module “archetypes” there might be. But all of our actual circuits are built from scratch employing our own designs, although of course, the circuits you built previously will always influence what you are currently working on in some way.
With our complex triangle-core oscillator Brenso for example, we started working on that after we realized that many people were actually using our function generator Falistri as an oscillator (laughs). And while designing Falistri, one thing we really wanted to do is to make it so that you can change the waveshape of the function without affecting the period of the wave, and we did that with a crossfader. And then we realized we could also use that trick at audio rates, so that you can change the waveshape of an audio oscillator without affecting the tuning, and that then also carried over to Brenso. So that’s just one thing, and of course there are differences between the two modules, we didn’t just transfer everything, but they definitely do share a lot of the same “DNA”.
What led you to start working on your new keyboard synth, the Magnolia?
We’ve had the idea to do a keyboard synth for many years, it just took some time to gestate and I guess it is all coming together now — you know, as you’ve said earlier, there was something “in the air” ten years ago in the modular world, and I think there is now something in the air when it comes to keyboards synths. I think in a way, we are perhaps now re-living what happened in the 60s and 70s, first building up these huge modular systems, and then realizing that maybe you can just shrink all of that down into a single instrument (laughs).
And the Magnolia circuit does actually feature many elements from our modules. So for example, the oscillator section of the Magnolia is taken from Brenso, and the filter section is taken from Cunsa. But the sound you get from these elements is totally different, because a fixed-architecture poly keyboard comes with a totally different interface and musical context. So it has been really exciting for us to see how these elements we developed in the past are now coming together to form this single musical instrument in a way that totally recontextualizes them. Like, even as someone that has pretty much been playing with the Brenso daily since its initial prototype stage, I have been constantly surprised at just how different it sounds as a part of the Magnolia.
I’ve already seen people call the Magnolia a “West Coast polysynth” (laughs) — would you agree with that assessment?
Yes, insofar as it is a polysynth that incorporates certain “West Coast” elements, although of course, as we all would agree, the actual existence of a so-called “West Coast school” is debatable at best —
(laughs)
But in terms of the prominent use of waveshapers and frequency modulation and so on, I would agree with that description. So you can “additively” generate very powerful waveforms with the Brenso oscillator section, which features through-zero FM, flip-sync, a waveshaper and a wavefolder on the first oscillator, and PWM and a continuous waveshape-knob on the second oscillator.
If you had to describe the character of the sound of the Magnolia, are there certain words or associations that spring to mind for you?
It’s really the sound of Frap Tools (laughs)! I think if someone is familiar with the sound of our modules, they will know what to expect with the Magnolia. But if I had to put it into words, I think our sound is very warm, fat, punchy and reactive; reactive in the sense that you can turn a knob, and get an immediate and significant reaction in the sound.
How did you arrive at the Magnolia’s modulation system — did you take inspiration from the world of modular control voltage modulation?
I think the main challenge with the Magnolia’s modulation was really to limit ourselves in terms of what can modulate what (laughs). You know, with modules, you can afford to put in some things that might sound weird or bad with certain settings or combinations, because that is a part of the modular exploration, and it is something that people in that world are familiar with and even welcome.
But with the Magnolia, it was important for us to build an instrument that is accessible to musicians and keyboard players that are not coming from the modular world. And to us, on a keyboard instrument, the actual notes played will always come first, and the sound of a synth should be in the service of those notes. A session or touring musician just doesn’t have the time to troubleshoot patches or spend half an hour trying to get a good sound, which is why we deliberately designed the parameters and parameter ranges so that there are basically no “dead spots” on the Magnolia. We’ve really spent a lot of time and effort to make it so that almost every patch and setting will sound good in some way, so that it can be an instrument that is very inviting and immediately playable.
In terms of the actual modulation routing setup, we wanted to have a very simple system that is easy to use and that you can immediately understand at a glance. Part of that was also our decision to limit ourselves to a simple LED display, rather than a full modern LCD screen. So the way it works is that the modulation sources are marked with a red LED, and then you just tap on the destination button, rotate the knob that is your destination, and under it, there will be a white LED indicating the modulation. So if you see a white LED, you know that something is being modulated, and a red LED indicates the sources. And if you want to know what the sources modulating a specific destination are, there is a toggle button where you can just tap that parameter’s knob, and it will light up all of the sources modulating that parameter.
Is there anything new you have learned or discovered in the process of developing your first keyboard synth?
I think that in a way, we have now made a full circle with the Magnolia — because what usually gets you into modular in the first place is that you start to run into certain limitations with fixed-architecture synthesizers that you would like to break out of, and modular lets you do that. But then, over time and as our line of modules has grown, I think we’ve come to realize that putting our modules into a keyboard synth can actually be a way of getting new sounds out of the designs we’ve made in the past, it’s not just imposing a limitation on them, but also allowing for something totally new to happen. So I think in that sense we have learned a lot with the development of the Magnolia.
How did you arrive at the Magnolia’s interface design and color scheme?
With the Magnolia, we took an approach to design that is very different from what we have done with our Eurorack modules. So while our modules are black and use colored symbols, the Magnolia is white and uses black text labels. We really wanted a design language that is fitting to the particular form of a keyboard instrument — it would be presumptuous of us to assume that keyboard players will be familiar with our modular design language just because we have made modules for ten years, and there is a long tradition of keyboard instrument design that we couldn’t and didn’t want to just ignore.
Is there any specific feature or characteristic of the Magnolia that you are particularly proud of?
I would say that I’m particularly proud of the analog FM of the Magnolia. It’s not just something thrown in an as extra, as it might be on other analog poly synths, but really at the heart of the Mangolia as a synthesizer, and we were able to retain the particular character of the Brenso oscillator — which can generate a lot of sidebands with its FM — within the context of a keyboard instrument in a way that still sounds musical.
I think I am also just generally proud of the fact we have managed to blend together these modular circuits in an unified instrument and have found a way to make them sound very musical in the context of a twelve-note keyboard layout that is centuries old. I think it’s very important to realize that you don’t always have to do something new at all costs. You know, in the West, people can sometimes be really obsessed with making “new” music or technology, whereas I think that it can already really be enough to make something that is “good” — okay, maybe someone already did that before, but who cares, really? Across the globe and across history, there are so many examples of cultures praising great artists that were making their voices heard while also being able to stay within a certain tradition.
You can find out more about Frap Tools over at their website and shop their line of modules over at SchneidersLaden. The Magnolia is currently still in the final stages of development, with more information following soon.