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Fairlight CMI
The Fairlight CMI (short for Computer Musical Instrument) is a digital synthesizer, sampler, and digital audio workstation introduced in 1979 by Fairlight. — with links to some Fairlight history and photos It was based on a commercial licence of the Qasar M8 developed by Tony Furse of Creative Strategies in Sydney, Australia. It was one of the earliest music workstations with an embedded sampler and is credited for coining the term sampling in music. It rose to prominence in the early 1980s and competed with the Synclavier from New England Digital. History Origins: 1971–1979 In the 1970s, Kim Ryrie, then a teenager, had an idea to develop a build-it-yourself analogue synthesizer, the ETI 4600, for the magazine he founded, ''Electronics Today International'' (ETI). Ryrie was frustrated by the limited number of sounds that the synthesizer could make. After his classmate, Peter Vogel, graduated from high school and had a brief stint at university in 1975, Ryrie asked ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fairlight (company)
Fairlight is a digital audio company based in Sydney. In 1979 they created the Fairlight CMI, one of the earliest digital audio workstation (DAW) with digital audio sampler, quickly used by artists such as Peter Gabriel, Kate Bush, and Jean Michel Jarre. They have since become a manufacturer of media tools such as digital audio recording and mixing consoles. Fairlight became such a prominent part of 1980s pop music that Phil Collins included the text "there is no Fairlight on this record" in the liner notes of ''No Jacket Required''. History In 1975, Fairlight Instruments Pty Ltd was established by Peter Vogel and Kim Ryrie. They produced microprocessor-based music workstations with samplers, which were revolutionary for their time. New sounds could be created by drawing a 'sound wave' on the screen, which the computer would produce as sound. Theoretically, any sound was possible. Apart from opening up a world of new sounds, the Fairlight gave composers and performers in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Digital Synthesizer
A digital synthesizer is a synthesizer that uses digital signal processing (DSP) techniques to make musical sounds. This in contrast to older analog synthesizers, which produce music using analog electronics, and samplers, which play back digital recordings of acoustic, electric, or electronic instruments. Some digital synthesizers emulate analog synthesizers; others include sampling capability in addition to digital synthesis. History The very earliest digital synthesis experiments were made with computers, as part of academic research into sound generation. In 1973, the Japanese company Yamaha licensed the algorithms for frequency modulation synthesis (FM synthesis) from John Chowning, who had experimented with it at Stanford University since 1971. Yamaha's engineers began adapting Chowning's algorithm for use in a commercial digital synthesizer, adding improvements such as the "key scaling" method to avoid the introduction of distortion that normally occurred in analog sys ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sydney Hydrofoils
The Sydney hydrofoils were a series of hydrofoils operated by Port Jackson & Manly Steamship Company and its successors on the ferry service from Circular Quay to Manly. The hydrofoils covered the journey from Circular Quay to Manly in 15 minutes compared to 35 minutes for conventional ferries. History By the mid-1960s, patronage on the Port Jackson & Manly Steamship Company's formerly lucrative Circular Quay to Manly service was declining. The company introduced a hydrofoil service halving the travelling time from 30 to 15 minutes but at a premium fare. Introduced in 1965, the first hydrofoil was a 75-seat PT20 from Hitachi, Kanagawa named '' Manly''.Down Under Foils ''Classic Fast Ferries'' June 2002 [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Digital Synthesizer
A digital synthesizer is a synthesizer that uses digital signal processing (DSP) techniques to make musical sounds. This in contrast to older analog synthesizers, which produce music using analog electronics, and samplers, which play back digital recordings of acoustic, electric, or electronic instruments. Some digital synthesizers emulate analog synthesizers; others include sampling capability in addition to digital synthesis. History The very earliest digital synthesis experiments were made with computers, as part of academic research into sound generation. In 1973, the Japanese company Yamaha licensed the algorithms for frequency modulation synthesis (FM synthesis) from John Chowning, who had experimented with it at Stanford University since 1971. Yamaha's engineers began adapting Chowning's algorithm for use in a commercial digital synthesizer, adding improvements such as the "key scaling" method to avoid the introduction of distortion that normally occurred in analog sys ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Home Business
A home business or home-based business (HBB) is a small business that operates from the business owner's home office. In addition to location, home businesses are usually defined by having a very small number of employees, usually all immediate family of the business owner, in which case it is also a family business. Home businesses generally lack shop frontage, customer parking and street advertising signs. Such businesses are sometimes prohibited by residential zoning regulations. Remote work has increased. Home offices compete with small commercial businesses and are cheaper to operate. It may also be possible to tax deduct some home expenses while running a home based business. High speed internet connections and smartphones help to make a home-based business a reality. Earlier home businesses had been where families lived on the second floor of their house while converting the first floor into a store, where upon close of business they would secure the first floor and retire ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Microprocessor
A microprocessor is a computer processor where the data processing logic and control is included on a single integrated circuit, or a small number of integrated circuits. The microprocessor contains the arithmetic, logic, and control circuitry required to perform the functions of a computer's central processing unit. The integrated circuit is capable of interpreting and executing program instructions and performing arithmetic operations. The microprocessor is a multipurpose, clock-driven, register-based, digital integrated circuit that accepts binary data as input, processes it according to instructions stored in its memory, and provides results (also in binary form) as output. Microprocessors contain both combinational logic and sequential digital logic, and operate on numbers and symbols represented in the binary number system. The integration of a whole CPU onto a single or a few integrated circuits using Very-Large-Scale Integration (VLSI) greatly reduced the cost of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter Vogel (computer Designer)
Peter Vogel (born 30 August 1954, Sydney) is an Australian inventor and technologist known for developing the Fairlight CMI. Career Vogel has worked in the electronics industry since graduating from Cranbrook School, Sydney in 1972. His first major achievement was the development of the world's first commercial sound sampling electronic musical instrument, the Fairlight CMI. Along with his school friend Kim Ryrie, Vogel was co-founder of Fairlight (company), Fairlight, the company that made the CMI from 1975 to 1999. Along with Tony Furse of Creative Strategies, the two were awarded the CSIRO Medal in 1987. In 1982, he designed a medical emergency response device called Vitalcall. As of 2014, he returned to this field as chief technology officer of Vitalcare, an Australian medical alarm service for the aged. In 1988 Vogel started Right Hemisphere Pty Ltd. This took him from the field of sound and vision processing to the wider realm of computers and communications. Around ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Electronics Today International
''Electronics Today International'' or ETI was a magazine for electronics hobbyists and professionals. Originally started in Australia in April 1971, ''ETI'' was published in the UK in 1972. From there, it expanded to various European countries, including France (where it was started in November 1972) and over to Canada. It was one of the first magazines to publish circuit diagrams for building homebrew computer systems. They also published a monthly series of articles for their "system 68" microcomputer based on the Motorola 6800 Microprocessor, most of them written by John Miller-Kirkpatrick, the dozen or so articles described in detail how to build a M6800 based microcomputer, including a VDU. In that sense it was one of the first computer magazines. The 1970s ''ETI'' was launched by Modern Magazines, a publisher of specialist magazines based in Rushcutters' Bay, Sydney. The magazine was started at the suggestion of Kim Ryrie (later of Fairlight CMI fame), the electroni ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Analog Synthesizer
An analog (or analogue) synthesizer is a synthesizer that uses analog circuits and analog signals to generate sound electronically. The earliest analog synthesizers in the 1920s and 1930s, such as the Trautonium, were built with a variety of vacuum-tube (thermionic valve) and electro-mechanical technologies. After the 1960s, analog synthesizers were built using operational amplifier (op-amp) integrated circuits, and used potentiometers (pots, or variable resistors) to adjust the sound parameters. Analog synthesizers also use low-pass filters and high-pass filters to modify the sound. While 1960s-era analog synthesizers such as the Moog used a number of independent electronic modules connected by patch cables, later analog synthesizers such as the Minimoog integrated them into single units, eliminating patch cords in favour of integrated signal routing systems. History 1900–1920 The earliest mention of a "synthetic harmoniser" using electricity appears to be in 1906, cre ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kim Ryrie
Kim Ryrie is an Australian synthesiser inventor who founded the audio technology company Fairlight with Peter Vogel. Career Kim Ryrie was the son of magazine publisher, Colin Ryrie, of Modern Magazines Pty Ltd. Based in Sydney, Ryrie launched the magazine ''Electronics Today International'' in 1970 where readers would build the ETI 4600 analogue synthesiser by adding to it with pieces in each issue month by month. In 1975 he discussed the limitations of analogue synthesisers with his schoolfriend, electronics designer, Peter Vogel and they invented the Fairlight CMI (Computer Musical Instrument). Launched in 1979, the CMI synthesiser became popular in the 1980s with musicians like Stevie Wonder, and the two founders received a CSIRO medal for their innovation. As other companies entered the market and introduced low-cost alternatives Fairlight went bankrupt. Ryrie purchased the companies patents and set up a new company called Fairlight ESP (Electric Sound and Picture), which s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New England Digital
New England Digital Corporation (1976–1993) was founded in Norwich, Vermont, and relocated to White River Junction, Vermont. It was best known for its signature product, the Synclavier Synthesizer System, which evolved into the Synclavier Digital Audio System or "Tapeless Studio." The company sold an FM digital synthesizer/16-bit polyphonic synthesizer and magnetic disk-based non-linear 16-bit digital recording product, referred to as the "Post-Pro." The Synclavier was developed as the "Dartmouth Digital Synthesizer" by Dartmouth College Professors Jon Appleton and Frederick J. Hooven, in association with NED co-founders Sydney A. Alonso and Cameron W. Jones. The Synclavier would become the pioneering prototype hardware and software system for all digital non-linear synthesis, polyphonic sampling, magnetic (hard-disk) recording and sequencing systems technology that is commonplace in all music and sound effects/design today. The instrument's development picked up speed in late ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Synclavier
The Synclavier is an early digital synthesizer, polyphonic digital sampling system, and music workstation manufactured by New England Digital Corporation of Norwich, Vermont. It was produced in various forms from the late 1970s into the early 1990s. The instrument has been used by prominent musicians. History The original design and development of the Synclavier prototype occurred at Dartmouth College with the collaboration of Jon Appleton, Professor of Digital Electronics, Sydney A. Alonso, and Cameron Jones, a software programmer and student at Dartmouth's Thayer School of Engineering. Synclavier I First released in 1977–78, it proved to be highly influential among both electronic music composers and music producers, including Mike Thorne, an early adopter from the commercial world, due to its versatility, its cutting-edge technology, and distinctive sounds. The early Synclavier I used FM synthesis, re-licensed from Yamaha, and was sold mostly to universities. The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
