The Composer-Tron was developed by Osmond Kendal for the Canadian

Marconi Company The Marconi Company was a British telecommunications and engineering company that did business under that name from 1963 to 1987. Its roots were in the Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company founded by Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi in 1897 ...

in 1953. It was the first analogue

synthesis Synthesis or synthesize may refer to: Science Chemistry and biochemistry *Chemical synthesis, the execution of chemical reactions to form a more complex molecule from chemical precursors ** Organic synthesis, the chemical synthesis of organ ...

and

composition Composition or Compositions may refer to: Arts and literature *Composition (dance), practice and teaching of choreography *Composition (language), in literature and rhetoric, producing a work in spoken tradition and written discourse, to include v ...

instrument of its kind. It utilized a unique and innovative control system that had a

cathode A cathode is the electrode from which a conventional current leaves a polarized electrical device. This definition can be recalled by using the mnemonic ''CCD'' for ''Cathode Current Departs''. A conventional current describes the direction in whi ...

ray tube input device that could read shapes or patterns that was hand drawn on to its surface with a grease pencil. The drawn shape could define the

timbre In music, timbre ( ), also known as tone color or tone quality (from psychoacoustics), is the perceived sound quality of a musical note, sound or musical tone, tone. Timbre distinguishes different types of sound production, such as choir voice ...

of the note, or the envelope shape of the sound. A sequence of the rhythmical markings could be defined using the writings similar to a cue sheet type strip of film. This was the future innovation for

composers A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Classical music, Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. E ...

. With Kendal's grease pencil, the composer could draw the grooves, run it through the Composer-Tron and can ensure that all written music was listened to first, before symphony orchestra's played the music. Before the Composer-Tron composers would have to wait years just to listen if their work was complete. Sometimes their best work was never heard by the composer himself. This invention was one of the first major steps that combined the producing efforts of the

RCA The RCA Corporation was a major American electronics company, which was founded as the Radio Corporation of America in 1919. It was initially a patent trust owned by General Electric (GE), Westinghouse, AT&T Corporation and United Fruit Comp ...

Synthesizer, by Harry Olsen and Hebert Belar with the

of America.

External links

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Further Information

"The Art Of Electronic Music", Darter,Tom. 1984 GPI Productions. (pp. 46_47) Electronic musical instruments {{electronic-musical-instrument-stub

Further reading

External links

Further Information