Howard Allen Chamberlin, Jr. is an American

audio engineer An audio engineer (also known as a sound engineer or recording engineer) helps to produce a recording or a live performance, balancing and adjusting sound sources using equalization, dynamics processing and audio effects, mixing, reproduction, ...

and writer from

North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and So ...

, most widely known as the author of the book ''Musical Applications of Microprocessors''.

Biography

In the 1970s while still at school he built an

analog Analog or analogue may refer to: Computing and electronics * Analog signal, in which information is encoded in a continuous variable ** Analog device, an apparatus that operates on analog signals *** Analog electronics, circuits which use analog ...

electronic music synthesizer and then a 16 bit computer from surplus

IBM 1620 The IBM 1620 was announced by IBM on October 21, 1959, and marketed as an inexpensive scientific computer. After a total production of about two thousand machines, it was withdrawn on November 19, 1970. Modified versions of the 1620 were used as ...

core memories to control it.
Hal Chamberlin's Computer
' ACS Newsletter, Volume III, Number 2, September 1972 He was awarded an MSc in

Communication Engineering Telecommunications Engineering is a subfield of electrical engineering which seeks to design and devise systems of communication at a distance. The work ranges from basic circuit design to strategic mass developments. A telecommunication enginee ...

from

NCSU North Carolina State University (NC State) is a public land-grant research university in Raleigh, North Carolina. Founded in 1887 and part of the University of North Carolina system, it is the largest university in the Carolinas. The university ...

in 1973. The subject of his

thesis A thesis ( : theses), or dissertation (abbreviated diss.), is a document submitted in support of candidature for an academic degree or professional qualification presenting the author's research and findings.International Standard ISO 7144: ...

was the design of a digital music synthesizer utilising an organ keyboard and a

Tektronix Tektronix, Inc., historically widely known as Tek, is an American company best known for manufacturing test and measurement devices such as oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, and video and mobile test protocol equipment. Originally an independent ...

453

oscilloscope An oscilloscope (informally a scope) is a type of electronic test instrument that graphically displays varying electrical voltages as a two-dimensional plot of one or more signals as a function of time. The main purposes are to display repetiti ...

for a graphics display. In November 1974 together with others began ''The Computer Hobbyist'' magazine. In 1977 he first published

wavetable synthesis Wavetable synthesis is a sound synthesis technique used to create Periodic function, quasi-periodic waveforms often used in the production of musical tones or Musical note, notes. Development Wavetable synthesis was invented by Max Mathews i ...

Byte The byte is a unit of digital information that most commonly consists of eight bits. Historically, the byte was the number of bits used to encode a single character of text in a computer and for this reason it is the smallest addressable unit ...

's September 1977 issue and together with David B. Cox started Micro Technology Unlimited.MTU Founders in Digital Audio Workstations
/ref> At Micro Technology Unlimited, in 1981, he designed the

6502 The MOS Technology 6502 (typically pronounced "sixty-five-oh-two" or "six-five-oh-two") William Mensch and the moderator both pronounce the 6502 microprocessor as ''"sixty-five-oh-two"''. is an 8-bit microprocessor that was designed by a small te ...

-based MTU-130/140 microcomputer and the Digisound-16 an early

digital to analog converter In electronics, a digital-to-analog converter (DAC, D/A, D2A, or D-to-A) is a system that converts a digital signal into an analog signal. An analog-to-digital converter (ADC) performs the reverse function. There are several DAC architec ...

. His seminal book ''Musical Applications of Microprocessors'' was first published in 1979.
The Kurzweil Music story: It all started with Ray
', Kurzweil Music Systems, 25 January 2012 In 1986 he left MTU to work for

Kurzweil Music Systems Kurzweil Music Systems is an American company that produces electronic musical instruments. It was founded in 1982 by Stevie Wonder (musician), Ray Kurzweil (innovator) and Bruce Cichowlas (software developer). Kurzweil was a developer of Opti ...

where he remained in one engineering role or another until retirement in 2014. While there amongst other projects he designed the Kurzweil K150 In 1992 he moved to

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

.Meet the Members of the Tour
KRWG, 2004

References

External links

Interview
by Brian Cowell, ''Sonikmatter'', January 2002. (archived)
"Hal Chamberlin"
search at Archive.org
''The Computer Hobbyist''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chamberlin, Hal Year of birth missing (living people) Living people American audio engineers 20th-century American inventors American engineering writers

Biography

See also

References

Further reading

External links