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Looper's Delight
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hi all, having played more than thirty Mellotrons of all types (M-400, Mk. 5, Mk. 2, M-300, and having actually owned one or two machines) over the past couple of years, I think I should chime in here. To put one thing straight first, the original Chamberlin/Mellotron design does not use closed loops of tape, but one legth of tape per key which allows you to play sustained notes for about eight seconds. The Birotron uses closed loops of tape stored on eight-track cartridges, and the Optigan/Orchestron use loops of optical waveforms drawn on translucent discs. I donīt think any "looper" or tape-based artist like Schaeffer, Henri or Stockhausen had an influence on the developement of the Mellotron. The Mellotron idea originated in the garage of Harry Chamberlinīs, an American inventor, where he designed a tapebased playback system that allowed him to store sounds on tape and play them by means of a keyboard (probably because he wanted more realistic sounds that a Hammond or whatever other organ could offer him) in the early 1950s. Magnetic tape had just become available past WW2 when German Magnetophon tapes and tape recorders were brought over to America and the idea was successfully adopted by Ampex, among others (Bing Crosby being one of the original Ampex shareholders, btw.). At roughly the same time Les Paul started doing tape experiments at home, applying various recording and playback techniques to this new medium (if at all, I think Les Paul can be called the father of both the homerecording studio and looping techniques). Funny is that before that, recordings were etched into wax disk by means of a stylus (like the way records were cut for ages), and the BBC continued to do so until the early 1960s, I think, before they switched over to using magnetic tape. Stockhausen, Schaeffer and others were using the tape medium as a means to reproduce certain structures by chopping up tapes into splices of certain length in order to produce rhythmic patterns (or to manipulate sounds). Out of this fashion of chopping up tapes Donald Buchla devised his first sequencer which allowed the performer to repeat certain patterns electronically, both on a sound-generating and sound-controlling level. Like it is often the case, the original inventor didnīt have the ambition to copyright his invention because he didnīt realize how far-reaching his invention would actually be. In Harry Chamberlinīs case, his idea was snatched from him by a ruthless (today he would be called "efficient") entrepreneur by the name of Bill Fransen who took Chamberlinīs ideas to England and introduced it as his own to three English gentlemen by the names of Les, Frank, and Norman Bradley of Streetly Electronics near Birmingham, a firm that produced various accessories for tape recorders, among other things (like recording and playback heads). Based on Chamberlinīs ideas, they unknowingly infringed on his mental property by designing the Mellotron Mk. 1 which was the ancestor of the famous Mk. 2 and M-400 many musicians used throughout the 60s and 70s (and still today they use Trons, as I had the pleasure of playing Oasisī Mellotron M-400 at Martin Smithīs place in Staffordshire where he and John Bradley are still fixing and refurbishing Mellotrons). A lot later Chamberlin found out about how his original ideas were used without his approval, and it caused quite a lot embarrassment on the Streetly side because they had not properly investigated if the idea they were using was actually copyrighted. Iīm not going to elaborate on the history of the Mellotron as most of you will know anyway, and if not, thereīs plenty of literature available. For a start Iīd recommend Peter Forrestīs A-Z of Analogue Synthesisers. As for the Chamberlin itself, I have never played one but what I have heard come out of it (like some of the Saxophone and Brass stuff on Bowieīs "Low") sounds amazing and a lot better than the Mellotron (especially the female choir of the Chamberlin sounds awesome). The nice thing about the Chamberlinīs tone is that it is not as overused and well-known (read: cliché-ridden) as the Mellotron, which makes it a little more exotic (Tracy Chapmanīs live keyboard player ad a Chamberlin M-1 with him, btw). If at all, Harry Chamberlin could be called the father of the sound sampling system based on keyboard instruments, just like Edison could be called the father of harddisk recording (in the most appropriate sense of the word). Looping as we know it today -- and as it was used and cultivated by artists like Bob Fripp, Dave Torn and numerous others, you name them -- goes back to Les Paul in my opinion. Sorry for wasting bandwidth, Stephen. "Human beings are a disease, the cancer of this planet, youīre a plague. And we are the cure." (Agent Smith / Matrix) Visit the official [īramp] website at www.doombient.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "samba *" <sambacomet@hotmail.com> To: <Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com> Sent: Saturday, October 30, 2004 9:35 AM Subject: Mellotron - > I already know how mellotrons work . I've opened one up.You can think of > it as a replay only sampler if you like,I wouldn;t argue,it's a >reasonable > functional description,but I'm trying to explore the history and development > of ideas and techniques ,your description doesn;t address the idea that > Shaeffer,the originator of looping directly influenced the development of > the mellotron. Also if you want to use strict definitions digital boxes > don't have loops in them either,and so aren't loopers. > I've had correspondance w/ someone who knows Terry Riley and asked > him.Riley says he can't remember the name of the engineer,but that he was > employed by RTF .This is significant ,as RTF employed Pierre Shaefer >when > he did his looping experiments in the 40s. Alot of people assert that > everyone who that got their hands on a tape machine in the early 60s looped > it,but there is pretty clear evidence showing that a single person invented > it ,and that further developments spread from the RadioTelevision France > where he worked ,and had the first multitrack tape machines. > > > > <html><div></div></html> > > _________________________________________________________________ > Express yourself instantly with MSN Messenger! Download today - it's >FREE! > hthttp://messenger.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200471ave/direct/01/ >