timrocker Posted March 18, 2003 Share Posted March 18, 2003 Hi everybody, On another thread "Fairlight" came up. Can any one tell me what that is/was? Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michael saulnier Posted March 18, 2003 Share Posted March 18, 2003 Early computer / music keyboard digital sampling product. [url=http://www.obsolete.com/120_years/machines/fairlight/]Fairlight info[/url] Check out this link. Never saw one in person, but I heard they're very cool. :thu: guitplayer I'm still "guitplayer"! Check out my music if you like... http://www.michaelsaulnier.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeff Klopmeyer Posted March 18, 2003 Share Posted March 18, 2003 Fairlight (along with New England Digital, creators of the Synclavier) was one of the first companies to make an integrated digital music production system. You can find out about them here: [url=http://www.fairlightesp.com/]Fairlight\'s Site[/url] - Jeff Marketing Communications for MI/Pro Audio My solo music and stuff They Stole My Crayon Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rog Posted March 18, 2003 Share Posted March 18, 2003 Back in the day, the Fairlight was a protean DAW. It's still around, I think Henchman uses one. Do a Google search. "That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." - Banky Edwards. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gtoledo3 Posted March 18, 2003 Share Posted March 18, 2003 [quote]Originally posted by Rog: [b]Back in the day, the Fairlight was a protean DAW. It's still around, I think Henchman uses one. Do a Google search.[/b][/quote]They were around back in the day, certainly. But they still make new systems, The Dream Station for example. Want mix/tracking feedback? Checkout "The Fade"- www.grand-designs.cc/mmforum/index.php The soon-to-be home of the "12 Bar-Blues Project" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super 8 Posted March 18, 2003 Share Posted March 18, 2003 They also cost a fortune. I think a base system started around 50k and skyrocketed from there. And then MIDI happend, and EVERYTHING CHANGED... Super 8 Hear my stuff here Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joegerardi Posted March 18, 2003 Share Posted March 18, 2003 The very first commercially available sampler. The best site on the web about them is here: http://www.ghservices.com/gregh/fairligh/ Here is a snippet from Greg's site: In 1975, Peter Vogel and Kim Ryrie started a company in Rushcutters Bay, New South Wales, Australia to make a digitally-controlled musical instrument that would provide an alternative to the analog synthesizers that were popular at the time. They built upon the dual-processor synthesizer design of Motorola consultant Tony Furse to create, in 1976, an eight voice synthesizer called the Qasar M8. Furse had worked previously with the Canberra School of Electronic Music to create a system that already had many of the classic Fairlight features, such as the lightpen and the graphics display. With the Quasar M8, Vogel and Ryrie tried to create realistic sounds by using something akin to acoustic modeling (where the processor generates a waveform in real time according to a mathematical formula), but the result was less than inspiring, so they took a new direction by using real-life sound samples to provide complex waveforms. Ryrie and Vogel felt that using samples was "cheating" since their original goal was to build a digital synthesizer that allowed complete control over every parameter in real-time. With samples they could only control attack, sustain, vibrato, and decay. The samples gave them complexity, but not control. Once an 8-bit analog-to-digital converter card was constructed, legend has it that an employee's dog bark was the first sound to be sampled and used in a melodic fashion. By 1979 they were ready to demonstrate the Fairlight Computer Musical Instrument. Peter Gabriel and Stevie Wonder bought the first Fairlight CMIs that year. Perhaps the earliest popular song to use the Fairlight was Peter Gabriel's "Shock The Monkey". The original idea was that the CMI would be shipped with a library of pre-existing samples which would provide Fairlight owners with everything that they would need. However, the owners starting creating large numbers of samples themselves, and so it was sampling that became the driving force behind the CMI's popularity. In fact, quite a few of the owner-created samples became part of the official Fairlight sound library. The first Fairlight (dubbed the Series I) had relatively poor voice cards, sometimes described as "scratchy", with a maximum sampling rate of 24kHz. The Fairlight Series II (circa 1982) improved on the sound and the software, including Page R which was so revolutionary that it was often the reason people bought a Fairlight. The Fairlight Series IIx (circa 1983) added MIDI support. The Fairlight Series III was introduced in 1985 with support for 16-bit CD-quality stereo sound, and was generally a new machine (or perhaps more accurately it was a re-working of the original idea). Well, more of a blurb than a snippet... :D And what do they look like? Well, see my avatar. And not to get too far ahead of myself, There's a VERY strong possibility (almost a certainty at this point) I may have a major stiffy in the next few weeks! ..Joe Setup: Korg Kronos 61, Roland XV-88, Korg Triton-Rack, Motif-Rack, Korg N1r, Alesis QSR, Roland M-GS64 Yamaha KX-88, KX76, Roland Super-JX, E-Mu Longboard 61, Kawai K1II, Kawai K4. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rog Posted March 18, 2003 Share Posted March 18, 2003 Strange co-incidence; Fairlight has just gone into administration. "That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." - Banky Edwards. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spigotsaol.com Posted March 18, 2003 Share Posted March 18, 2003 Fairlight still makes the best "Pure audio editor" I have ever used. Their MX3 plus was a great machine in it's day. Their customer service was sub sub par in my opinion (example, customer: "I'm getting error # 12345 in the shell" Tech Support : "Well, were the only techs there are and nobody here has any idea what that error means." Customer: " ...{stunned silence, then the sound of jaw hitting floor]"). And since it was 'black box" technology, they had you over a barrel. If Rog is saying that their in trouble, it's because of mismanagment and poor planning, not because of their product. Frank Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
D. Gauss Posted March 18, 2003 Share Posted March 18, 2003 please refer to the chapters on "art of noise," def lepperd's "pyromania" and the cars' "heartbeat city." i believe every note on those records was coming out of the original fairlights (series 2 and 3).... -d. gauss Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timrocker Posted March 18, 2003 Author Share Posted March 18, 2003 Thank you all for the info! :thu: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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