The Yamaha AN1x Synthesizer mailing list

Jon,

> > A company called Kahler used to make an item called the "Human Clock" in
> > the late 80's that does exactly what you want.  It takes a 1/4" signal in,
> > averages it into a tempo, and then sends that tempo out as a MIDI 
> clock.  I
> > don't know how hard they are to find these days.
>
>Bruce,
>Was there not also a box along similar lines called a 'Garfield Master
>Beat'? Or was that a SMPTE/MTC solution? I seem to recall it was out
>around the same period as the Human Clock?

Yes, as I recall, there might have even been a third box that did about the 
same thing.  I never owned one, but from the reports that I received, all 
of the boxes did pretty much what they were supposed to do, with the Kahler 
as the king, such as it were.  Unfortunately, the expectations were too 
high:  bands tried to use them for all sorts of music, including ballads, 
reggae, and jazz.  In retrospect, the expectations were almost absurd -- 
how can you ask a reasonably-priced machine to follow music with an uneven 
tempo, in real time? -- but they managed to kill any demand for the 
products, nonetheless.  Kind of a shame, because they would lend themselves 
to many genres:  dance, techno, funk, punk, etc., etc.  We would probably 
be in the third or fourth generation today.

Regarding click tracks:  I played live in a MIDI'ed rock band with a 
drummer, and it is a difficult proposition at best.  We had probably the 
most ideal situation possible:  a very groove-oriented drummer who enjoyed 
working with sequencers, who played an mostly-electronic kit, in a band who 
played only canned arrangements of songs (no extended solos and such).  The 
drummer was ready and willing to put on a set of headphones with the click 
track, even though it diminished his ability to hear the rest of the 
band.  Even with that background, it was very stressful for him:  While any 
of us could pull the band off the click by getting over-enthused, only the 
drummer could pull us back -- and the audience would certainly fault him 
for any tempo mismatches.

Regards,

-BW

--
Bruce Wahler
Design Consultant
Ashby Solutions™   www.ashbysolutions.com
CloneWheel Support Group and HiNote moderator
978.386.7389  voice  978.964.0547 fax
bruce@ashbysolutions.com