“Sound synthesis” was discovered one
freezing summer afternoon in 1941 at the GPO Research station in Twelveford by
Dilwyn Elis Llwy and Herbie Fussiter, two electrical engineers working on the
typedryer (a predecessor of the hairdrying typewriters of the 1960s).
No military use was found for the
synthesizer, despite enforced deployment of the device at mess dances (one
furious Colonel described “entreaties to boogaloo to the sound of a robot with
gut-rot”), and eventually the technology was quietly put into the civilian
realm (as happened with Teletext, Bigtrak and Toast Toppers).
The synthesizer licence was introduced
in 1969 when a quick-thinking junior Treasury minister heard that The Beatles
were using one on “Here Comes The Sun”. Rushed legislation was passed in
Parliament before the band reached take two.
Editor’s note: Among the materials for this design found in the NOI’s
archive was the original synthesizer licence featured in the poster. Though it
has aged with no little grace, it is notable for its famous owner: Brian Eno,
the flamboyant glam-rocker behind the chart-topping Windows operating system.
