Fairlight US - Provider of Professional Audio Production Solutions

About FairlightUS

FairlightUS is headquartered in Pasadena, California and is the exclusive distributor for Fairlight products in the North American market. Fairlight designs and manufactures media creation tools including digital audio recording, editing and mixing systems for standard and high definition audio post, broadcast and music production applications. Fairlight's family includes Xynergi, EVO, StationPlus, Constellation and Anthem. The Fairlight family of products are powered by Fairlight’s breakthrough CC-1 technology, the world’s first FPGA based media processing engine which introduces Dynamic Resolution Optimization and delivers previously unattainable price performance gains together with unprecedented speed, flexibility and exceptional sonic quality. The platform sets the benchmark in low latency processing.

Fairlight has been at the forefront of digital audio development since its inception in 1975. 2005 represented the 30 year anniversary since the inception of Fairlight Instruments - we are one of the oldest, if not the oldest, player in the digital audio recording business. Fairlight pioneered digital sampling and music sequencing, leading the world in cutting edge digital music synthesis.

In 2003 Fairlight launched the DREAM Constellation. This product sets a new benchmark for price and performance in large format fully automated digital mixing systems. Unlike other companies in the Pro Audio market place Fairlight’s philosophy emphasizes quality not compromise. Its reputation for sonic purity and state of the art DSP technology are without rival.

Fairlight’s customer list reads like a who's who of the industry. Whilst many are large facilities in Broadcast, Feature Film, Television, Advertising and Music production there are hundreds of smaller studios throughout the world who have found that an investment in Fairlight equipment returns instant business benefits in time saved and revenues generated. Fairlight’s products are optimized to enhance the creative talents of the user. Using Fairlight equipment has helped many of these studios to grow their businesses quickly and in new directions.

Fairlight equipment is used in the audio post-production of major feature films and television programs around the world as well as hundreds of lower budget movies, television programs, commercials and documentaries. It is also increasingly used in music recording in major music centers like Nashville and London.

A dedication to innovation, quality and customer service has made Fairlight one of the most respected companies in professional audio. An investment in Fairlight products is an investment in the future success of your business.

This unique knowledge of digital audio has been the platform for the Company to become the world leader in professional audio editing, recording and mixing. During the Nineties Fairlight had designed and delivered new approaches to audio disk recording and editing. The company had pioneered an architecture including an editing model that continues to be easy to use and innovative. It is designed to address user requirements that cannot be addressed on platforms primarily designed as office equipment. This approach was widely accepted as the Benchmark for speed and performance in editing applications. For these developments Fairlight and its R&D team were awarded two Scientific and Technical Academy awards.

Links to Other Fairlight Sites

Fairlight Australia
http://www.fairlightau.com

Peter Vogals archive photo site http://www.anerd.com/fairlight/gallery.htm

Greg Holmes Site
http://www.ghservices.com/gregh/fairligh/

Misc Links
http://www.pamalliance.org/articles/article0017.html

http://www.sonicstate.com/news/shownews.cfm?newsid=4315

http://broadcastengineering.com/audio/fairlightus-independent-distribution-company/

http://mixonline.com/news/headline/fairlightus-northamerican-distributor-022607/

http://preview.mixonline.com/news/headline/fairlightus-crystalcore-training-030707/

Listen to the History

"Reelin in the Fairlight..." - Listen to the history of the Fairlight CMI. Recorded for Qantas "in flight" entertainment November 2005 by the "Rock Brain of the Universe", Glenn A. Baker. Running time approximately 2 hours with lots of great music from the late 70's through to the late 80's. Part 1 and Part 2

Fairlight History

The hydrofoil named "Fairlight"

The hydrofoil that used to pass the offices where the Fairlight CMI was originally developed. Circa 1975.

A special thank you to David who wrote the original text below and provided the images. His original text about the Fairlight CMI and Mellotron can be found on his WEB site "Candor Chasma" by clicking here

In 1976, Fairlight created a first prototype, that included the concept and the architecture of Furse's M8. This prototype, which was simply called Qasar, was a complicated and bulky machine, with a poor sound quality. Ryrie and Vogel's initial aim was to create a totally digital synthesizer, that would be able to generate sounds that were very close to acoustic instruments, and with a total control over the different sound parameters - exactly like a musician's control over his instrument's sound. It was a kind of acoustic modelisation before its time. Disappointed as they were by the poor sound quality and the lack of variety of the Qasar's sounds, they had the idea of recording natural sounds digitally, in order to get richer and more complex sounds. The idea of sampling was born. Ironically, for Vogel and Ryrie, the sampling technique that would give birth to a revolution of music and sound creation in the '80s, was only, at that time, a very limited alternative to their original concept. Indeed, although the sampled sounds were richer than simple digital waveforms, they couldn't be controlled as easily as those waveforms. Only a few parameters (attack, sustain, vibrato and decay) could be modified. According to Vogel and Ryrie themselves, the sampling technique was only a roundabout way to get richer sounds out of their instrument : "We wanted to digitally create sounds that were very similar to acoustic musical instruments, and that had the same amount of control as a player of an acoustic instrument has over his or her instrument. Sampling gave us the complexity of sound that we had failed to create digitally, but not the control we were looking for. We could only control things like the attack, sustain, vibrato, and decay of a sample, and this was a very, very severe limitation of the original goal that we had set ourselves. We regarded using recorded real-life sounds as a compromise - as cheating - and we didn't feel particularly proud of it." (Kim Ryrie - Audio Media magazine, January 1996)

However, they decided that the conception of their machine should now include the sampling technique. In order to raise funds for this project, Fairlight produced about 120 office computers for Remington Office Machines. These computers were based on the bi-processor architecture of the Qasar.

Fairlight CMI I In 1979, their work resulted in the creation of the Fairlight CMI I (CMI for Computer Musical Instrument). Based on the architecture of the Qasar M8 (two 8-bit 6800 Motorola processors with 8 voices of polyphony), the CMI I featured a 73 note keyboard, a central unit with two 8" floppy disk players, an alphanumeric keyboard, a monochrome monitor, and a lightpen. The operating system was the QDOS, a variant of the MDOS Motorola system. The CMI I was the first machine featuring the sampling technique, a graphic representation of waveforms, additive synthesis, and a sequencer. It was the first workstation. In spite if the poor sampling quality (8 bits - 24 kHz maximum), the Fairlight was presented as a machine that was able to perfectly reproduce the sound of real instruments. It featured a floppy disk with a sound bank that included various samples of acoustic instruments.

Peter Vogel went looking for clients and distributors, traveling around the world with a CMI. In the summer of 1979, he met Peter Gabriel, who was recording his third album in his studio. Vogel showed a demo of the CMI to Gabriel, Stephen Paine (a close relation of Gabriel), Hugh Padham and Steve Lillywhite. Quite impressed by the possibilities of the machine, Peter Gabriel used the CMI during the whole week of Peter Vogel's stay. Peter Gabriel eventually bought a CMI, and created Syco Systems with Stephen Payne. It was the first company to import and distribute Fairlight In Europe. John-Paul Jones was the second buyer (he wanted to replace his Mellotron !), followed by Richard Burgess (Landscape), Kate Bush, Geoff Downes, Trevor Horn, Alan Parsons, Rick Wright, Thomas Dolby, Stewart Copland, J.J. Jeczalik (Art of Noise), Mike Oldfield... In the USA, the CMI was successful too : it was used by Stevie Wonder (first customer), Herbie Hancock, Jan Hammer, Joni Mitchell... In Austria, Hubert Bognermayr (Eela Craig), in France, Jean-Michel Jarre, Indochine, Daniel Balavoine, Louis Chédid... were among the CMI users.

Because of the poor quality of the CMI's initial sounds, many users created their own samples. Some of them would later be included in Fairlight's official sound bank.

Fairlight CMI II In 1982, the CMI II, a slightly improved version of the CMI, was created. The sampling rate turned from 24 to 32 kHz, still in 8 bits ; but the main innovation was the inclusion of the "R page", the first sequencer with a graphic representation of the 8 tracks and notes. It was based on a system of patterns (sets of bars) that you could repeat, copy, paste... You could also quantify the notes. The R page was a revolution in the use of sequencers. Some musicians bought a CMI only for this graphic sequencers. 1982 also saw the release of "Shock The Monkey" by Peter Gabriel, the first hit single featuring a Fairlight.

In 1983, a major CMI update appeared : the Fairlight CMI IIx. Several internal cards were modified. The two 6800 processors were replaced by 6809 processors, and a MIDI/SMPTE interface was added.

Fairlight CMI III In 1985, the Fairlight CMI III was a new step forward. Although it had the same architecture as the CMI I, the CMI III was the first 16 bit sampler with a sample rate of 50 kHz max in stereo, or 100 kHz in mono. The polyphony turned from 8 to 16 voices. A hard disk drive was added. A new operating system (OS 9) was created. The lightpen was replaced by a graphic tablet. The R page was replaced by a new sequencer, the CAPS (Composer, Arranger, Performer, Sequencer).

Fairlight CVI A few months later, the Voice Tracker (a Pitch-to-Midi converter for the voice or acoustic instruments) and the CVI (Computer Video Instrument, a picture and video processing machine), were released.

Fairlight MFX In 1987, Fairlight turns to the post-production market with the MFX ("Music and effects"). Basically, the MFX, which was also called MFX III, was a CMI III with a new control keyboard that fitted the new Cue List sequencer.

At the same time, other manufacturers released cheap priced samplers : Akai with the S612, the S900, and then the S1000 ; Ensoniq with the Mirage. Sequencers also appeared on computers such as the Atari ST or the Macintosh. Fairlight was slowly losing its supremacy in these two sectors (sampling and "graphic" sequencing). Moreover, with about 50 CMI sold in England, the market was saturated.

Fairlight ESP decided to work exclusively on the post-production market, with machines such as the MFX1 (1990), MFX2 (1992), MFX3 (1994), MFX3plus (1996), MFX3.48 (2000) or, more recently, the DREAM (2003). Up until the MFX3 model, the MFX were always based on the CMI III system, and still had these functions. It was only from the MFX3plus that the CMI III compatibility was given up.

Qasar (I) (1970-1971, digital/analog hybrid synthesizer): (prototype, by Tony Furse (Creative Strategies, Sydney).)

Qasar II (1972-1973, duo-phonic digital/analog hybrid synthesizer): (prototype, by Tony Furse (Creative Strategies, Sydney), supported by Federal government funding from the Australia Council, The Canberra School of Electronic Music, and especially Don Banks.)

QASAR M8 (also "M8" or "Multimode 8", 1975, digital synthesizer, 8 Bit, 8 channels, 4KB shared sound data RAM): (by Tony Furse (Creative Strategies), wire-wrap STTL technology, reworked (with PCBs) by Fairlight and released as the Fairlight QASAR M8 in 1976, direct ancestor of the Fairlight CMI) dual-6800 Main CPU, 2slot/8Bit/16Bit QASAR Bus, combined channel processing (8 channels with 4KB shared memory), light-pen

CMI (Series I) ("Computer Musical Instrument", 1979, sampler + additive synthesizer, 8 Bit, 8 channels, 8x separate 16KB waveform RAM, max. 24kHz sampling, pitch by variable sample clock rate, based upon the QASAR M8 which gave the name "QASAR" for the control computer part of the CMI): dual-6800 Main CPU (running QDOS, Q026 + Q032), 2slot/8Bit/16Bit QASAR Bus, 64KB system RAM (Q096), 512x256 B/W graphics (Q045 + Q025), light-pen interface (Q148), 8 channel boards (with 16KB private waveform RAM, CMI-01), channel master board (main sample clock, sample in, CMI-02), optional analog interface board (CMI-07)

CMI Series II (1982, max. 30.2kHz sampling): (Improved CMI Series I) new channel boards (CMI-01-A), optional MIDI (68B09, CMI-08)

CMI Series IIx (also called "CMI-09", 1983): (improved Series II with new dual-6809 computer; typically Q2xx, CMI-2x) new main board (CMI-25), new front panel (Q137), dual-6809 Main CPU (running 6809-QDOS or OS-9/6809 Level 2, Q209 + Q133), 256 KB system RAM with MMU (Q256), 512x256 B/W graphics + light pen interface (Q219), optional MIDI (68B09, CMI-08), later optional 68000 general interface (CMI-28, for MIDI/SMPTE, output board: CMI-29), optional DMA hard disk interface (Q077)

CMI Series III (1985, 16 Bit, 16 channels standard, max. 14 MB shared waveform RAM, max. 50/100kHz sampling, pitch by variable sample clock rate): (Basically, the main computer parts of the Series IIx and the Series III are the same: Q209, Q133, Q256, QFC9, Q219, Q014, Q137; and even some CMI parts: CMI-28, CMI-07. The waveform processing with shared waveform memory is a new design: CMI-3x, CMI-3xx, software Rev6 and below) dual-6809 Main CPU (running OS-9/6809 Level 2, Q209 + Q133), 2slot/8Bit/16Bit QASAR Bus, system RAM with paging hardware (2xQ256/1xQ356: 512KB/1MB), 512x256 B/W graphics (Q219, light-pen interface not used: graphics pen integrated into Preh Alpha-keyboard), general interface (68000 CPU,CMI-28, for MIDI/SMPTE, output boards: CMI-332, CMI-333), SCSI board (Q777), waveform processor (68000 CPU, CMI-33), 8slot/16Bit/23Bit waveform Bus (14MB waveform address space), waveform RAM boards (2MB, CMI-39, 7 slots for max. 14MB), channel support board (CMI-32), 8x channel cards (2 channels per card: clock + address generators, 6 DACs for CVs (for VCFs/VCAs on analog board), 68B09 control CPU, later optional alternating looping, CMI-31), 8x analog output boards (2 audio channels per card, VCFs/VCAs/Main DACs, CMI-331), sample input board (2 channels, CMI-337)

MFX sound design console (also "MFX III" (not to be confused with MFX3), MFX="Music and Effects", 1987, audio post-production option) (special control keyboard for CMI Series III, for use with Cue List timecode sequencer and DTM (later: MDR) harddisk recording software) MFX keyboard "generation 0" (68000 master CPU, 6809 slave CPU for trigger keys, built-in: Alpha-keyboard, trigger-keys, mode/transport-keys, jogger-wheel, character LCD-display, mouse-port)

Waveform Supervisor, etc. (1988, max. 32MB waveform RAM) (upgrades for CMI Series III; typically CMI-4x, CMI-34x, software Rev7) waveform supervisor (replaces waveform processor CMI-33, 68020+68881+68450 CPU+FPU+DMA, on-board NCR5380 SCSI controller, CMI-41), 8slot/16Bit/24Bit waveform Bus (32MB waveform address space), new waveform RAM board (4MB, CMI-40, 7 slots for max. 28MB), new sample input module (digital + analog, CMI-346+347)

XDR ("Extended Disk Recorder", 1989, now Fairlight ESP): (upgrade package for Series III, software Rev8 with dynamic channel allocation, preliminary 8(16)-track version of MDR harddisk recording software; typically ESP-xxx) waveform supervisor (see above, CMI-41), new waveform RAM board (8MB, CMI-43D, now 32MB possible with 7 slots), 24(12) channel output router (arbitrary dynamic mapping/mixing of the 16 channel outputs to 24(12) extra outputs, ESP-RT1), new 2-channel analog + digital sample input + digital output module (56001 24-Bit DSP, sample-rate conversion, ESP-348+349)

MFX1 (also called "MFX" or "MFX.DR", 1990, hard disk recording system/sampler) (CMI Series III XDR and new MFX keyboard, 2/24 channels in/out with 16 simultaneous and 8 tracks sustained output, software Rev9, full CMI functionality, MDR hard disk recording software, support for 2-channel digital audio output) new "Mini-Floppy" controller (for PC-type floppy drives), color graphics controller card (ESP-CG1, and new monitor), MFX keyboard (generation 1)

MFX2 (1992) (improved MFX1, 2/24 channels in/out with 16 tracks sustained output, software Rev10 and Rev11, full CMI functionality) 8slot/16Bit/25Bit waveform bus (64MB waveform+extension address space), TurboSCSI card (NCR53C94 SCSI controller, higher SCSI transfer rate for 16 tracks simultaneous and sustained output, contains CMI-32 functionality, ESP-TS1), improved graphics card (ESP-CG2/CG3), optional waveform accelerator card (96002 32-Bit DSP, multiple banks of SRAM and WRAM, ESP-96K), MFX keyboard (generation 1)

MFX3 (1994, digital audio workstation/hard disk recording system, not to be confused with "MFX III" console) (24 channels analog+digital 16-Bit in/out, software Rev12 and Rev13, CMI functionality still supported in Rev12) QASAR CPU (Q256, Q133, Q209), 2slot/8Bit/16Bit QASAR Bus, Waveform Supervisor (CMI-41 or CMI-41R w/o CMI sample input), 8slot/16Bit/25Bit waveform bus, SMPTE/MIDI (CMI-28), color graphics (ESP-CG3), TurboSCSI card (ESP-TS1 or ESP-TSR w/o CMI-32 functionality), digital channel cards (ADSP-21020 SHARC 32/40-Bit floating point DSP, multiple banks of SRAM and WRAM, 4 channels audio I/O per card, ESP-DCC), 8Bit timesliced bus, digital audio I/O cards (4 channels per card, 68HC11 control CPU, ESP-DIO), optional analog audio I/O (ESP-AIO, daughter board for ESP-DIO), SYNC card (68030+68882 CPU+FPU, AES/EBU I/O, ESP-SYN), Digital MFX Synchronization I/O (front-end to SYNC, ESP-MIDI + ESP-PLL + ESP-9PIN + ESP-LTC), optional CMI channel + WRAM cards, MFX keyboard (generation 1)

MFX3^plus (1996) (improved MFX3, revised MFX keyboard, 24 channels analog+digital 16...24-Bit in/out, no CMI functionality anymore, software Rev14) Wave Executive (68040 control CPU, running OS-9/68K, PCI-Bus interface, ESP-WX and ESP-RIO frontend, replacing: QASAR CPU + CMI-28 + CMI-41) with new color graphics (ESP-CG4, replacing ESP-CG3), PCI bus interface (PCI interface, 56002 DSP as PCI-to-waveform-bus DMA bridge, ESP-PCI), optional TurboSCSI controller (ESP-TSR), optional PCI SCSI controller, optional PCI 100MBit/s Ethernet controller, MFX keyboard (generation 2)

MFX3.48 (2000) (improved MFX3plus, 48 channels analog+digital 24-Bit @48-96kHz in/out, software Rev15) QDC channel cards (8x ADSP-21061 SHARC 32/40-Bit floating point DSP, 128MB private waveform RAM, 24 channels audio I/O per card, max. 8 QDCs in system), MFX keyboard (generation 2

CC-1 (2006) Crystal-Core technology takes over from DSP's. 1 x Altera FPGA now takes over what a fully loaded QDC used to do (64 x DSP's). System now runs on Windows XP. Nothing from the original QDC used except I/O cards if you use the SX-48.

Xynergi (2007)

EVO (2010)