For those not all that familiar with synthesizers and electronic music, a sampler is an electronic musical instrument that unlike a synthesizer does not generate new sounds, but uses recorded sounds or “samples” that are loaded or recorded by the user to be played back by means of a program, a keyboard, a sequencer or other triggering device, to perform or compose music.
In today's time of digital data storage and when sound recording samplers are relatively simple to make; they aren't usually much larger than the user interface used to control them and they start at about 150 dollars on Amazon.
This was not always the case: Back in the late 1940s, the re-writeable recording medium of choice was magnetic tape and as is often the case people started to think about how to use the medium for things more creative than simply reproducing sounds that had at some point been produced acoustically.
Synthesizers using tone wheels to generate synthetic waveforms had been invented as early 1906 with the noteworthy and outright huge Teleharmonium leading the way at a massive weight of 200 tons and ran on 50HP.
But something was needed to recreate existing sounds and recombine them into new musical effects. Especially cabarets and other small venues wanted to be able to recreate realistic sounding music from larger ensembles of musicians without actually hiring any of them.
With that came the idea for an invention for the first music sampler which takes us back into the 1940s Iowa home of Mr. Harry Chamberlin who played the pipe organ and must have been outright obsessed with anything sound and music. At some point towards the end of that decade, he came up with the idea to use several early magnetic tape recorders that were just being made available as spoils from World War II and use them to reproduce different notes to play music.
The basic principle used a series of looped tapes, each containing different sounds and when the appropriate key on a piano like keyboard was pressed the corresponding tape would start spooling and be pressed against a magnetic head, hence reproducing the desired sound.
The first Chamberlin, Model 100 could play 14 different drum loops that were recorded on ¼ inch tape. It was intended for household use and between 4 and 10 units were sold, accounts vary here. Even at those very small numbers Chamberlin was encouraged enough to go all in. The magnetic tape manufacturer Welk had also been impressed by his invention and offered to fund a scale production under the condition that the new instrument would be called a “Welk”, but Chamberlin refused and uprooted to California and set up a shop under his own name instead.
The model 200 stopped using loops meaning that the amount of music that could be reproduced was limited in duration, but it introduced a novel concept: The entire bank of tapes could be replaced changing the musical instrument from a selection of flutes, violins and oboes. A line called Rhythmate was also available that can today be considered the first drum machine:
More than 100 model 200’s were sold and the model line continued to grow until the model 600 MusicMaster brought a turn for the worse for Mr. Chamberlin: At this point the instrument had evolved into having a total of 35 keys split into a voice bank and a rhythm section and the following video shows and sound effect banks were also made available:
Driven by the previous success, Chamberlin had hired a sales representative Bill Fransen. On assignment to England to find a new supplier for magnetic tape heads, Fransen brought two MusicMasters 600s with him. When demonstrating the instrument to a potential tape manufacturer called Bradmatic LTd. things started to spin out of control for Mr. Chamberlin. The people around David Nixon at Bradmatic had great ideas to improve the concept, and found financing for the very expensive recording of new sound banks through musician and bandleader Eric Robinson. In this entire process, Fransen somehow failed to mention that he didn’t own the design but was rather an employee of the Chamberlin Company. Regardless of this rather unfortunate omission, a company called Mellotronics was formed and the first Mellotron MK 1 hit the market in 1963.
The following outright fantastic 1965 advertisement shows what the Mellotron was capable of. It also showed what Eric Robinson by claiming that he and David Nixon had invented it.
The Mellotron was a rather expensive piece of equipment with prices that would be on par with entry-level real estate at the time, but nevertheless it had great success and the BBC radio workshop became a notable early adopter. King Hussein, Peter Sellers, Scientology founder L Ron Hubbard and princess Margeret were all prominent early owners of the instrument.
At some point Chamberlin and Mellotronics must have struck an undisclosed deal, as both companies continued to produce instruments in parallel and without much legal quarrel after the initial hefty dispute.
The Mellotron definitely made its entry into the world of music when at first the Moody Blues bought a second hand model and then John Lennon and Paul McCartney each bought one and used it in the recording of Tomorrow Never Knows the last track on “Revolver“ was one of the first song to ever be recorded using the instrument. Strawberry Fields Forever” in 1966. “The Magic Mystery Tour” and “The White Album” both saw extensive use of the instrument.
In the following video, McCartney shows his continued endearment to the instrument.
The Rolling Stones who tend to be accused of having followed The Beatles around at the time started to use a Mellotron with Brian Jones using it on some studio tracks, including "She's a Rainbow" and "Jigsaw Puzzle" in 1967.
The instrument saw its last notable entry in Rock n' Roll history in 1995 for its use on Oasis' album (What's the Story) Morning Glory? It was played by both Noel Gallagher and Paul Arthurs on several tracks, but a particularly prominent use was the cello sound on the hit single "Wonderwall", where it was played by Arthurs.
Chamberlin continued to build his own version of the magnetic sampler until 1981 when he gave up after a total of 700 units.. A technical genius he was also particularly about his strong dislike of rock music. Maybe his business fate would have been better if he had not been so vocally reluctant to hang out with people who’s hair was significantly longer than what he considered appropriate.
Arved Deecke is founder of the Danish / Mexican Loudspeaker company KVART & BØLGE that makes audiophile quarter wave loudspeakers and sound systems at a price anyone can afford. In his free time he blogs about all things related to sound, music and audio.
