1980: The Sound of the FUTURE! With the Fairlight CMI | Tomorrow's World | Retro Tech | BBC Archive

Kieran Prendiville demonstrates the sonic weaponry that is the Fairlight CMI!
The Fairlight was one of the first commercially available digital samplers and could manipulate sounds in all sorts of interesting ways.
There's a whole world of BBC Sound Effects you can explore at sound-effects.bbcrewind.co.uk/
Originally broadcast 27 March, 1980.
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[@steventaylor3789]

So many negative comments?! As a kid in the eighties this stuff was magic. I don’t think it was meant to go into massive detail. It was a programme for the general public and it was very often introducing completely new concepts in a light hearted way. Many happy memories of Tomorrows World. It was a brave new world but perhaps being the youngster I was back then this is just my subjective opinion.

[@Respected_Gentleman]

Looks like someone is fishing for attention.

[@ahronthegreat]

@@Respected_Gentlemantf are u on about😂

[@ramencurry6672]

Most people who watch these videos are not into keyboards. I have a software version of this. It looks like a terrible synthesizer but it’s actually excellent sounding and deceptively good

[@Respected_Gentleman]

3 things that revolutionised music in the 80s and forged the sound of today: The sampler The arpeggiator MIDI sequencing

[@cricketexplained8526]

Shoutout for the drum machine.

[@NegativeReferral]

Shoutout to the algorithmic (FM or VA) synth! The DX7 makes sounds with little more than math and a speaker (sold separately).

[@MartinHannett_]

This machine is why Martin Hannett and Factory records famously parted ways. He wanted a Fairlight and they wanted a nightclub. We all knew who won out in the end.

[@itz2komplikayted207]

I ❤❤❤ how he is still a kid here, he looks like if you locked him up with a Fairlight, you would never see him again, as he would have so much fun, he would become one with the machine! "WELCOOOOME ... TOOOOO ... THE MACHIIIIIIINE!!!" 🤗🤗🤗

[@MacXpert74]

It's interesting how he describes the way the Fairlight supposedly works. It's not quite correct. He says the sounds are 'not recordings' and that the 'computer worked out' how the sound should be made. What he's describing is what we today know as 'modelled synthesis' and can indeed now be used for realistic sounding instruments (like the Pianotec VST for modelled piano sounds). However the Fairlight didn't model anything, but was in fact the first digital sampler. It DID use recordings instead of modelles to create the sound. But they were of course digital recordings.

[@project-95]

we don't realise how lucky we are having all this tech packed into a tiny laptop

[@Markcain268]

We didnt need pcs back then, i dont really need one now, its just for entertainment when i have nothing else to do

[@ClayMann]

its insane that a quarter of a million pound synth can now be beaten by a £20 tablet by miles. I wonder what will exist in 30 years that kids today will look back on and remember how quant that £2000 PC was they had as a teenager.

[@SidechainStudios]

The FairLight has already been translated perfectly to an iPhone app, so ‘packed into our Mobile Phones’ is even more impressive

[@saharya104]

Uhh what about modern smart watches? Apple Watches chip set is way overpowered for what it is

[@Neojhun]

LG V series phones literally was designed to emulate this. With all the dedicated DAC and ADC processing hardware in a freaking phone.

[@zamiadams4343]

The golden age of the sampler, I got my Roland W-30 back in 1990 and the world was mine, its amazing to look back now with all the tech we have these days.

[@ClayMann]

around the same time I got my £30 sampling cartridge for my Amiga computer and sampled glorious 8bit quality mono and made probably some of the most awful acid house stuff ever. But my god it was so much fun.

[@Skootavision]

Snap! First proper keyboard I bought myself when I qualified as a nurse. Loved that thing, and still addicted to sampling today. I miss those times in many ways but the technology now is mind blowing

[@Respected_Gentleman]

@@ClayMann Better than hanging about on the streets getting up to no good.

[@Rr0gu3_5uture]

@@ClayMann Yep, I had the MegaloSound v1.35 by Microdeal. I used it for chopped-up breaks in Octamed. I also had a bunch of old pawnshop Roland synths and drum machines connected via midi.

[@onlyme219]

I do enjoy this archive channel thing 👍 I'm 56

[@4seeableTV]

58 here.

[@fidelcatsro6948]

49 here amigo!

[@rorynator7567]

I'm 19 lol

[@onlyme219]

@@rorynator7567 you made me giggle, Best wishes 👍

[@derrylallen]

such a milestone in literally every piece of eqiupment we have today

[@martinvernon4129]

Every part of that episode is a CLASSIC!

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

Many don't seem to understand just HOW BIG of a deal the Fairlight Computer Music Instrument was. THIS thing was the very first Digital Audio Workstation before DAWs were even a thing. And even at its laughably low memory capacity and initial low sampling frequency, it already did let you play polyphonic samples and digitally created Synthetic Waveforms (like the later PPG Wave with the additional Waveterm addon) and letting you arrange it in a rhythm and easily save the samples and project to disc so you could later recall it and continue working on it. Without the Fairlight, the massive sampling Tec of the 90s and 2000s would not have been possible if it wasn't for the groundwork done by this marvel of an instrument.

[@mattsan70]

Sample rate 10KHz - the good old days

[@project-95]

I still sample at that rate on my Akai S950, sounds better than most modern tech!

[@Respected_Gentleman]

@@project-95 As long as the DC hiss is gone, a sample can sound great at most rates.

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

well not quite. the more polyphony, the lower the sampling frequency was. That was one of the limitations of the early Fairlights as well as the 8bit depth. The subsequent CMI IIx and series III were much better. Especially series III was 44,1khz at its lowest and 16bit standard bitdepth. But even at the lower samplerates, the CMI always sounded way better than most of todays Samplers because of the way the CMI was resampling.

[@george.mathieson2]

A classic from Tomorrow's World

[@darkdogstudios]

It’s very quaint, but also inaccurate. The Fairlight was a sampling machine, it played little snippets, ie: samples, of recorded audio. It wasn’t a synthesiser as they tell us here. It also cost as much as a small house at the time, now there’s an app for your phone of the Fairlight… 😆

[@butternutcrunch]

The Fairlight most definitely was fully capable of synthesis as well as sampling. In fact it could combine the two and it was the first digital sequencer allowing full track production.

[@squirrelarch]

“Remember these aren’t recordings...” er...yes it is. That’s exactly what it is. Digital recordings albeit in crunchy 8 bit resolution.

[@J0J0Z]

Masterpiece !!

[@brianbrino4310]

Excellent!

[@tdcattech]

I feel like these are samples...so recordings. Not synthesized sounds. 🤷🏻‍♂

[@olliedann]

Exactly my thoughts. It's not as if they digitally recreated a dog's bark, when they could very easily just record it.

[@Respected_Gentleman]

Tomorrow's World was wrong in about 99% of all cases. Truly an embarrassment in science TV. You had to watch Micro Live to get any serious stuff about computers.

[@noyoureafuckintube]

3:25

[@tdcattech]

@@Respected_Gentleman I’ve only ever seen Micro Live on KZbin etc. but it’s a great show.

[@tdcattech]

@@noyoureafuckintube Yes, that is a recording but he clearly states earlier that these are not recordings. I think the fact that they’re ‘digital’ meant that they couldn’t be true recordings in people’s minds. In 1980, the two didn’t go hand in hand.

[@jamesfx2]

Isn't the same without Synthesiser Patel. Notice how the presenter glossed over the fact that this synthesiser couldn't come close to emulating the bassoon.

[@aeiouxs]

Anyone mentioning that shallow, watery legend gets a like from me.

[@DustyCustard]

They're working on that one.

[@kaitlyn__L]

It’s got such a delicate sound… I don’t think they’ll ever recreate it. (I wonder if he tried sampling a bassoon, or if he stuck to just sampling his own voice 😅)

[@rareblues78daddy]

They're so bloody expensive...

[@andycummings-music]

I feel like he's about to tell us the location of the remaining golden tickets.

[@vectordnb]

_SYNTHESISER PATEEEELL_

[@Wizardofgosz]

Someone needs to go back 43 years and tell this guy that these ARE recordings.

[@eiffe]

Well akshually, samples are recordings, just on a digital medium! 🤓

[@MAXERNEST]

Blimey this takes me back ,good old Tomorrows world ,used to watch this when aired, with Raymond Baxter an ex spitfire pilot , he also used to host the farnborough air show, as well as T.W. along with Judith Hahn? ,some of the things shown probably were just ideas ,did they predict the Internet and the revolution in digital tech , maybe but not the speed of the progress that took place

[@Rr0gu3_5uture]

My first pro sampler in 1995 was a fully expanded 'Budget Model' E-mu Esi 32. In todays money, it cost the equivalent of £3500! TBH right now is the golden age for music tech, stuff is just so cheap and readily available.

[@indieshack4476]

oh to be transported back to 1980...

[@Respected_Gentleman]

To watch Tomorrow's World and shout at the TV - "NO YOU'RE TALKING NONSENSE, MATE!" Then watch someone performing "live" on Top Of The Pops pretending to play a guitar in a tune with NO guitar.

[@indieshack4476]

@@Respected_Gentleman yeah, it wasn’t all beer and skittles but life was simpler

[@Respected_Gentleman]

@@indieshack4476 At least we had Saturday morning wrestling with Big Daddy.

[@grandadgamer8390]

Great clip, my god, all digital sampling and delays cost the earth back then.

[@Respected_Gentleman]

Yes, some of these devices had burglar alarms on them. They were not cheap.

[@Wagoo]

Easily the price of a nice house for a Fairlight back then

[@TinLeadHammer]

Did the BBC shoot film at 24 fps for TV broadcast back in 1980?

[@BossySwan]

*_enormous lengths_*

[@zmix]

This was the golden age of anthropomorphizing computers to either mystify or de-mystify them... 1:32 " [The Computer] has mathematically worked out the incredible complexity of the sound..." To be fair, most people didn't know what sampling was, so this probably seemed like magic to them..! EDIT: What he says at 2:10 ....now this is just misinformation..!

[@kaitlyn__L]

Yep! It’s a recording alright! Just digitally doing what Musique Concrète was doing on tape. Including adjusting the speed for specific pitches. It’s not even been deconstructed into all its constituent sine waves for pitch or formant alterations while retaining the speed, as modern options do. It really is the digital analogue to playing tape like this. No disrespect to the Fairlight of course! People still use some of its factory sounds for good reason.

[@Respected_Gentleman]

@@kaitlyn__L Synths and samplers are good, but Delia's original Dr Who tune (using nothing but tape relays) is still infinitely better.

[@Respected_Gentleman]

I actually wrote a sampler and basic sequencer on my C64 in 6510 assembly when I was 15. You could control the tape mechanism with a zero page command to start/stop and record it into memory, of course even the 4bit volume hack based samples were terrible, but at the time it was amazing. Then the sequencer just triggered the sample memory space with a 2 byte location. Clumsy code and you could sample about 2 seconds maximum. And as for trimming the sample, well, you just had to zero out memory and hope for the best.

[@kaitlyn__L]

@@Respected_Gentleman yes! The archive video on here about that is so impressive too :) all manually spliced tape loops, not even special machines to make it easier like the French Concrète artists. Just a dedicated team!

[@Respected_Gentleman]

@@kaitlyn__L The stuff the BBC radiophonic workshop did waaaay back in the early 60's was quite impressive.

[@vapeymcvape5000]

Check out Ross Gellar over here!

[@LittleRichard1988]

Could you imagine being a kid growing up in 1980 and asking your parents to buy you a Fairlight CMI? I think the answer would have been "NO!!!!".

[@AtheistOrphan]

What’s the analogue synth at 1:08?

[@Respected_Gentleman]

That's a Minimoog Model D , ma boi.

[@AtheistOrphan]

@@Respected_Gentleman - Thanks very much!😀

[@Respected_Gentleman]

@@AtheistOrphan The later model of the synth Jean Jacques Perrey popularised with his amazing album from 1968. True genius.

[@AtheistOrphan]

@@Respected_Gentleman - Moog Indigo? I used to have that album! (And Switched-on Bach).

[@Respected_Gentleman]

@@AtheistOrphan Walter (Wendy) Carlos used a full Moog Modular for that album. Not cheap!

[@kaitlyn__L]

See, all this time I assumed Synthesiser Patel was an exaggeration. Nope, he was pretty direct. Right down to the playing out of key at the end…! Not to mention Patel was more honest about how sampling works too! (Although strangely he managed to sample on a Jupiter-4!)

[@tachikomakusanagi3744]

What, or who, is 'Synthesiser Patel'? But yeah, i don't think the computer works out all the incredible complexity of a tympani just because someone fed a soundwave of a recording of one into it.

[@theycallmejpj]

3:36

[@dean6816]

What kind of turntable was that?

[@Respected_Gentleman]

Looks like a variant of the EMT 950, 948 or 938. More 948 than the others. These were custom built & maintained on contract by Technics, so they come in a wild range of looks. You can find them online being flogged for £5,000. They're VERY good and will probably last a thousand years... UNLIKE THE BBC!

[@dean6816]

@@Respected_Gentleman Thanks for that. I dream of owning an EMT deck one day. I never knew Technics (Panasonic) build EMT decks?

[@Respected_Gentleman]

@@dean6816 If you ever get one, don't be doing any 80's hip-hop style scratching on it. Or I'll come to your house and thump ya!

[@dean6816]

@@Respected_Gentleman Lol I have a Technics SL1210 and I strictly don't even do any scratching on that (also because I don't want to damage my MC cartridge!).

[@Respected_Gentleman]

@@dean6816 Good. I remember back in the 80's people would just toss out classics like these. A friend wanted to toss his classic Waltham away because one of the valves on the amp had died. I took it off him, sourced a new valve for about £2 (a lot of money back then, lol!), soldered it in and flogged it off for £100. People are stupid. Always have been.

[@paulcernech8454]

lol well he got it completely wrong as this was the first “sampling “ synth. So it was a recording. Whoops!

[@NegativeReferral]

Theory: Pixar sampled this very video...

[@4seeableTV]

During the decade that followed this episode, the synthesizer would going on to score many films. We liked it at first because it sounded so new and interesting. The best being Chariots of Fire. Eventually though, many composers went back to using orchestras. But all of those 80's movies still *sound* like 80's movies. The synth dates them to that era, where as the real orchestra sound is timeless.

[@Goettel]

The T2 soundtrack wants a word.

[@aeiouxs]

Works both ways. Orchestral scores have been overused in Hollywood Movies to a tedious extent, which can remove semblance of eras or styles. I'd rather wear the silly current fashion, than the same waistcoat for 50 years - then I can see that I've lived.

[@4seeableTV]

@@Goettel A computer synth score works well for T2, Bladerunner and similar movies.

[@4seeableTV]

@@aeiouxs One thing I found interesting was that the movie Cast Away had absolutely no score until Tom Hanks finally leaves the island. And I didn't even notice there hadn't been one until that time. So a score definitely doesn't need to be overwhelming, or even used much at all.

[@aeiouxs]

@@4seeableTV very nice point indeed - I'm all for artistic vision especially when it doesn't follow the expected norms - your example sounds like great Film Directing and Art.

[@noyoureafuckintube]

Jarvis looked so good back then.

[@Respected_Gentleman]

Using a light pen to page down 5 times, page right once and hit return. Yeah.

[@noyoureafuckintube]

Oh! And he's not playing that 7". Or hitting that timpani. Didn't even touch it!

[@TheRasteri]

and it comes fitted with a burglar alarm too

[@Respected_Gentleman]

Synthesiser Patel!

[@AtheistOrphan]

All stored on eight-inch floppies! 💾

[@zebedep]

Pardon?! 😅

[@kaitlyn__L]

@@zebedep it’s true! Some people have gone to great lengths to use the original files from those floppies on modern stuff too, as opposed to just re-sampling the output.

[@Respected_Gentleman]

A hard-drive was just the stuff of myth back then.

[@dmgsoultogetherness6667]

say no to drugs kids lol

[@Wagoo]

I beat @FailedMuso to the comments section! 🥳

[@privatename3621]

Why does he keep saying the sounds are "created" by the computer? That is factually incorrect. The computer simply digitally sampled the sound and played it back, with the ability to run it up and down the octave scale by mathematically manipulating the digitally sampled sound. He really tries to make you believe the computers is generating the source content of the sound. Kind of irritating.

[@lbat5276]

2:10 That's a total lie!

[@shaftsbury94]

Great fart a 2-08

[@DukeOfKidderminster]

Does that come fitted with a burglar alarm?

[@drummerbod]

Typical BBC approach to technology... cheesy, insulting and completely glossed over so much.

[@Respected_Gentleman]

Look Around You series 2 was more realistic than Tomorrows World. This whole scene here was parodied by that in the "Synthesiser Patel" scene. kzbin.info/www/bejne/sGPQqnmCiql1bZY

[@kaitlyn__L]

@@Respected_Gentleman they didn’t even have to exaggerate in this case

[@pyeltd.5457]

it's for children like Blue Peter

[@Respected_Gentleman]

@@pyeltd.5457 Even worse to misinform children, don't you think?

[@Celosia]

Ugh, leave the Fairlight to Peter Gabriel 🙉

[@Respected_Gentleman]

1:26 No, it's a sample. I always hated this TV show, just endless misinformation.

[@pyeltd.5457]

It's for kids I guess so they have to break it down.

[@Respected_Gentleman]

@@pyeltd.5457 No.

[@rareblues78daddy]

Two words: "Synthesizer Patel."

[@ashtongrist]

Its disturbing to think these are people that are dead or very old

[@Respected_Gentleman]

Why is the inevitability of death disturbing to you?