Library Organization

University of Iowa Electronic Music Studios

Founded 1964 around the world's first real-time digital synthesizer, built by James Cessna.

Type
Organization
Creators
Philip Bezanson, Robert Shallenberg, Kenneth Gaburo
Subjects
Sound Computation

Established in 1964 after physicist James Van Allen, supervising student James Cessna’s project to build one of the world’s first digital synthesizers, approached composition head Philip Bezanson about housing it, the University of Iowa Electronic Music Studios were among the first in the world with real-time digital synthesis. Robert Shallenberg directed the Studios alongside Cessna’s ongoing work on the instrument; Kenneth Gaburo, appointed director in 1983, expanded the Studios into speech, text, and image manipulation.