The musician's "word processor."

Nation's Business, April, 1986 by Karen Berney

The Musician's "Word Processor" What do Oscar Peterson, Sting and Chick Corea have in common? Besides the fact that all are highly talented and successful performing artists, each recently shelled out over $100,000 for a "Synclavier," a computer-driven synthesizer that transforms them into one-man bands in their own homes.

To Sydney Alonso and Cameron Jones, Synclavier's inventors, that engineering and commercial triumph is the culmination of stick-to-itiveness that started when they met on the Dartmouth College campus 13 years ago. The two saw a small university research project grow into New England Digital Corporation, a company they founded in 1976 to commercialize what was then "a primitive tool to provide ear training for music students," says Alonso.

From that point on, Alonso, now NED's chairman and director of research and development, and Jones, assistant R&D director, would apply their genius to improvement of the Synclavier until world renowned musicians would make NED one of the fastest growing audio engineering companies in its field. The goal: to build NED into a $200 million to $300 million a year audio giant over the next five years.

The privately held company appears to be on the right track. Last year, NED, with 80 full-time employees, reached sales of $9 million, an 80 percent jump over 1984. "We have been on that kind of growth curve since 1979, when we had only 15 people and were doing $300,000 worth of business a year," reports Jones. Of his association with, NED, he says, "I was just a student. I never had a plan to start my own company."

Not so for the more entrepreneurialminded Alonso. Before forming NED, he had tried to launch electronics ventures three times and failed miserably. "I think I succeeded with NED because it was the one enterprise where I wasn't hedging any bets," he says.

Much of the credit for the Synclavier goes to John Appleton, a leading composer and teacher of electronic music who planted its seed when he asked Alonso, a hardware designer, to brainstorm a way to get Dartmouth's central computer to control his analog synthesizer. Inspired by Appleton, Alonso raised support for a research project, recruited Jones "for his software brilliance" and embarked on development of their digital synthesizer.

Another grant followed, and pretty soon "we were getting inquiries from Norlin Corporation, a music conglomerate that wanted to test market the synthesizer," recalls Alonso. Alonso quit his research associate position at Dartmouth, and he and Jones--just graduated--launched NED in White River Junction, Vt. Norlin lost interest, but teh two were convinced that by exploiting rapidly advancing computer technology, they could create what jones calls the "musician's word processor."

"With today's Synclavier you get the capability of a $1 million studio--the tape recorder, mixing consoles, reverb machines--in one box for fraction of the cost," Jones declares.

Despite the Synclavier's dazzling effects, NED does not expect smooth sailing from here on. Concedes NED President Brad Naples:

"There is a lot of ignorance about the Synclavier. People put it down, saying it makes plastic music. The job ahead amounts to no less than re-educating an entire industry to a coming renaissance that will radically change the way music is made."