Page "Drum machine" Paragraph 13

In 1959 Wurlitzer released an electro-mechanical drum machine called the Sideman, which was the first ever commercially-produced drum machine.

The Sideman was intended as a percussive accompaniment for the Wurlitzer organ range.

The Sideman offered a choice of 12 electronically generated, predefined rhythm patterns with variable tempos.

The sound source was a series of vacuum tubes which created 10 preset electronic drum sounds.

The drum sounds were ' sequenced ' by a rotating disc with metal contacts across its face, spaced in a certain pattern to generate parts of a particular rhythm.

Combinations of these different sets of rhythms and drum sounds created popular rhythmic patterns of the day, e. g. waltzes, fox trots etc.

These combinations were selected by a rotary knob on the top of the Sideman box.

The tempo of the patterns was controlled by a slider that increased the speed of rotation of the disc.

The Sideman had a panel of 10 buttons for manually triggering drum sounds, and a remote player to control the machine while playing from an organ keyboard.

The Sideman was housed in a wooden cabinet that contained the sound generating circuitry, amplifier and speaker .< ref >