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Don Lewis - The Untold Story Of A Synthesizer Pioneer · Electronic Music

• Hello and welcome to the Sound on Sound podcast channel about electronic music and all things synth. I'm Rob Puricelli and in this episode I talk to musician Don Lewis and director Ned Augustenborg about The Ballad of Don Lewis, their new documentary movie on Don's amazing story in the world of music. From the creation of the live electronic orchestra, a collection of synthesizers, organs, and drum machines that Don built himself, and which both predated and inspired MIDI connectivity, to his struggles with the musician's union that wanted to stop him from performing live. Don's story, which has been meticulously told by writer and director Ned, is both fascinating and inspirational. And so I began by asking Don how it felt to have a movie made about his life. There are no words to describe this. Um, this is like, you know, a dream. I never had, um, uh, you know, I never thought that my life would be, I hope it would be interesting for me and my family and maybe my community, but I never thought it would reach to this level, this level of, um, engagement and thanks to Ned. Um, who's become my, my little brother, he, you have to understand that he's six feet seven, and I'm, I'm barely five feet seven, and I call him my little brother. But he has taken, uh, taken his life, the last 15, 16 years of his life to tell this story. The story's not, um, the film's not that long, but... But he's managed to, um, to make a very wonderful, wonderful portrayal of, of the incidences, uh, the, the, the people that I've met, the people that I, I feel like I stand on the shoulders of. Um, who helped me, uh, throughout this whole, this whole world of music. And, um, he has done a brilliant job, um, the reviews that are coming back even right now from Amazon and so forth. Five stars, and, uh, the reviews are just off the wall, and, and I'm, I'm just, uh, grateful and humbled at the same time to, to be receiving the, this kind of, um, recognition. Because I think it's, it's, uh, I hope that this is a, a wonderful way to inspire people to understand that. The reason we're here is to create, be co creators. And when we, and we can, when we recognize that in any one of us, it just builds the whole world up. I don't know Ned, what was the catalyst? What was the moment you thought, I need to make a film about the life of Don Lewis? It came very early on. It actually, I believe it was, uh, the first day I met Don, it was a three camera shoot that I'd set up of a concert with the Leo, the live electronic orchestra at the Museum of Making Music funded by NAMM. And, uh, At that point, I just was thinking it'd be maybe 30 seconds of maybe a larger documentary because I've always loved synthesizers, uh, uh, just something I was fascinated with. So I, well, this guy looks pretty cool, but it was either, I think it was the next day, uh, I interviewed Don and, you know, but the interview process is a pretty intimate process. It's a kind of a bizarre process because it's sort of unnatural in a way as we participate at this very moment. And, uh, it wasn't really till after the. The interview, I sat down with Don for about 45 minutes and it was like kindred spirits. So I just said to myself, this, this is it. This is the personification of a subject that I have a, a real strong, um, appeal, you know, attraction to. And uh, and then from there it sort of built, you know, there were elements that I knew I needed to have a successful documentary completed, but that was a matter of Don and Julie, his wife, Julie, um. You know, gaining the trust factor where they were willing to tell me about certain aspects of their life that they otherwise maybe didn't feel comfortable talking about. So, it was very early on, but then built from there. Don, why create Leo? What was the, the impetus behind the creation of this, this amazing piece of equipment? Why not? Okay. Well, I, you know, when, when I created Leo, it was really after accumulating so many instruments and trying to play them on stage. And it was so inconvenient. Um, it was not easy. Uh, every, uh, in the early days, of course, you know, synthesizers, the keyboards for them only played one note. Uh, they were monophonic. And, um, so, um, Trying to make a chord, you have to have three, four keyboards almost to make a four note chord. And, um, and that got kind of unwieldy. So, um, I decided, um, back in 1974, I sat down with my, my, uh, T square, my triangle, and my drawing board. And I, and I drew some plans, preliminary plans. And that's, you know, that's one of the things that, that happens when you write things down or then you have a goal, you have something to look at. And it took three years later before it actually became. But the whole idea was, um, to set this off, uh, after I heard, uh, Walter Carlos, Wendy Carlos now, uh, was switched on Bach. And I was a big fan of, of Bach. Uh, I love that music. And then when I heard these, these sounds coming from what I would normally have called in the Honeywell days when I was working as an electronic technician at Honeywell, I would have called that a function generator because it had all the waveforms there. But here you've got this function generator that that responded to the pitches that you needed to make a chord or to make a sound, and then you had filters and so forth. So, when I heard what she had done, it just blew my mind, and then I found out it took two years to do this in a studio, particularly sitting down and doing lines. By line. And I said, no, I can, I, I can't wait that long. I may not live that long. , I need to do this real time live. And so I started pursuing that in 1972. I think it was right before, uh, the NAMM show there. Um, I was introduced to the ARP company, uh, Alan r Pearlman's, uh, company, and, um, Paul Pittman, who was, um, had found a new job, he used to work with Hammond, and he found a new job as being the national sales manager for ARP, and he pulled me on board. And when I got a hold of the 2600 and the soloist at that time, and I put it in combination with Concord Hammond at that point, for that 72 NAMM show in Chicago. And then it started to make sense, it started to make sense. And then I just kept building on top of that, building on top of that, until I decided, I've got to take all these little parts and put them together in a package that I can play. Do you have an aversion to playing in a band? Was that part of it? Or did you like the control? it gave you? Well, you know, really, except for, for, um, for high school, that was the only time I had ever played in a band. Um, and, and, uh, you know, I played instrumentally with, with choirs, you know, as, as a keyboard accompaniment. Um, And, uh, the organ, you know, being raised on the organ, the organ is sort of, you know, self sustaining. I mean, it can do, it can do some stuff all by itself. So when I started professionally playing, the organ was the first, um, And it wasn't that I had an aversion, but in the places I was playing, you couldn't put a band in there. I was playing in little, you know, uh, restaurants and, and so forth. And so I just tried to, uh, how can I say, make the most efficient use of the space that I had. And that ended up being solo. Uh, on top of that, I, I've appeared with, uh, symphony Orchestra as, as a so soloist. Um, and so it's not that I haven't played with a band. I like playing with, with guys when we get together. Um, and, and Jim and I love that, uh, we had a, the experience of playing, playing with a drummer in, at Carnegie Hall. That was the first time I think I had a drummer, a live drummer, all everything else before that was rhythm units. And, um, and that was a, a real, um, real wonderful, um, collaboration. The process of making a documentary, as I've spoken to other people who've done that job, it's a very challenging process in assembling all of the characters and getting those interviews and also, you know, creating a story arc that you can hang all of these wonderful events on to make sense to the viewer, to make it engaging. What were some of the big challenges that you faced making this particular film? Well, about every challenge that the mind could imagine, um, and a lot, a lot, a lot of it had to do with my lofty goals. I mean, if you look at the traditional music documentary, quote unquote, you know, it's standard form, it's, you know, a bass player, guitar player, junior high or high school, they get together, they talk some kid down the street into playing drums, they got themselves a little high school rock band, uh, find an agent, have a hit. Uh, all of a sudden, they got some playtime on the radio, and now it's time to get a drug habit, maybe an alcoholic in there somewhere, and one of them has sex with his other's girlfriend, and before you know it, the band breaks up, and then 20 years later, they have a reunion concert, and um, Final credits. Okay. So this this obviously was not that the a subset of Far from it Um, so but then the subset of that which you've we've seen more and more of thank god because it's a wonderful subject I'd be the first to say that is uh I'll call it electronic music documentaries that concentrate on a specific instrument designed by a specific person or maybe even a company. And um, uh, all of those tended to have certain limitations and what was great about Don is he was, you know, the personification of, so many instruments and so many of the achievements that a lot of people don't necessarily relate to electronic music or synthesizers. So that, that was a challenge there. And right off the top. So having said that, I wanted to do something that wasn't just for a synthesizer, synthesizer enthusiast, or even just, um, A person who loves popular music. I wanted something that was for the masses, which of course everyone tells you you can't do it. That's stupid. That's a bad marketing strategy. You gotta come up with your demo market. But, but I felt that Don's story was universal from the very beginning. So, the biggest issue I had Having committed to that is how do I make this movie about a guy who made so many technological advancements were responsible for them? How do I work around terms like live electronic orchestra, subtractive synthesis, frequency, modulated synthesis, musical instrument, digital interface, how do you? Not turn off your normal viewer with those types of, you know, terms. And, you know, I had so many great people in the film, 17 in all, that were hip to that jive. You know, before I interviewed them, I told them, look, I want everyone to understand this. I wanted to be educational without being dry, and I don't want people to feel stupid because they don't know about the technology behind all these achievements, and, and, God, you know, when you're dealing with talented, smart people, that, it, it, that makes the interview process so much better. So that was really one of the biggest highlights of the film, is every time Julie and Don booked somebody, Julie mostly, it just got better and better. I mean, you're talking to people like Don. Dr. John Chowney and Gary Luemberger and it just a list goes and doc, you know, Mr. Kakashi, you know, you're just feel like I, I've said this before is, you know, there's always a part of your ego as a producer, especially documentaries where you think, come on, we're going to get this done, you know, and part of me said, well, if it never gets done, this has been such great experience for me, Don and Julie, just to bring all these wonderful people together that hadn't seen each other in years, just to do the interview was just. Uh, uh, fulfilling experience in and of itself. Yeah, there did seem to be a lot of love in, in the room, so to speak, between all of the people involved. Yeah, there's a huge, huge amount of respect for everyone amongst everyone. It was, it was very, you know, that, that really struck me. The film Don depicts your life, both from a technological perspective and also a personal perspective. And I just wanted to kind of focus on that. Just for a moment, because it depicts your struggle against the musicians unions of the time and also, you know, the underlying cultural tones that were going on in various aspects of America at the time, you came up against so many barriers, but you blazed a trail. And here you are today being celebrated. You know as you as you should be do you feel vindicated by that? Well, I don't know if vindication is something that I was looking for but I feel satisfied Uh, with the fact that, um, musicians after, after the court case, we won the court case, were basically given the okay that they would not be banned from using synthesizers as a part of their, Uh, the other thing is that I, I wanted. In that court case, I just wanted this information to be public. And that was a public record for, for the courts. We didn't know how it was actually going to turn out, but we wanted, the vindication was just getting this information out so people could look at it for what it was worth back then because we didn't know what was going to happen. It's five days in the courtroom and, um, um, uh, I think it was the same. The same judge that shut down, uh, Napster, remember when, okay, that was Judge Patel, Marilyn Patel. Um, and she was the, uh, she was presiding over that, over that, um, session and, and, uh, I just felt like when that was over, I had won. something for all the people, all the bands that I was not in, I want a place for them to be a part and not feel like The tools that they wanted to to use were, were, uh, taken away from them. In my case, it was not the tool we had. We still had Leo, but we couldn't perform, we couldn't perform with Leo. And, and that was not only in the Bay Area, but it went national. Um, sure. And, uh, so, um, I just want, uh, everyone to know that, uh, I'm, I'm fine. I was, I was fine then. It reminds me of an old hymn that it is well with my soul. Uh, that, that, that, that I felt. Um, and both Julie and I went through. But for us, it was also, um, a way to understand that there are more ways. And I, I had, um, thank God I had this knowledge of sound design and electronics and so forth, uh, that I could fall back on during the days that I couldn't perform, uh, out as a musician in the, in the ways that I had been. And, um, and, and so, so I got to hone my, my, uh, skills even more during that period of time. It was a very, I had a lot of growth in there. And then I met people like Alan Kay, who is actually residing in London right now. Um, and, uh, his wife, Bonnie, who's, The Sherlock Holmes novelist now, uh, I met people like that, uh, who gave me, um, even more to do with music. And that's when we, uh, was involved with the vivarium, um, project that Alan was over. And, uh, in LA with the public schools where we were bringing, uh, the DX7, the QX1, the TX816 into a school, elementary school, and teaching kids how to use this equipment. This was back in the 80s. Amazing. I said, hold on, hold on, just a little while longer. I said, hold on, hold on, just a little while longer. Everything's going to be alright. Coming back to the, the technological side of things, I've got a couple of questions that relate to that. So first of all, if we look at Leo, Leo is a combination of, at its heart is, is a Hammond organ. And to the left and the right, you have a variety of analog synthesizers and correct me if I'm wrong, we've got some rolling gear on on your left and on the right. We've got the, uh, the Oberheim stuff and there's some art stuff in there as well. So it's predominantly very old technology. Uh, two questions. First of all, why those particular instruments? What was special about those? And secondly, have you ever considered swapping them for other things, you know, making it a modular kind of thing? You know, um, I, I did with what I could do, whatever, whatever it was, I could get my hands on, um, and, and then, um, one of the things I think that was so interesting about that process and I find it more, more difficult, the more keyboards I have. Uh, I was limited, but yet creativity wise, it was unlimited, um, because I, I would think of things, um, to do with that one or two or three instruments that You know, 14 instruments, uh, would be confusing. I used to tell Mr. Kakahashi, I says, you know, when everybody started coming out with, oh my god, you got a thousand sounds on here and you got this. I says, I don't need a thousand sounds. I says, I may need ten basic sounds, but give me a thousand ways to manipulate it. And so that's what... That, that, the foundation of, of, uh, Leo was to take those, uh, uh, technologies that were available, uh, available to me, uh, the Oberheims, uh, I love the sound of the Oberheims. Uh, I love the sound of the art, but never did you ever hear the two of them being played together. In an ensemble as such, um, um, cause most bands were not instrumental bands. Um, they were vocal bands for, for the most part. I mean, Emerson, Lake, and Palmer were probably the exception to that. Um, And, um, so, uh, and then having the Roland equipment and then the vocoder, we didn't really talk too much about the vocoder, uh, at all in the, in the, in the, um, in the movie. But, uh, man, that was like having a gospel choir and no, and not having to buy robes. Leo was a way, uh, was a, uh, uh, um, a catalyst for me to take my musical experiences that I had, uh, from my early beginnings, uh, in the church and working with choirs, and loving orchestral music, uh, the symphony as well, and loving jazz, and all of those things combined and, and taking that instrument through, um, it's paces, um, and, you know, I lived with, with Leo a long time. I, when I played at night, normally I would go to the Hungry Tiger during the daytime because I always had to do some repairs on it. And while I was there, I would do some, uh, rehearsing. And, um, so I lived with it. Uh for five years at the hungry tiger And it was it was quite a a wonderful trip. It was a wonderful trip Um back in those days, of course dancing was was a big which you know disco And of course tr808 Hey We can make some we can make some disco out of that But um taking those, um you know, just thinking about, um, the instruments that were, are now iconic. And I had almost first dibs on, on using them. Um, and, and not only using them, but helping, um, and giving and consulting with Roland, uh, to build them. Uh, Kakehashi and Ki Komoto. Who, who was the guy who, with the t r 8 0 8, uh, and getting to know those guys. Those, those, those guys were my family. Yeah. Uh, it was, it was more than just building instrument. It was building relationships. And, and to me, uh, I find that a very comforting, um, and a humbling aspect. Yeah. Uh, getting to know those people, uh, uh, was just. Uh, and, and, and Alan, uh, Perlman, I got to know him when I first joined, uh, ARP and, um, even knew the president of, of Hammond, Dave Kuttner at the time, and Jack Rickberger who brought me into Hammond, uh, during the, during those times. So it was really about a people thing. And I think we all understand that, uh, uh, traveling in certain circles, um, but. Having something to, to share and willing to, to be there to share and, uh, to see what happens, giving, you know, people some inspiration. Yeah. Cause I get fired, I got fired up about, The, uh, the ace tone in the very beginning when I met Mr. Kagehashi. I says, every time I want to make a new rhythm, I have to take my soldering iron and go inside and change all the, all the circuitry. And I says, I need, I need programmable rhythm. And he would look at me and says, Oh, wait a little while. So expensive. Yeah. So have you ever been tempted to replace Leo with the modern technology of today software? Have you ever considered building a software? Leo? Uh, yeah. Um, I'm sitting here looking at. Um, in my studio, um, I, I, and you'll see if there's some titles on some of the files here. It says Leo two, Leo number two, but. But they don't have, they don't have the personality. I cannot find that personality in the digital world that I had in the analog world. Uh, the unwieldiness of analog, the drifting oscillators, the filters that crackle once in a while, that gives you a sound. Oh, I want that sound again! Um, they made things too predictable. In fact, um, uh, especially when the digital stuff started coming out and everybody wanted to make everything perfect because the, the analog was not perfect. And then we found out that we like the imperfection better when we like the perfection. So then we started de detuning things to get, make a fatter sound. It's still never really got that analog sound, but, uh, they're still working on that. They call it, um, audio, audio, uh, what is it? Uh, physical modeling for, for audio, uh, to get it from analog, from digital to analog to make it sound more analog. It would be nice to have a backup, uh, in case Leo once in a while, uh, has its own agenda. It may, you know, there may be parts of it that need a little tension. It's like, it's like the early, um, I, I, I may get cut off when I say this, the early Jaguars that you had to spend a lot of time working on the motor. Yeah. I think the synthesizer world has a lot in common. So particularly the vintage with vintage automobiles. Yes, it really does. Yeah, it really does. But there's a personality, um, that, um, I think it's almost the fact that you could see the, um, not the uniformity of the parts that went inside, there were tolerances on, on, on the, on the actual value of a resistor, and capacitors, and all that, and so you had all these variables already built in. built into the instrument, so you know it's not going to be that stable. Um, but, um, and, and now going in and repairing, I, I've been going and restoring the pro soloist that's inside the, of Leo. And I had a couple of ICs that went bonkers and took me weeks to find out which one it was. Um, and, but going in and then finally getting it to work and you said, Oh my gosh, this is really great. Um, because that sound, it was the sound that, that you're after that analog sound. I was struck by the, the caliber of guests, uh, that, you know, contributors that you had like Kakahashi san and, and am I right in understanding that this was probably his last? Well, one of his last kind of appearances before his untimely passing, I think from a formal sense, I think there might have been a couple of one offs for some, some quick blogs or something, but certainly in a formal sense, it was. Yeah, but you managed to pull together some, some really interesting people from, from Don's life. And you mentioned earlier, you alluded to the fact that Don's wife, Julie, um, helped in, in kind of getting that. What was that a difficult process to, to collate these people and to get the, um, get their input. No, it was the easiest part of the whole film. As a matter of fact, it was just a matter of scheduling it. And in a lot of cases, these folks have, like all of us have gotten a bit older, so their time wasn't as I'm not gonna say not as value, but I mean, their schedules weren't as taxing as they once were. And of course, everyone wants It's happy to provide time for Don, you know? Um, and, and you know, one of the things I didn't mention earlier when you were asking about the film, but it made me think of it when Don's talking about Middy, and in its most simplistic form, I think one of the guiding lights I had, and Don and I talked about this at length, is this film is really about... Connectivity, you know, and and midi is sort of a metaphor for really life. You know, you've got all these connections that happen through midi But you know don's life certainly wouldn't have been as enriched as it is Without all of these people to connect to and I think You know if younger people are watching this film It'd be great if they got inspired to be involved in music and it's specifically synthesizers But more than anything I want them to understand the importance of connecting with other human beings. I mean, what are the odds of Don, this kid who grew up, you know, in the projects, you know, post World War II, or really, uh, you know, Dayton, Ohio, end up being lifelong friends with this guy who's... from post World War II Japan, who had terrible physical problems as a kid and overcame them, and they became two of the most important people in each other's lives, you know? Um, I mean, it's just, you can't even come up with the odds. So that's where the, I think the connectivity is a real strong, um, way to describe this and very simple way to describe the film. In terms of the, the production of the movie, I kind of get the impression that it's a very, you have a very minimalist. Crew, I guess. I'd say so, yeah. Well, when you're going to do a film, and probably any other venture, you've got two things you need. You need time, you need money. I had a bit more time than I had money. So that meant I could do a lot of things that I otherwise wasn't expecting to do. So I produced it, directed it, I cut it. cut everything. I had to learn new skills. Um, and even the animations really, um, those animations that you're seeing in the film because I wanted to have whatever I thought was sort of a nice comedic break in the rest of the film. Um, those are really supposed to be samples for more professional and experienced LA animators. But, you know, I had a couple come in and I got the same thing. It's like, well, it looks like it's It's done to me. And you know, what do you want me to do? And then they found out that I did it all the animations on Photoshop and with Adobe Primer Pro, they got mad at me. They said, that's not what that software is designed to do. It's not designed to do animation. They were offended. And I said, well, I don't know how to use the other stuff. So I just. I don't know. And I said, I said, give me some better ideas and they never did. So I just kept it, you know, and, and, and, and answered it. So in a way there's, there's this, this kind of mirroring of Don's life that, you know, you're using the tools that you have and the limitations make you ever so much more creative. Absolutely correct. Exactly. Exactly. It's basically the same thing. We've talked about that too, but there's a strong parallel. You, you, you do what you can with what you have. And I like limitations personally. Because you know what? It sort of gives me a timeline and it's sort of this, sort of vague in a way, a deadline. It's like you can only do so much with this limited type of software or tools and you're done with it. And, uh, I kind of like that. Plus, if part of me is just too lazy to learn more software and I didn't have the time to learn any more software, I already learned far more software than I wanted to do in this film, you know, uh, not that I don't enjoy that process, but the problem when you're learning software and creating a, uh, a project or a piece of art is. You know, you're always questioning yourself. Do you, should I spend more time researching this so I know more features? Or should I just delve into my sort of creative habits of wanting to get this down and see if it works? And I, I kind of, I lean toward the latter. I I come up with an idea and a, you know, a juxtaposition of concepts and, uh, you know, a, uh, a shot piece aligned to another shot piece, and I wanna see if it works right away. And, and when it came to the real linkage of the whole story, I had six or seven major accomplishments that had to be told about Don, you know, and you were asking me earlier, one of the challenges, one of the big challenges of the film, too, is that Don is not a household name, you know, and it's not like I'm doing something on Jimi Hendrix for the 30th time or David Bowie. And the other thing is that Don's alive. Most documentaries are done on dead people, to be quite frank, you know, so that that kind of offers a carry up. I hope he does this before my husband dies, or before I die. And I would say, I hope I do it before I die. You know, I'm the key guy here. I'm the one that needs to live. But anyway, there were these sort of major... Accomplishments and falling back on my news background, not knowing what the final arc is going to be because like with narrative film, you've got your blueprint, you've spent your time with the script, and now you can dump money into the script. This is just the opposite. You're dumping money and time into something that you don't even know where it's. you know, And so, I would just say, okay, let me do a seven or eight minute video on frequency modulated synthesis and how Don was involved in this, and I'm going to do another six or seven minutes on, you know, the T r eight oh eight and without a lot of Uh, thought as to where it's going to be placed in the final, you know, arc, so to speak. Um, and then I figured they'd take care of themselves and it did. It worked out because that was a very productive way, fortunately, that I luckily came up with to expedite the process as much as I could. The one thing I'm always conscious of with these films that they do have a limited market if you pitch them to synthesizer geeks. So, what steps have you taken to pitch this to organizations, distributors, to get them to take this story, which is a very human story, but also, you know, deeply rooted in technology? How have you gone around pitching that? Well, I haven't been doing the pitching. The first, actually I shouldn't say that. Our first pitch was to find an agent. You know, you gotta find a sales agent that has as much enthusiasm for the film as you do. And we found one in L. A., Mark Bruder. He's great. I mean, he just... Immediately loved this story and it's strange how I even found him. I, you know, I have a long background in sports directing and producing live event. And I found Mark through a guy who was a satellite guy for me when I was doing ESPN shoots. And he said, I grew up in Hollywood with this guy who's now a sales agent. And boom, I mean, who would ever. But he is totally sold on it and he just loves Don and Julie. So we were about ready to close some fairly big deals and I'm still looking at HBO Showtime, those types of people, no big names have said no yet. They just say, we love this story. Give us a second. Well, we gave him a few seconds in the pandemic hit and it's kind of like, you know, the breaks went on with a lot of things. So in the meantime, what's turned out to be a very, very, very, um, Pleasant surprise has been DVDs, you know, who would have thunk, you know, everybody said DVDs were dead a few years ago and People are buying the DVD. So we're lucky to have I mean just just yesterday. I found out Barnes Noble and Amazon Prime are Distributing it through their DVD, you know lines of distribution as well as a American American movie class No, Turner, uh, Turner Classic Movies, and I didn't even know they had a division like that. And then, of course, we've, we've got Target and those others. So, um, the, uh, the distributor of the DVDs has had no problem getting these people to carry this film. So, um, and then we're, I haven't seen the numbers yet on VOD, but, you know, it's available to 80 million households that subscribe to cable. That market's dying out as well, but I think DVDs are coming back, um, and I don't know the numbers on that so far, but I'm getting calls from friends that said, Hey, I watched it on TV. They live in New York, you know, they live in Houston, they live in San Francisco, Portland. So, uh, we'll have to see, but essentially this is all in theory, a big buildup to, uh, you know, a larger venue. So, and do you hope to maybe have a theatrical release of this? Well, well, you know, it, it, it's almost screaming for it. This is really a film because we did so many test screenings and I, I, I, uh, te we did test screenings on, on two different rough cuts. 'cause I'm big on that. As much as I hate to be in an audience watching my own film, um, like I've said before, I'm cowering in the back corner with my head between my legs not wanting to be there, but, you know, I still learn a lot from the live audience and it, it, it really is a movie that needs to. call, you know, four wall experience now because people are obliged to stay there and really take the movie in because it isn't an easy viewing film. I think you'll agree with that. It's you got to kind of stay on your toes a little bit. There's a lot of stuff going on. Um, you know, and so to answer your question, I would like to get something going theatrically. I don't know how successful I'll be, but that will complement the DVDs being out there. And we certainly have to go to certain markets in Japan. We need to have a couple screenings in Los Angeles and San Francisco. So, yes, that's gonna happen. How, how formalized that becomes in terms of a long term distribution through theaters, I don't know yet. But we certainly have at least a dozen, uh, four wall screenings that we have to take care of, yeah. Yeah, and I'd love to come to London actually yeah, and and get a theater there and have a showing that would be wonderful I'm gonna go to Ireland and do it. I know that So yeah to come back to you Don what one of the the central stories within the film is the development of MIDI and and your Inspiration behind that you know that what you were doing with Leo and how that inspired Okay Roland and so on. So here we are 2020 MIDI 2. 0 has just just been ratified. Yes, some for 35 odd years after the dawn of MIDI. I was just wondering what your thoughts are on the on how solid that that protocol has become and how you feel it represented. What you were trying to do has it kind of surpassed your expectations maybe well, I I look at leo And doing hard wire so to speak uh of each note, um Controlling each one of the oscillators and and the gates and so forth that happen um, and one of the things that happened with leo, um that Uh, it's sort of pedestrian, but it is a, um, um, is the control of the volume, and I do that with an expression pedal, but the expression pedal, uh, was controlling eight different channels, and each channel could have its own dynamic curve. This was unheard of back in those days, uh, that you could actually have certain, as you increase the, the volume, certain, certain, uh, channels would increase more than others. So if you had a solo going on, you raise it up. And the others would come up a little, but that solo voice would really be done. And that was done with, with the expression pedal. Um, those are, those are things that, that really, um, facilitated me. Um. Um, wanting to, to, to, to see how expressive this instrument could be. And when Kakehashi would come to the Hungry Tiger with his engineers, Um, they, when they saw Leo, I think they, they, they looked and they said, Oh my God, here's Oberheim, and here's Arp, and here's Hammond, and here's Roland. all operating from the same console, for the most part. And that, that was the seed uh, that was put in Mr. K's mind, uh, that this was not just a Roland interconnect, because he had done that with some of his instruments. But he said, we need to come up with this. protocol that, that's open source. In fact, he, he, he, he, he wanted to be open source, so it would equalize for, for everyone who wanted to enter. And when I, when I saw the results of that, I really didn't know. In fact, he never really told me until much later on. It might have been when, when, when Ned went to Japan, when we went to Japan to interview him, that that cat come out of the bag like that, because I never asked him directly. Um, and Ned asked him questions that I probably never would have thought of. And I sat there and I went, wow. This is admitted. Don, you were crying. Uh, okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. You gotta understand. You have to understand. Ned really didn't want us in the room normally when he was doing an interview. He would always have someone handling the audio and the audio guy billed before we went to Japan. He got a job with the reality show and bailed on me two days before the trip. Yeah. Yeah. And so. I ended up being the guy holding the microphone. The boom and an overqualified audio guy. That's for sure. Okay. I've never been on the end of the boom like that. And, and when, and when I, uh, was listening to the answers that my dear friend had known since 1969. Uh, never spoke to me in that way Yeah, it was I there were times when I thought I was going to drop the microphone because I I was so emotional to to know that that we had affected each other's lives in that manner. And I'll tell you, um, uh, you know you've really lived a life when you can hear your friends. Um, it's one thing to do it when you're, you know, in a casket or something. And you can't do it very well there. But when... But when... When people are giving, uh, giving, um, an account of your relationship, it just makes you, um, I don't know, it's just very humbling and it's, um, a wonderful way to think that You have made a difference in someone else's life, and they made a difference in you. And so this has always been this, you know, uh, yin and yang, kind of. You needed both, both sides. You need a receiver. It's just like MIDI. In and out, of course, Midi only did it with, they had to have two cables. Um, but, but it was that way. And, um, to know that this, this instrument and the concept was, um, was the inspiration for MIDI. And for him, for Kagehashi, for Taro Sana, we, Taro is his nickname, and, um, he, for the first time and the only time, got the four manufacturers, uh, in, in Japan. to cooperate. And only one manufacturer in the United States, Dave Smith, Sequential Circuits, um, joined with that. And they did it in less than a year. A protocol. It's remarkable. It's remarkable. It is. It's a remarkable achievement that has lasted so long as well. Yeah, as much as people, as many people, you know, the technocrats get in there and they say, well, it doesn't do this and it doesn't do that. But how much stuff did it do? I haven't heard. I haven't heard anything that has moved me. That would another parameter that is going to move me musically That will make a difference. Um, they might have made it tighter and more resolution and so forth. But that's only because, that's only because they can do it now. Or they, they wanted to do it now. And, um, and I hope that, uh, with all of this, this new, um, technology, that it yields more than just MIDI, what MIDI 1, 1. 0, uh, um, uh, emitted. Um. And if it does, hopefully we can change the way that people think about each other. Ned, can you tell us, um, how we can get hold of this movie right now? What, what do people need to do? Where do they need to go? Okay. If, if you're not in the United States proper, then you get. For now can go to four, the number four bri. com and they will direct you to a distributor that can get you the film. It's going to take, take a few weeks. Uh, and we're right now working on an international distributor so it can be much more efficient, obviously, so we can get the product out, out to, out to Europe. Um, Otherwise, you know, if you're in the United States, you can purchase it. Just go to the website, theballadofdonlewis. com, and right there on the portal page are four very valid options, like Amazon, Target, places like that, where you can just click it, it goes right to the, to the, uh, ordering page, and you can, you can pick it up, you know? And then, of course, there's, there's video on demand, so if you happen to be in the United States and you're a cable TV subscriber, you can just, uh, do a search for the Ballad of Don Lewis. It'll pop up. And you can just click it and watch it. So, uh, this is the early stages of distribution, but it's available. So excellent. And I, yeah, highly recommend it. It's a great, great film, gentlemen. It's been an absolute honor to, to speak to you both. It's been so much fun. I wish we could do this more often and for longer, but thank you ever so much for, for taking part. Great. Thank you for inviting us, Rob. Thank you for listening and be sure to check out the show notes page for this episode, where you'll find further information along with web links and details of all the other episodes. Before you go, make sure you visit the sound on sound podcast page at sound on sound. com forward slash podcasts. Where you can explore all the other great content playing across the other channels. I'm Rob Puricelli and this has been a Failed Muzo production for Sound On Sound.