Dominic Sutton

I’m not a tech - I’m more shepherd than vet to these cranky old sheep - however, I am fascinated by the “crumbling edge” (found at the opposite end of things to the bleeding edge) where knowledge, expertise and technology is being lost at a rapid pace. The first wave of engineers who were working when this gear was new are retiring (or heading for the great workshop in the sky); or in some cases the things were so uncommon and so idiosyncratic that no one ever really knew how to fix them! This is the survival I’m interested in, with a particular interest in the earliest moments of new tech - the true pioneers where the designers had no map and were making everything up as they went along. I’ll be bringing along some examples of these trail-blazers from when the first time digital entered the world of analogue music gear, and talking about what we do, telling some stories, and making some strange noises.