Electronic musical instrument was designed to be a lower-cost alternative to a pipe organ for church music, musicians soon discovered that the Hammond was an excellent instrument for blues and jazz; indeed, an entire genre of music developed built around this instrument, known as the organ trio (typically Hammond organ, drums, and a third instrument, either saxophone or guitar). The first commercially manufactured synthesizer was the Novachord, built by the Hammond Organ Company from 1938 to 1942, which offered 72-note polyphony using 12 oscillators driving monostable-based divide-down circuits, basic envelope control and resonant low-pass filters. The instrument featured 163 vacuum tubes and weighed
Gene Quill Gene Quill Daniel Eugene Quill (December 15, 1927 – December 8, 1988) was an American alto saxophonist known for his bebop jazz records with Phil Woods. He and Woods recorded as Phil and Quill. Additionally, he played with the big bands of Gene Krupa, Buddy Rich, Claude Thornhill and Gerry Mulligan. Seminal albums include "Four Altos" with Phil Woods, Hal Stein, and Sahib Shihab, and "Phil & Quill", both on Prestige. In 1988, Gene Quill died at the age of 60 in his hometown of Atlantic City, NJ. As a Leader With Manny Albam With Bob Brookmeyer With John Carisi