Bob Yannes
| Robert J. Yannes | ||||||||
 |
||||||||
| ||||||||
Bob Yannes is an American engineer with focus on electronic music, best known for the SID chip and Ensoniq company.
Yannes was influenced by the solo at the end of Lucky Man by Emerson, Lake & Palmer and had all albums by Kraftwerk and Mike Oldfield. In 1979, he graduated from Villanova University and was hired, partly for his knowledge of music synthesis, by Al Charpentier of MOS Technology (bought earlier by Commodore). He was constantly being confronted with looking younger. At home, Yannes started designing the VIC 20 home computer using existing chips.
In four or five months up to November 1981, Yannes designed the SID chip for the VIC 20's successor, the Commodore 64. The C64's built-in ROM hides his initials, "BY". The engineers had a lot of fun, but were given very little time. After release in mid-1982, they faced pay freezes, so almost all left to found Ensoniq, with Yannes as a senior engineer.
In 1985, Villanova gave Yannes a Professional Achievement award. He has answered questions only through an unnamed third person. In 2005, he rebutted the idea of Commodore reverse-engineering Atari.
Picture Gallery
Third from right. Commodore Magazine, April/May 1982.
Unknown source. First found in June 2011.
Links
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Yannes - Wikipedia.
- sidmusic.org/sid/yannes.html - Interview from August 1996.
