Why was the RCA Electronic Music Synthesizer installed at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center?

The RCA Electronic Music Synthesizer was installed at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center in 1959 to provide composers with a tool for achieving greater precision and control over their music.12

Originally designed by Harry Olson and Herbert Belar at RCA Laboratories for research into sound properties, the synthesizer attracted composers who sought to extend the range of available sounds and achieve total control over their compositions. Specifically, the machine allowed for the encoding of musical instructions—such as pitch, tone color, vibrato, and envelope shapes—onto punched paper tape. This mechanism enabled composers to define musical properties with high precision, far exceeding the capabilities of traditional performance.312

The composer Milton Babbitt became particularly associated with the instrument, as it provided him the opportunity to realize his complex, serialized compositional techniques with the exactitude he required. By using the synthesizer, composers could also avoid the labor-intensive and error-prone process of splicing tape by hand, which was the standard method for creating electronic music at the time.12