Page 46 - Fall 2007

Passings
Dick Stern
Applied Research Laboratory, The Pennsylvania State University PO Box 30, State College, Pennsylvania 16804
Acoustics Today welcomes contributions for “Passings.” Submissions of about 250 words that may be edited in MSWord should be e-mailed to AcousticsToday@aip.org. Photographs that may be informal must be at least 300 dpi. Please send the text and photographs in separate files.
John Morgan Eargle 1931 • 2007
John Morgan Eargle, a Fellow of the Acoustical Society of America (ASA) and the Audio Engineering Society, who made important contributions to recording prac- tice, electroacoustic design and application, and surround sound production, passed away sometime around 7 May 2007. At the time of his death he ran his consulting firm, JME Consulting, and was also Senior Director of Product Development and Application for JBL Professional and Harman International Industries.
John was born in Tulsa, OK on 6
January 1931. He learned to play the piano
in grade school and later took up the
organ. While in high school he worked
part time for Paul Klipsch in Hope,
Arkansas. He earned a Bachelor of Music degree from the Eastman School of Music, a Master of Music degree from the University of Michigan, a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering degree from the University of Texas, and a Master of Engineering degree from The Cooper Union. His thesis, under Professor Daniel Schutzer, was titled “Four-Channel Stereophonic Transmission Over Two Normal Audio Channels.” His early professional affiliations were with Klipsch, RCA Records, Mercury Records and the Altec Corporation. He started JME Consulting in the early 1970s. One client was JVC and he assisted them in developing and introducing the CD-4, an entry in the quadraphonic sound format war.
John recorded and/or produced approximately 275 records and CDs, many under the Delos label, covering a wide spectrum of musical styles and ensembles, including the Seattle Symphony, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, the London Symphony, the Helsinki Philharmonic, the Westminster Choir, the chamber orchestras of Los Angeles, New York, and Moscow, and the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet. Soloists included John Browning, Arleen Auger, Janos Starker, Garrick Ohlsson, Carol Rosenberger, and Bella
Davidovich. He received a Grammy Award for Best Classical Engineering from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (NARAS) for the year 2000 for his Delos recording of Dvorák’s Requiem and Symphony No. 9 per- formed by Zdenek Macal and the New Jersey Symphony. He also engineered recordings by Joe Williams, Red Holloway, Ruth Brown, Clark Terry, Tommy Newsom, Ruth Brown, and Etta James. His recording of Joe Williams for Delos, “Nothin’ But The Blues,” won a Grammy in 1984 for Best Jazz Vocal Performance Male. His recording of Ruth Brown for Fantasy Records, titled “Blues on Broadway,” won a Grammy in 1989 for Best Jazz Vocal Performance Female.
Mr. Eargle was a member of the faculty of the Aspen Audio Recording Institute and the Aspen Music Festival and School as well as a member of the Corporate Board of the Music Associates of Aspen. Among the architectural projects in which he was involved with the loudspeaker system design and installation are the Samuel Goldwyn Theater at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), the two theaters at the Director’s Guild of America, and the Hollywood Bowl. He received a Scientific and Technical Award (Technical Oscar) from AMPAS in 2001, with Don Keele and Mark Engebretson, for the concept, design and engineering of modern constant-directivity, direct radiator style motion picture loudspeaker systems.
John Eargle was a Fellow, Honorary Member, and past President of the Audio Engineering Society (AES) and the recipient of the AES Bronze Medal. In addition to the AES, ASA, NARAS, and AMPAS he was a member of the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE), and a sen- ior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). He was a member of Tau Beta Pi and Eta Kappa Nu. His 10 books, many in multiple editions, include
Acoustics Today welcomes items for “Passings.” Submissions of about 250 words that may be edited in MSWord or plain text files should be e-mailed to AcousticsToday@aip.org. Graphics may be informal, but must be at least 300 dpi. Please send the text and graphics in separate files.
44 Acoustics Today, October 2007