- John Wheeler (audio/video technologist)
John Henry Wheeler (born 1957 in
Bristol, Tennessee ) is anEmmy -Award-winning audio/video engineer, computer programmer, and developer of thePenteo surround-sound process.A teenager in the 1970s, John worked as an apprentice recording engineer under
Rick Salyer and [http://www.artistdirect.com/nad/music/artist/credits/0,,396545,00.html Bobby All] at Tri-State Recording inKingsport, Tennessee , a studio which was producing several nationally distributedsouthern gospel albums per week, using an MCI console and multi-track recorder. In addition, the studio operated its ownphonograph record manufacturing plant, where John helped to maintain the record presses, boilers, and associated manufacturing equipment.Later in the '70s, John became a producer at Dallas-based TM Productions, where he co-produced radio station
jingles andneedle drop production libraries.In the 1980s, he was hired as an audio engineer and music editor for Turner Production (TBS/
CNN ) inAtlanta , for the development of stereo television, and developed many techniques for live multi-location television remotes for " [http://www.jasonproject.org The Jason Project] " and the original 1986 "Goodwill Games " from Moscow. As a music editor, Johnneedle drop scored several episodes of "World of Audubon" and Jacques Cousteau specials, and was responsible for editing most of the original theme music which appeared on CNN from 1985 until 1990.In 1988, while at TBS, he won an audio engineering Emmy award for a promotion for the American version of "Letters from a Dead Man", a motion picture which
Ted Turner purchased from Soviet Television for air in the U.S. onTurner Broadcasting . [ NATAS 1988 Atlanta Emmy Awards]As a hobby, John was a
C language programmer inMS-DOS andUnix , and became adatabase normalization design hobbyist. After Ted Turner's purchase ofMGM in1987 , John developed a networked film library database system for Turner/MGM between operations in Culver City and Atlanta, using the tools ofInformix Software on an SCOXenix platform. In 1990, he was recruited to theSan Francisco Bay Area as a technical services consultant for Informix. [ CIO Magaine, March 1999 "Developing Database Strategies using 4GLs"] Working for Informix, he spent three years developing one of the country's firstreal-time stock options trading systems at [http://www.group1.com Group One] in San Francisco, in 1991 linking their floor traders ondumb terminals in Chicago, New York, and Philadelphia with the home offices in San Francisco. At the time, the network was novel, designed as aVirtual Private Network between four cities usingAppleTalk tunnelling throughinternet protocol to tie together local networks.In the 1990s, he was hired by
Skywalker Sound presidentTom Kobayashi in the role of Core Network Architect for Entertainment Digital Network (EDnet), first based atSkywalker Ranch inMarin County, California and worked as the personal installer of a private real-time digital audio network linking Skywalker withCapitol Records studios,Sony Music studios,20th Century Fox studios,A&M Records , and the home studios ofMariah Carey /Tommy Mottola ,Robert Zemeckis ,Phil Ramone ,Walter Afanasieff , andGloria Estefan fordigital audio internetworking. He also co-engineered the telecommunications links forPhil Ramone for theFrank Sinatra "Duets" series. [Album credit on CD liner.] He has the distinction of being the very last person credited on the last Frank Sinatra album ever produced, "Duets II".Personal life
John is the great-grandson of "Singing Bob Leonard", who, along with his cousin [http://www.birthplaceofcountrymusic.org/node/190 Flanders Bays] were the traveling music teachers in churches and schools in Benhams and
Maces Spring, Virginia , whose turn-of-the-century students included theCarter Family , pioneer contributors to the beginnings ofcountry music .His parents died when he was a child; John was raised by "Singing Bob"'s son Thomas Leonard, a building contractor, who first taught him many aspects of
music theory as a child using theshape note system, which had been used by his own father to teach students in the 1800s. Thomas also built him a home recording studio where, as a teenager, John learned his later craft.Openly gay, he participates and promotes the annual "Out@NBCU"
NBC Universal gay contingency in the West Hollywood gay pride parade.He currently resides in
Berkeley, California .References
External links
* [http://www.penteosurround.com Official Penteo Website]
* [http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/latimes/access/59622263.html?dids=59622263:59622263&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:FT&type=current&date=Jul+5%2C+1994&author=AMY+HARMON&pub=Los+Angeles+Times+(pre-1997+Fulltext)&edition=&startpage=1&desc=Company+Town+Hollywood+Plugs+In+New+Technology+Lets+Studios%2C+Stars+Communicate+Globally LA Times article (includes photograph) (pay)]
* [http://www.ednet.net/company/index.html EDnet company history]
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