RMI was a subsidiary of the Allen Organ Company. The owner and founder Jerome Markowitz was a man of vision, and saw RMI as an opportunity to diversify from the organ business into the glorious new world of electronic instruments.
It was through his vision and financial support RMI was able to create the RMI Calliope.
Through the kindness and research from the Allen Organ Company Service Department, I was provided with further information and photos of the RMI Calliope.
There was another version which is called the Band Organ which I've included their photograph as well.(It could be the Band Organ being played in the Country Joe and the Fish video in the other thread).
Let's do some traveling back in time! The RMI Calliope contains a 37 note keyboard with a completely solid-state transistor tone generation design. There was even a novelty button labeled "TOOT" which was wired to (3) different oscillators to give a "train whistle" type of effect. There were several versions of the Calliope case styles available over the time period in which the instrument was available. See the attached pictures for some different examples. The red/white colored case with decals and wheels was the more common version you are more likely to see. The RMI Calliope was even available as a build-it yourself "KIT". The internal electronics (tone generation) was the same between all the different case styles. A special designed "WHIND" power supply was incorporated into the Calliope that introduced "white noise" into the audio system through the oscillators. This provided a simulated life-like "air" sound that added to the realism of the instrument. The WHIND supply was an adaptation from what Allen was using in the organ designs to provide life-like pipe sound. It was very successful!
The tone generation system in the early analog RMI instruments, Electra-Piano series, Rock-Si-Chord, Explorer and the Lark (combo organ), were based on the analog series organ's being produced by the Allen Organ Company at the time. In fact, both the Band Organ and Calliope tone generation system were similar in design to the Lark whereas two adjacent notes share the same oscillator. The trick was an additional tuning capacitor added to the second note key contacts which tuned the oscillator to that note. The key contact was designed so that the tuning contact made connection before the key voltage keyed the oscillator. The decision to do this was because musically no one play two adjacent notes at the same time. This design concept made the tone generation system smaller and more compact. The Electra-Piano, Rock-Si-Chord and Explorer were all individual oscillators (one-per-note). The oscillator output tone shapers were designed to simulate the sound of a real calliope pipes.
Here are links to the photos of the Calliope, Band Organ and a advertisement detailing it's features.
Sorry for providing links to my flickr page, I couldn't insert the images since there are none online to use.
This literally made my eyes pop.
