Contributors from around the world!

Alan Ernest Calvert (1950 - 2011) is the founder of the Yoshimi project. He lived in Australia and married his childhood sweetheart, but sadly she died when their only child was still a toddler. He brought her up single-handedly, never remarried and, according to his daughter, never even looked at another woman.

When he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, nobody thought he'd survive long enough to see his first grandson born. To everyone's astonishment, he actually fought it off for five years, so not only saw, but got to know both of the boys.

Through all this, he never lost his sense of humour. This is evident in some of his Yoshimi list entries. For a long time on his website, there was a picture of his daughter and the boys, simply titled: "Three reasons to be cheerful". Survival rate for this cancer is very low - life expectancy is usually less than 6 months. However, it wasn't this that killed him, but in his weakened state he developed another type of cancer.

Those who knew Cal miss him greatly. One of his legacies is our wonderful software synthesizer, which he called Yoshimi.

Two interests that go back as far as Will Godfrey can remember are music and electronics. Work took him in the direction of electronics, but the two first came together briefly in the 1970s when he built effects pedals for guitarist friends.

It wasn't until the early 1990s that he had sufficient spare funds to buy the (still very expensive) modern synthesisers, by which time he was quite involved with computers, and some limited coding. By the early 2000s he was finding hardware synthesisers limiting, and a Linux friend suggested that he should try the new soft-synth called ZynAddSubFX. Will got immediately hooked.

ZynAddSubFX had some serious issues, which remained for some time. However, Cal (Alan Calvert) developed the fork Yoshimi. Will moved over to it, and has stayed with it ever since - to the point that he is now the developer‑in‑chief.

Hermann Voßeler has always been at home both in the realm of engineering and in the world of arts. Born in 1968, he's got an education in physics and computer science and works as software developer in the banking sector.

However, he also worked as camera operator and editor, and he has lots of experience with recording classical music, especially pipe organ. He created sound-design, arranged and composed music for film.

As OpenSource developer he contributed to projects like Cinelerra and Blender. During the last years, his main focus is on the Lumiera project, which aims to build a free tool for professional film/video editing needs.

Jesper Lloyd is a self-professed loon in Swedish Lapland who for some reason holds an MSc in computer science from Chalmers University of Technology.

His contributions center around the GUI, where he has worked on dynamic tooltips, and added graphical editing for format filters. He also re-designed the splash screen, and has created promotional artwork for the project.

Jeanette C. is a synthesist with an eclectic background, mainly focussed on classical and electronic pop music. She acquired her first hardware synthesizer in the late 1990s, and with it a fascination for sound design. Being introduced to Linux in the early 2000s, she quickly discovered the command line based audio ecosystem, which back then was the safest accessibility guarantee for visually impaired users.

She set her sights on ZynAddSubFX early on. It was Will Godfrey's dedication to Yoshimi's command line interface which finally gave her full access to the synth and effects engines, and thus made Yoshimi an integral part of her composition and sound design setup.

Kristian Amlie had an interest in music since a young age, ever since his father introduced him to bands like Pink Floyd, Toto, and Supertramp. In 1998, he started making his own music, but since he could not play an instrument, he turned to computers, particularly to sequencers. In 2002, he had a flat mate who taught him the basics of playing guitar, and the guitar has featured in all his recordings ever since.

His heart has always been with rock music, but he also very much likes complex sounds and sound textures, which is why he developed an interest in synths. He chose Yoshimi as his main synth, because it appears to be the most feature rich and stable Linux synth. Yoshimi remains his favorite synth to this day.

Kristian is a professional software developer, and since 2007 he has also become more interested in the programming aspects of audio software. He has been involved in and contributed to several open source projects, including Yoshimi.

He still has several ideas for new Yoshimi features, and he hopes to contribute more in the future, time permitting.

Others who have helped Yoshimi in various ways