British Design Award - Stepp DG1.
On 13 April 1988, at the newly opened Glasgow Princes Square, I was honored to be presented with a British Design Award for the Stepp DG1 by HRH The Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Philip.
Although the Stepp was invented by me because I wanted access to all the sounds that a keyboard player had but I only knew how to play a guitar - the Stepp was designed by several people. The electronic design was done by Dave Simmons who invented the electronic drums. Dave told our investors "I've sold over 2,000 electronic drum kits, and in every band, there's at least three guitarists..."
The Stepp's product design was done by Grey Matter, an industrial design company in London. Although many people assumed the guitar was an "ugly version of a Bo Diddley square guitar" the Stepp was actually curved so it fit slightly around the player's body. The guitar's synthesizer and power supply were built into it's stand. All quite ingenious in its day.
The guitar's detection and control design - the bit that no one had ever solved before - was done by AIM Cambridge. In hindsight, they really over-engineered the instrument which increased it's cost and overran the development budget and schedule, but the smart "intelligent frets" were their invention. When frets and strings are metal, you can't detect a specific string on a specific fret as they're all one circuit - other companies divided the frets into six sections, but that made the instrument feel very odd to play. AIM invented "semiconductive intelligent frets" - the top surface was a resistance, so a string could touch it without shorting, and could even be pitch bent - all clever stuff.
Prior to meeting the Prince, there were strict instructions that we could only speak to him if he spoke to us first, in which case, we must address him as "Your Royal Highness." If he continued the conversation, we must then refer to him as "Sir."
All the pomp and circumstance was pretty stressful for me - a mere commoner! I kept practicing "Your Royal Highness... Sir, Your Royal Highness... Sir" on the off chance he would ask me something.
It was obvious that Price Philip was quite bored with the ceremony - having to make conversation with various engineers and designers who won awards in categories as exciting as Durable Consumer and Contract Goods, Components and Computer Software. By the time the Prince reached me, with his hands famously cupped behind his back, he leaned forward and asked "Can you make it sound like a dog barking then?" to which I nervously forgot all the instructions and muttered "of course it can Sir I mean Your Royal Highness Sir, and it can sound like an orchestra or a even... a guitar..." but he was already walking up to a designer who won for a pewter hip flask.