Frequency

In 1978, a graduate student named Joan Liang wrote a 14-page paper on frequency modulation synthesis at Stanford's Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics. Her advisor, Dr. Michael Halpern, called it "interesting but impractical." Two years later, Halpern licensed a version of the algorithm to Yamaha. The DX7 synthesizer — the instrument that defined the sound of the 1980s — was built on FM synthesis. Halpern's name is on the patent. Joan's is not. Frequency is a fictionalized account of Joan's story, renamed here as Mei-Lin Chen to protect creative flexibility. The film follows Mei-Lin from her arrival...