The Ikutaro Kakehashi & Roland Coporation Gallery

At the heart of Roland Corporation is a passion for music—the special bond between musician and instrument, art and technology.  It is truly the reflection of the company’s founder, Ikutaro Kakehashi.

Born in Osaka, Japan in 1930, Mr. Kakehashi had to overcome many adversities in his young life.  Not only was he orphaned as a child and raised by his grandparents, he also battled tuberculosis during his teens.  It was while he was hospitalized that he first recognized and relied on the healing power of music.  He would listen to the radio, hour after hour, day after day.  The music nurtured him to appreciate both the power of music and the various technologies that could assist in spreading its power to the world.

Fostering musical expression through technology was to become Mr. Kakehashi’s life ambition.  After years of developing his skills as an electrical engineer, he established Ace Electronic Industries in 1960 and set to work designing his first musical instrument: an electronic organ.  It was during this time that Mr. Kakehashi also began developing an innovative new rhythm machine—a product that would later serve as one of the key elements in establishing the Roland Corporation in 1972.

And the rest, as they say, is history.  Under Mr. Kakehashi’s direction, Roland brought groundbreaking products to the mainstream public and opened new channels of creativity for musicians the world over.  Entirely new technologies were introduced, such as the world’s first programmable drum machine, the TR-808 Rhythm Composer; the world’s first computerized sequencer, the MC-8 Micro Composer; the world’s first digital synthesizer with integrated effects processing, the D-50; and the world’s first chorus effects pedal, the BOSS CE-1 Chorus Ensemble.  Mr. Kakehashi led Roland Corporation into totally new areas of music making such as guitar and synthesizer integration with the GR-500 Guitar Synthesizer, hard disk recording with the revolutionary VS-880 Digital Studio Workstation and innovative modeling instruments such as the VG-8 V-Guitar System and the V-Drum System.

In fact, many Roland and BOSS products have become the backbone of contemporary music.  With each innovation, Roland has continued to set the industry standard for sound quality, playability and thoughtful design.

Mr. Kakehashi was one of the original advocates and supporters of MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface).  This became the widely accepted industry protocol, which enabled digital musical instruments and computers to communicate effectively with each other.

But most importantly, Roland Corporation has always fostered the unique relationship between player and instrument that lies at the core of the world’s greatest music.  It is this union of the artistic and scientific that has so influenced the course of modern music history, and for that we have Ikutaro Kakehashi to thank.