{"621552":{"#nid":"621552","#data":{"type":"news","title":"Georgia Tech Grad Plays Fight Song on His Mortarboard","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u0026ldquo;Music has always been a passion for me,\u0026rdquo; says new Georgia Tech graduate Nathan Batey.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\r\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\r\nBatey grew up in rural Whigham, Georgia, a four-hour drive south of Atlanta. It\u0026rsquo;s almost as far away from Tech\u0026rsquo;s campus as you can get while staying in the confines of the state. At the age of 9, he started playing old-time bluegrass and gospel music on the fiddle. At Cairo High School, he started learning piano. Since then, he\u0026rsquo;s added the organ, mandolin, and synthesizer to his repertoire.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EComing to Georgia Tech as an electrical engineering student, Nathan sought different opportunities to keep music a part of his journey. He took a position at Georgia Tech\u0026rsquo;s WREK radio station and hosted his own weekly bluegrass show called The Back Alley Pork Roost. And he was part of the music team at the Wesley Foundation.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EMusic also worked its way into Nathan\u0026#39;s academic career. He participated in undergraduate research with Timothy Hsu in the School of Music and helped model historical venues to establish a better understanding of their acoustic qualities. One of Batey\u0026rsquo;s last electrical engineering courses at Tech was Analog Circuits for Music Synthesis with professor Aaron Lanterman.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0026ldquo;I highly recommend the course for anyone interested in analog circuits or music,\u0026rdquo; says Batey. That course, coupled with his love for music, inspired his one-of-a-kind mortarboard for graduation.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EBatey built a working synthesizer atop his cap and used it to play Georgia Tech\u0026rsquo;s fight song. He sourced the keys and speaker on the internet, disassembling a toy piano. He used a protoboard for the power supply, and an oscillator and breadboard for a large adjustable bank of resistors used to tune the oscillator.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EAll the tech talk aside, it\u0026rsquo;s a pretty cool Georgia Tech graduation accessory.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0026ldquo;I\u0026rsquo;m just happy it ended up working,\u0026rdquo; Batey laughed. After graduation, Batey will be staying in Atlanta to work for Southern Company where he interned twice as an undergraduate. In the future, he\u0026rsquo;s planning to return to Georgia Tech to pursue an MBA \u0026mdash; and possibly build a few more synths.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EBatey built a working synthesizer on his graduation cap, and used it to play Georgia Tech\u0026rsquo;s fight song.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"Electrical engineer uses in-class skills to build a working synth on his graduation cap. "}],"uid":"28058","created_gmt":"2019-05-09 17:18:02","changed_gmt":"2019-05-09 17:21:44","author":"Steven Norris","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2019-05-09T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2019-05-09T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"621554":{"id":"621554","type":"image","title":"Custom Made Instrument\/Mortarboard ","body":null,"created":"1557422479","gmt_created":"2019-05-09 17:21:19","changed":"1557422479","gmt_changed":"2019-05-09 17:21:19","alt":"Nathan Batey made a mortarboard that was also an electric synthesizer. ","file":{"fid":"236752","name":"Screen Shot 2019-05-09 at 1.17.07 PM.png","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/Screen%20Shot%202019-05-09%20at%201.17.07%20PM.png","image_full_path":"http:\/\/www.tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/Screen%20Shot%202019-05-09%20at%201.17.07%20PM.png","mime":"image\/png","size":2550847,"path_740":"http:\/\/www.tlwarc.hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/Screen%20Shot%202019-05-09%20at%201.17.07%20PM.png?itok=XP5ZUd9j"}}},"media_ids":["621554"],"groups":[{"id":"1214","name":"News Room"}],"categories":[],"keywords":[],"core_research_areas":[],"news_room_topics":[{"id":"71871","name":"Campus and Community"}],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003ESteven Norris\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EGeorgia Tech Social Media\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EInstitute Communications\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["snorris@gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}