Jeroen Tel

Dutch composer (born 1972-05-19 in Eindhoven, raised in Helmond — his own account, source: s-imr-jeroen-tel-interview; alias WAVE), co-founder of maniacs-of-noise with charles-deenen and, after rob-hubbard and martin-galway, the third name every source in this wiki reaches for when it names the great sid composers. He wrote his first game soundtrack at 14 and calls himself "one of the first composers to write music specifically for video games" (source: s-hugi38-interview-jeroen-tel). Best-known C64 games (from the Wikipedia biography quoted by Hugi): Combat Crazy, Cybernoid, Cybernoid II, Dan Dare 3, Eliminator, Hawkeye, Myth: History in the Making, Nighthunter, Robocop 3, Rubicon (title), Supremacy (source: s-hugi38-interview-jeroen-tel).

Background and start#

• Raised in a musical family — father piano, mother flute, godfather Guus Tel a music teacher and pianist; his father's double-quartet choir rehearsed in the house every Monday, and "without that experience I would not have understood harmony, melody and arranging songs the way I do now" (source: s-hugi38-interview-jeroen-tel).
• Bought a C64 at 12, learned BASIC, "bumped into the SID and I was sold", and wrote "a little BASIC player" before he could program the 6502; meeting Charles Deenen solved that — "me and Charles designed our first MoN routine" (sid-player-routine; source: s-sidmusic-jeroen-tel-interviews).
• "From 1985 to 1987 I used to sit down and study his [Hubbard's] music. Making notes about his arrangements, techniques, melodies & sounds. I even hacked into Hubbard's routine to compose music in machine-code, since I didn't have my own music driver yet." He first heard Hubbard at 13 (sources: s-hugi38-interview-jeroen-tel, s-sidmusic-jeroen-tel-interviews).
• In 1991, aged 18, he was moving to England to work at Probe Software while Deenen went in-house at Interplay — "We took both jobs. Somehow that's too bad"; 64'er's introduction that year said he had "decided to become a solo artist" (source: s-sidmusic-jeroen-tel-interviews). The Hugi biography adds "several years at Funcom in Norway" (source: s-hugi38-interview-jeroen-tel).

Working methods#

• Charles Deenen on how he composed: "He'd literally write out a music piece in assembly with melodies, chords, bass, without sometimes even hitting play once, and it would sound great" — with "his perfect pitch ear" and "coding/tech skills" (source: s-hugi38-interview-jeroen-tel). In the early MoN division of labour Deenen programmed and made sound effects while Tel composed; later both did both (source: s-sidmusic-jeroen-tel-interviews).
• His own favourite: Turbo Outrun — "Having samples (and my own voice) inside a tune, that was awesome" (chip-samples); in 2014, Supremacy, "because of its melodic content and its arrangement" (sources: s-sidmusic-jeroen-tel-interviews, s-hugi38-interview-jeroen-tel).
• On the filter: "It was a real bugger when it came down to using the SID-filter so that it would sound good on every C64. There were several versions of the SID-chip around, which varied a lot. But in the end I got hold of all C64 versions and could do some 'average' filter settings. But it remained different.." (filter-programming; source: s-sidmusic-jeroen-tel-interviews).
• "Programming a soundchip (like the SID, or SNES soundchip) is more fulfilling. The limits of the soundchip makes me wanna push it to its maximum"; "I wish the manufacturers of computers would build a SID inside every computer" (source: s-sidmusic-jeroen-tel-interviews).
• In 2014 ideas come from the piano and from "playing around with drums, beats, basslines, chords and melodies in a music program called Renoise"; what he prizes in C64 music: "Funky basslines in combination with snappy drums, good chord progressions and playful, jazzy melodies" (DRAX and Mitch & Dane do it best); philosophy: "Be inspired and always keep working on improving your skills" (source: s-hugi38-interview-jeroen-tel).
• A multispeed example of his is already in the wiki: Rubicon's title music runs at 2× with drums impossible at single speed (multispeed, wavetable-programming; source: s-witchmaster-creating-chiptunes-with-sid-wizard).

The MoN driver and the Hewson years#

• Before the first MoN routine he, like Deenen and Marcel Donné, "had already arranged music … using soundmonitor"; when Deenen "saw Tel arrange a song in about 10 minutes, he created a music driver for Donné and Tel" (sources: s-vgmpf-maniacs-of-noise, s-vgmpf-soundmonitor-tfmx).
• Deenen on who wrote what: "Jeroen Tel used the Maniacs Of Noise driver that I wrote for several years. He only started to write his own after I left to the states. The editor for both of us was easy: turbo-assembler" (source: s-charles-deenen-interviews). VGMPF: the MoN composers "arranged by typing hexadecimal numbers and labels into the driver's source code. After splitting from Deenen, Tel programmed himself" — later he "programmed his own sound drivers in the assembly language of the respective consoles (mainly Z80 and 6502)" (source: s-vgmpf-maniacs-of-noise).
• That driver is musicfile; its Cybernoid II source ("MUSICFILE V01-07-1988 / Programmed by Charles Deenen") is public and shows Tel's instruments as 8-byte rows — pulse $41 basses and leads, triangle drums with a fast filter count, sawtooth arpeggios (cybernoid-ii; source: s-realdmx-sid-players). Two 2014 videos play cybernoid and Cybernoid II over that Turbo Assembler source (source: s-cybernoid-behind-the-notes).
• Three channels, in his words (from a Dutch video interview with Hubbard, translated by VGMPF): "If you would compose one chord, you run out of channels. So you have to be creative. By quickly switching between three notes on one channel, you saved two channels. For example: you would have a bassline and a drum both on one channel … And so you left room for a melody" (channel-interleaving, chord-arpeggio; source: s-vgmpf-maniacs-of-noise).
• Dates from VGMPF: wrote for hewson "until he left in July 1990"; Probe Software "from January 1988 … until July 1993" (reconciled 2026-08-30 by his own accounts: Probe used his C64 music exclusively and flew him over "for composing a couple of times" from early on — VGMPF's January-1988 start fits that freelance relationship — while the six-month in-house contract as "Computer Audio Programmer" came "at eighteen" / "when I turned 18", i.e. 1990/91, the move the 1991 interview describes; sources: s-domination01-jeroen-tel-interview, s-imr-jeroen-tel-interview); Funcom 1994–96; Backbone 2004–09. Left MoN between 1990-03-28 and 1990-06-23, returned "in 1992 or 1993 … meanwhile a programmer himself"; the NES RoboCop 3 was done "one night at Probe's headquarters in 1991" before the C64 version; Turrican (C64, 1990) is credited to him as "Sample driver" (chip-samples). VGMPF gives Eindhoven as birthplace where Hugi's biography says Helmond (source: s-vgmpf-maniacs-of-noise) — settled by Tel himself in 1996: born in Eindhoven, "I have lived in Helmond (also NL) for the biggest part of my life" (source: s-imr-jeroen-tel-interview).
• The split of credit, title by title: Deenen's own 2010 list puts "Sound effects" — not music — against the famous Tel soundtracks (Battle Valley, cybernoid, cybernoid-ii, Dan Dare 3, Eliminator, Myth, Nighthunter, Rubicon, Savage, Scout, Turbo Outrun, Golden Axe, Afterburner …), keeping his own composing for later imports and conversions. On the canonical MoN records the music is Tel's and the effects and driver Deenen's (source: s-c64com-charles-deenen-interview).
• chris-huelsbeck names him among his four favourite C64 composers (source: s-remix64-huelsbeck-interview); goto80, a generation later, lists him among his own favourite SID composers — his account of what that music meant to the chipscene of the 2000s is on goto80 (source: s-remix64-goto80-interview).

In the scene's memory#

• SIDwave: "He makes music in BASIC (none of that is released), and in 1986 Jeroen does various tunes in Soundmonitor, like the rest of C64 scene. To be honest, it's not very good. :)" — then, in TMC's player, "they take it by storm". Later: "JT has some tunes that use all 3 voices and running at 8x. This creates some synth leads, which sounds like they actually came from a 'standard' analogue synth. He uses those in his tunes, those he play on sets" (multispeed; source: s-recollection-brief-history-of-sid).
• JCH: "Jeroen Tel also composed a lot of marvelous C64 tunes with an amazing harmony and vivid melodies, topped of with the most delicious and polished instruments you can imagine" (source: s-chordian-sid-musicians). SIDId's MoN/FutureComposer editor was built on the player of his Noisy Pillars (source: s-sidid-player-list).

• dustbin (Simulmondo's composer, 2004): learned from "tons of Jeroen Tel's tunes played 24:7"; "Jeroen Tel is my music hero" — "whose technical skil was, and stil is, incredible (he was already musician at age 0)"; cybernoid's title was the first Tel tune he heard (source: s-sidin07-dustbin-interview).

On Hubbard and Galway#

Hubbard is "the Godfather of Commodore 64 music", who "tried to emulate a lot of different styles and mimic real instruments like bassguitar, electric guitar, drums, violin and piano", "extremely catchy and very 'to the point'"; Galway "is the guy who really used the Commodore 64 SID chip as a synthesizer", "more biased around atmosphere and sound", stretching one theme over many minutes (source: s-hugi38-interview-jeroen-tel). In 1997: "In the beginning, Rob Hubbard and Martin Galway. But I tried to do my own thing most of the time. Copying someone is boring." His favourite tunes by others are listed in s-sidmusic-jeroen-tel-interviews. Galway in turn liked his Cybernoid 2 theme (source: s-remix64-galway-interview); Hubbard counted him among the C64-era friends he was still in touch with in 1997 (source: s-sidmusic-hubbard-interviews); bob-yannes had not heard him, or any of them, in 1996 (source: s-sidmusic-yannes-interview).

Works and later career#

• Other platforms by 1997: Amiga (Agony, whose samples were cut to a low rate for memory), NES, SNES, Game Boy, Master System/Game Gear, Mega Drive, Saturn, 3DO, PlayStation; the last C64 job was Psygnosis' Lemmings; upcoming in 1991: OutRun Europa, Super Monaco Grand Prix, Supremacy (source: s-sidmusic-jeroen-tel-interviews).
• CDs under the Maniacs of Noise name — Vivid Video, Original Video Game Sound Effects (284 effects), The Video Game Soundmakers (1993), the single X-Mess-House (1992) — and a planned multi-composer remix album (source: s-sidmusic-jeroen-tel-interviews).
• A 2020s enthusiast site's summary: "the Dutch prodigy, was composing professional SID music by the age of fifteen and contributed to over a hundred titles" (source: s-commodore-64-eu-sid-chip; secondary).
• By 2014: 25 years of music for games, TV, commercials and film, sound design, DJ sets of remixed C64/Game Boy music (chiptune); live performances at X 2012 and Assembly 2012 (with VJ The C-Men); joined Oxyron in November 2012; an option on the London Symphony Orchestra playing MoN music; about 10 % of his music released (source: s-hugi38-interview-jeroen-tel).

Traces in others' sources (2026-08-30)#

• Johannes Bjerregaard's 1989 James Bond 3 demo, commissioned as "A DEMO OF THE MANIACS OF NOISE MUSIC STYLE", names an instrument JEROEN PLOINK — a Tel-style sound as a genre (source: s-realdmx-bjerregaard-player).
• The MUSICFILE note table he composed in for Cybernoid II is the tail of the driver's original 95-entry table (the eight lowest notes dropped), and its sequence transposes are upward only, 0–31 semitones (source: s-realdmx-deenen-test-tunes).

Named as the best (SIDin interviews, 2008–2010)#

hermit: "The best for me is Jeroen Tel. I think, he is one of the very-best composers in the world. I started to live-remix his composition and play them with my band in Hungary", listing Rubicon, Wiz, Aspar Grand Prix, Myth, Poseidon, Supremacy, Golden Axe, Eliminator, Cybernoid I and II and Savage (source: s-sidin12-hermit-interview); tsm and freedom both put him beside Hubbard and Hülsbeck, Freedom naming cybernoid-ii (source: s-sidin13-tsm-freedom-interview).

In the SIDin news (2003–2015)#

• hvsc kept finding his unreleased work: new tunes in 5.5 (2003-12-19), a featured composer in 45 (April 2006), and in 46 (2007-01-21) "Jeroen once again opened his treasure chest of unreleased tunes and gave the scene three 'new' songs. But we also found a bit of old and forgotten stuff from him"; more in 48 (March 2008) (source: s-sidin-news-digest).
• Tel Me More (sidin #15, 2015-10-31): "Jeroen Tel (Maniacs of Noise) remakes of his most memorable Commodore 64 video game soundtracks" on Indiegogo — Robocop 3, cybernoid-ii, Rubicon, Hawkeye, Myth, Turbo Outrun, Supremacy, Stormlord, Battle Valley, cybernoid, Eliminator, Iron Lord (source: s-sidin-news-digest).

Four more interviews (1989–2015)#

• C=Lehti 4/89 (he is 16): self-taught on guitar, piano, bass, drums and flute; his method — find chord progressions on the guitar, "type the chords as numbers into the machine", doodle melodies on the synthesizer over the C64's backing, add drums and a few special effects last (tracking-workflow); one to four days per composition; school exams could keep him off the machines for weeks; idols then Toto, Kim Wilde, FunFun (source: s-c-lehti-maniacs-of-noise).
• Domination #1 (1994): demo tunes in soundmonitor ("Madonna Remix"); "about ten demo-tunes" made to show at the PCW show; Electronic Arts offered him an in-house job — "I didn't really feel like moving to the USA at the age of fourteen"; Probe wanted his C64 music exclusively, and at eighteen he signed six months in-house as "Computer Audio Programmer"; by 1994 an Akai S3000 studio and a Nintendo-club-exclusive CD of studio versions (source: s-domination01-jeroen-tel-interview).
• IMR (1996): born in Eindhoven, raised in Helmond; scene chronology HCS (at 12) → The Artworks (13) → scoop-designs (14, in 1986) → Maniacs of Noise the same year; proudest moment — "everybody was playing the CYBERNOID title in their intros when I arrived at a party in Venlo" (cybernoid); his own theory of his impact: "I brought some kind of SONG feeling to the c64-music, since I always made up melodies with lyrics in my head" (melody-writing), literally copied by 20CC and an inspiration to DRAX; a planned 3-CD studio album of C64 classics with Hubbard, Galway and Follin, including "a CD-rom-track containing SIDPLAY plus the original SID-music" and an internet vote (source: s-imr-jeroen-tel-interview).
• GamesArt (2015), during Tel Me More: the 2015 wording of the driver story — Deenen "wrote a simple music routine and together we expanded it to meet my music (effects) needs" (musicfile); "The first game music I wrote was composed for the game Hawkeye, at the age of 14/15"; Level 42's "Hot Water" sent him and his brother into funk/slap bass, "a noticeable influence in the music I produce even today"; the Mortal Kombat plug-and-play conversion transcribed by ear in two weeks after other composers gave up; next: the pop act Tess & Tel ("Pixel Pop") and Pixel Racing (source: s-gamesart-jeroen-tel-interview).

Related#

maniacs-of-noise · charles-deenen · rob-hubbard · martin-galway · sid · filter-programming · chip-samples · multispeed · commodore-zone · sid-homepage

Sources#

s-hugi38-interview-jeroen-tel · s-sidmusic-jeroen-tel-interviews · s-sidmusic-hubbard-interviews · s-remix64-galway-interview · s-sidmusic-yannes-interview · s-witchmaster-creating-chiptunes-with-sid-wizard · s-commodore-64-eu-sid-chip · s-charles-deenen-interviews · s-vgmpf-maniacs-of-noise · s-realdmx-sid-players · s-cybernoid-behind-the-notes · s-vgmpf-soundmonitor-tfmx · s-recollection-brief-history-of-sid · s-chordian-sid-musicians · s-sidid-player-list · s-realdmx-bjerregaard-player · s-realdmx-deenen-test-tunes · s-sidin07-dustbin-interview · s-sidin12-hermit-interview · s-sidin13-tsm-freedom-interview · s-sidin-news-digest · s-c-lehti-maniacs-of-noise · s-domination01-jeroen-tel-interview · s-imr-jeroen-tel-interview · s-gamesart-jeroen-tel-interview · s-c64com-charles-deenen-interview · s-remix64-goto80-interview