Roger Scott Nichols (September 22, 1944 – April 9, 2011) was an American recording engineer, producer, and inventor. Nichols is best known for his work with the group Steely Dan and John Denver. He was also the audio engineer for numerous major music acts including the Beach Boys, Stevie Wonder, Frank Zappa, Crosby Stills & Nash, Al Di Meola, Rosanne Cash, Roy Orbison, Cass Elliot, Plácido Domingo, Gloria Estefan, Diana Ross, Béla Fleck and the Flecktones, Rickie Lee Jones, Kenny Loggins, Mark Knopfler, Eddie Murphy, Michael McDonald, James Taylor, and Toots Thielemans, among others. On February 11, 2012, Nichols was awarded a Special Merit/Technical Grammy Award, his eighth Grammy overall. In May 2010 Nichols was diagnosed with stage IV pancreatic cancer. He died from the disease at his home on April 9, 2011. In his subsequent New York Times obituary, Nichols was referred to in the headline as an "Artist Among Sound Engineers." The Roger Nichols Recording Method, his guide to audio engineering, was released by Alfred Music Publishing on June 17, 2013. Early life Roger Nichols was born in Oakland, California. His father was a U.S. Air Force B-47 pilot; as a result the Nichols family lived in various spots in the U.S. for the first eleven years of his life. In 1957 his family settled in Cucamonga, California, where Nichols attended High School. One of his classmates was Frank Zappa; Zappa would drop by Nichols' house to "play guitar, and we would do multiple passes of guitars and bounce them together" on Nichols' first recording device, a reel-to-reel tape deck using quarter inch tape. He attended Oregon State University where he studied nuclear physics. From 1965 to 1968 he was a nuclear operator at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (aka SONGS). From nuclear operator to recording engineer Nichols and some friends created their own recording studio, Quantum Studios, in Torrance, California in 1965. The facility originally was a four-car garage; it was converted into a four-track studio to record high school bands. A hi-fi supply store, created as a side business by Nichols and his partners, brought in clients and contacts that led to recording commercials, with future stars Karen Carpenter and Larry Carlton performing on some of the spots; another musician Nichols recorded in this era was the former Mouseketeer Cubby O'Brien, on the drums. Nichols also recorded Kenny Rogers, then with the First Edition; the