The Cinema Audio Society has announced the inaugural Jeffrey S. Wexler Award for Advancement in Sound Technology. The annual award honors individuals, companies or products whose innovations have significantly improved existing methods or are so innovative in nature that they have materially changed how sound is recorded, edited, mixed or delivered.
This year’s award will honor achievements in non-linear technology for sound recording, editing and mixing. Recipients will be honored at the CAS Awards on March 7 at the Beverly Hilton.
Recipients of the 2026 Jeffrey S. Wexler Award for Advancement in Sound Technology are:
–Evan Brooks, cofounded Digidrums with Peter Gotcher in 1983, and the company was incorporated in 1984 as Digidesign, Inc. He developed the audio editing software package Sound Designer, and then Sound Tools, the first affordable, professional digital audio workstation, paving the way for the introduction and success of Pro Tools.
–Peter Gotcher, cofounded Digidesign with Evan Brooks and served as its president, CEO, and chairman. Digidesign became the world’s leading manufacturer of digital audio workstations. After Digidesign was acquired by Avid in January of 1995, he remained as executive VP of Avid until 1996. He currently serves as chairman of Dolby Laboratories.
–Glen Sanders, founder and president of Zaxcom. In the 1990s, he worked closely with Zaxcom’s engineering team to develop the Deva portable digital audio disk recorder, the first multitrack, file-based recording system designed for location sound.
–Howard Stark, chief engineer at Zaxcom. Stark made enduring contributions to the design and development of professional audio technologies used throughout film and television production. He led the engineering design for the Deva portable hard disk recorder.
The award is named in honor of the late Jeffrey S. Wexler CAS, the revered production mixer, leader, educator, and consummate sound professional whose career exemplified both technical excellence and forward-looking innovation. He passed away on December 9, 2025. His career spanned more than 40 years and included an impressive resume of more than 70 feature films, hundreds of commercials and numerous documentaries. Wexler was honored with a BAFTA Film Award for Best Sound for Almost Famous and was a two-time Academy Award® nominee, as well as an Emmy® and CAS Award nominee for his work on The Last Samurai, Independence Day and the HBO film 61. In 2011, he was the recipient of the CAS Career Achievement Award.
Wexler was among the first to use digital audio tape (DAT) and was at the forefront of file-based production recorders, which ushered in the next major technical transition in motion picture sound recording and the way virtually all sound is recorded today.
Peter Kurland, president of CAS, noted, “Honoring Jeff with an award that celebrates technological advancement is especially fitting. Throughout his long and deeply respected career, Jeff was always on the cutting edge, embracing new tools, improving established practices, and adopting new and better ways of working. Innovation is the foundation of this award, and we are proud to recognize four individuals who embody that same ingenuity. Congratulations Evan, Peter, Glenn and Howard. Your contributions have elevated audio quality and revolutionized the workflow of every sound professional.”
Wexler’s children, Vanessa Withers and David Wexler, commented on the award in a joint statement. “Our father would be delighted to be recognized in this way by his friends and colleagues at CAS. His curiosity, creativity, and deep commitment to his work was inspiring to so many. Our family wants to thank the Committee and CAS for memorializing his legacy within the sound community; to see his name on an award that honors his ingenuity is deeply moving to us.”
Applications for the 2027 Jeffrey S. Wexler Award will begin early in the second quarter of 2026. Rules, entry guidelines and a detailed timeline will be announced shortly. Applications may be submitted by committee members, CAS members, product manufacturers and individual inventors. Awards may be given to a specific technology, individual or product, or to multiple recipients honoring a broader category of contribution.
As previously announced, the CAS Awards will honor Academy Award®–winning filmmaker Guillermo del Toro with the Filmmaker Award, and sound mixer Skip Lievsay CAS, who will receive the CAS Career Achievement Award.
