Weak fore

So, according to a promotional site for some particular brand of yoga, these pure emotions mentioned in forum are as follows.... beneath the explanations are some sounds that I think could express these emotions Shringara Love Romantic love, more broadly speaking family and friends love. According to Indian mythology Male and Female energy used to be one entity then it decided to play a game of hide and seek with itself. Ergo we have 'romance', the embodiment of this game. Life exists purely for the enjoyment of this emotion You know what, I got no idea what love sounds like! Hasya Joy While this may manifest itself as humour it is at its best, joy that exists for no apparent reason. A major chord of course, preferably played on a piano Adbhuta Wonder Curiosity, mystery embracing your own ignorence The sound of a cartoon lightbulb turning on Shanta Peace Calmness, relaxation can only be achieved at the highest level of meditation/yoga induced relaxation. An ambient pad Sound of a garden on a Summer day Raudra Anger Irritation, stress through to full blown fury. A good thing to try and control, express it but do not exact the punishment. Someone bowing a violin badly Cats fighting Veera Courage having perfect control of the body and mind A note on a trumpet played well Karuna Sadness The conversion of sadness from being sad for oneself to being sad for others (compassionate). Opening chord for Rei's song (Neon Genisis) Bhayanaka Fear Product of the imagination Howling wind Vibhatsa Disgust Depression, self-pity the ego that has forsaken its kingdom. Ads for mobile phone ringtones/misc

Forum wk 3 1st year presentations

Well, most first years just presented their music concrete pieces. I'm baffled, there is no way every single first year is an ambitious young electronic art music composer, is this just another demonstration of the skew of favour within the EMU to this archaic monster? There are a multitude of aspects to 'music technology' most of them more profitable than the composition of (often) obscure music that (potentially) alienates the listener... Having said this, some of the compositions actually sounded cool, way to cool to be titled 'art' it's like serialist music all over again. Yay for Webern, the element of compromise! I think it is a credit to the technician when a concrete piece sounds like something you might hear and enjoy on 3D :-D. While it was a little rough still, I liked Scott H's intro for his song. There were some innovative foley sources and I liked that his composition had a purpose upon completion and was not just a composition for composition's sake. Non CC presentations included the audio track for a short animation (which seemed like a pretty seamless effort to me, well done), demonstrations of some video game music which Josh has composed (please note, in his enthusiasm to break into the industry, he is working for free. Something maybe justifiable if the video game company is not actually making any income at this time but none the less worrying. I wonder what sort of royalty scheme is in place fr the composition of video game music and sound effects) and Alex's AA. General consensus was that Alex had pulled a pretty good mix. He informed us that he had gone easy on the post production (the exact opposite of my current mind set). This has set me wondering, critique of a mix being the wholly subjective activity it is, can we even ascertain a 'good mix' without a reference. And then, are you convinced your reference is perfect, or are you just using it because you like it? Why is it I am forced to process my kick drum to fit into a certain mold? A kick drum in a room sounds nothing like a kick drum through a PA or recorded, who decided that the sound needed altering? Puzzling, maybe. Personally, I think that once I have nailed imitation, I shall try and reinvent everything :-D

Forum wk 2

I was sick

Forum wk 1

This week's forum raised some interesting issues, one which I have contemplated in some detail. We were looking at the nature of technology and how it affects our consumption of music. Today finds music more accessible than ever before in history courtesy of developments in recording technology and distribution through the internet. Some wonder if the ease of access to music has lessened its value. Certainly, the live performance has suffered from the recording (although more recently there has been an increase in live concert going as the record companies lose their stranglehold on music distribution to the internet). The other intrigue is the issue of fidelity. Up until about ten years ago, the quality of fidelity consistently improved. Then audio quality reached a point where the fine tuning of clarity became imperceivable to Joe Average, since then, the masses have in sacrificed quality in favour of ease of access and reduced cost (in the form of MP3 files shared over the internet). I have also seen people sacrifice fidelity through their play back devices. The MP3, headphone combo that has infiltrated the mainstream in the form of the ipod, listening to songs played back through mobile phone speakers and, my own personal dilemma, play back through crappy laptop speakers. In my own case, I often lament the reduced quality of playback but, without an easily accessible speaker system, make compromise in order to still be able to listen to music in some form. I have also had it suggested to me that the fact that people are happy to sacrifice fidelity is a compliment to the quality of the music that has been captured. That they are able from an incomplete image to still get full enjoyment from a song is testimony to the value that music has in our lives.

forum week 12

Something

forum week 11

four rum week ten

fourim 9

Seb - boundaries/milkcrates Works on the basis of two principles - contextualisation (taking things out of one context and using them in another). - limitations (maximum output, minimum input). The first composition Seb played us consisted of an 11 millisecond sample of sound. Using samples and a Max patch he turned this into 20 minutes worth of music. As incredible as this is, I can't seem to find any value for this style of composition beyond the gimmicky, it always has a similar sound - spacious, too alien to be pleasurable. Then Seb spoke at length about his milkcrate project. Sound hackers gather in a specified location for a 24 hour music making stint using only materials they can fit inside a milkcrate. (This fitting nicely with his ethos of context and limits). I find it interesting that, given the capacity to make sound with no limitations, people create limitations for themselves... Darren Curtis - IS MAKING MONEY FROM SOUND/COMPOSITION GOOD GRIEF we should bring him back for the career management class! This guy is the mastermind behind the 'Music of the Spheres' Fringe event. He actually created this experience to investigate the effect of sound on the brain/people in environments. So, very intriguing, cymatics - wave phenomena (galaxy patterns). Sound has an effect on sand, stuff, surely water, and so probably us. The question is how? Well, Darren doesn't quite have the conclusion to that yet but he outlined how he made his composition based on scientific findings (space makes music, F#, A and C# in fact). These frequencies can be found as standing waves in pyramids too (and there is a pyramid in Mexico where, if you stand at the base in a certain spot and clap, the echo returns as a bird call. REALLY COOL STUFF).

britney comes to forum

Well, this forum was absolutely jam packed with information. Our guest speaker, Peter, had two, entirely different topics to speak about and we got to hear of both. Topic one: Doing a live recording of a 20 piece big band ensemble, how the heck to approach it... PRE PRODUCTION!!!!! Peter couldn't stress enough the value of solid pre production when you have 20 odd people hanging around expecting everything to go smoothly. Handy/obvious advice included confirming with the band and booking your recording space well in advance of the recording day, inspecting the studio resources so to know what you have to play with. Coming in personally to assess the space and equipment/checking everything listed in the resources is physically present. Establishing how you want the band located in the room and making a diagram (which stays in the room). It seems that protoolsing things up is inevitable. Peter found that the trumpets and piano player might nail their parts straight up but the trombonists sound better on the fifth take, he spent a bit of time afterwards mixing and matching takes until he had the best of everything. He also extensively cleaned up spill on the various tracks. The second hour was spent talking about sound production in the advertising industry (where the money is). So the secrets to these super smooth, highly produced sounds....compression, LOTS of it, auto tune/rhythm (Peter says no advances have been made in audio fidelity over the last 10 years, just corrective plugins - how sad). Engineers cut away the gaps in between vocals to make the singer seem even bigger than life. Engineers working on big advertising projects get to use huge protools sessions capable of supporting 190 tracks. There can be potentially 5 or 6 different mixes of the same song stacked on top of each other. The reason for this is because Advertising executives and the so forth are probably in the control room with the engineering and wanting to listen to all available options so as to be able to choose their preferred mix. It seemed to me that this would prove to be an organisational NIGHTMARE. Peter stays on top of things by using markers

Forum out at sea

In brief, today's forum was a tribute to the recently deceased Tristram Cary who, among many other illustrious things, finished building the Adelaide uni EMU and then taught here for many a year. It seems this non household namer in parallel with other modernist composers, carved himself out a niche as a pioneer of electronically generated music. In fact, teamed up with another fellow, creating one of the first synths was an exercise in raising capital (cash). When he wasn't making his knowledge of electronics and music work for him he was creating avant garde compositions. In fact, his composition provides the music for the early episodes of Dr Who. Eventually he ended up teaching Music tech at Adelaide uni. It's a nice city, the living is cheap, certainly, he would have had no competition here. Anyway, the idea that most interested me was in post presentation discussion time. Something about music in context, the masses might not put on an album of Tristram Cary compositions on but they will enjoy his music in the context of Dr Who. Likewise, a Raver probably won't sit still and listen to Drum and Bass, the will consume this product in the context of the Rave. I haven't any opinion on this phenomenon yet, it's just interesting to note.

Week Fix a forum and mash it up some

This week’s forum saw us spend a large chunk of time listening to mashups in conjunction with completely unrelated visual material (which of course, our minds spent the entire time trying to relate to the audio). The end of forum featured the obligatory debate between 2nd/3rd years and lecturers again with the theme of value. So, our bringer of mashupdom, a woman called Vicki Bennet says herself that she takes music of little note and mixes it with more music of little note. (of course, this is assuming that everyone hates a catchy tune just because it is simple). It was suggested that because the end product possibly required little energy to create, it has little value.. Well, to me, it seems like Vicki is using the songs like Pierre uses sampled sound, like a DJ uses vinyl, like a pianist uses the piano or dare I say, like a composer uses an orchestra. Does the end result have worth? It is certainly listenable. How much energy goes into making it? Does it matter? The composer is still striving for a preconceived musical aesthetic. Does that not put the mash up artist in the same category as a traditional composer? Could it be that the concept of instrumentation is evolving, ever more things coming under this scope (I mean, if John Cage can stand there is all seriousness and play a bowl of water…). Whatever conclusions people draw, I think Vicki could conceivably be put in the same box as our friend Pierre.

For Rum...where is the rum?

Truly, hit and miss/random chance composition is the composition of our era. It is rife through commercial music (the stuff of bands, not the stuff of pop singers who could not be more removed from hit and miss composition if they jumped on a boat to the Antarctic), it certainly appears to be the main mode of music creation amongst the electronic noise artists, even the Classicists sometimes abandon themselves to formulas (take Serialism for example). So, today in forum we found out about a French, Music Concrete fellow named Pierre. I wouldn't say so much that this guy is a composer of one kind or the other, more a fanatic of sound. Sound is his instrument, he has a library of samples as long as my arm and the means to summon them at will (almost, and with the aid of his wife Bernadette). His compositions consist of to my interpretation, simple improvisation with his samples as the notes on his instrument. Of the works that we heard, I much preferred his collaboration with standard rock music than his pure noise works (with Pierre referring to his best known Rock music collaboration as being to him as The Bolero was to Ravel...to both these composers I say - lighten up, perhaps the people like these because they sound good, perhaps a good composition is not necessarily a technical one!). Amazingly enough, his remixed Classical music features standard mainstream techno beats, these works have aged quite well...

Wk 4 forum

Continuing on with the presentations of work done by second and third years, the idea that the composer is obsolete is now firmly established in my mind. The music that students create using technology rarely has any premeditated design...but it sounds fine, and is applicable to the real world..chances are people would pay for a CD of it (gullible fools). So, who needs a composer nowadays when you can grab and sound tech student from uni and tell them to go through a, b and c arbitrary sound manipulating processes to produce an end product. (Not that this is necessarily a bad thing, it could be the natural evolution of music, I mean, I use this same trial and error, do it if it sounds good technique when I am coming up with riffs..). So, what proof do I have of this phenomenon this week....our friend Freddy was told to make 'sounds' using a guitar (strictly not allowed to 'play' said guitar though). He sequenced and recorded these sounds using software sequencing programs where in real time he was then able to add effects and processing to these 'sounds' (like mass pitch shift, reverb and the such). He made recordings of his output and chose his favourite out of several. This end composition surely is nothing more than the nicest/most interesting sounding out of a collection of potential compositions generated out of the experimental process. But it sounds absolutely awesome, I would not be surprised if I heard it on a TV show, or in a video game, somehow, it has value.

Wk 3 Forum looking at other students wonderful creations

Today in forum, we first years got to experience some of the work that the second and third years have done in their time at Adelaide. By the end of the lecture I found myself wondering about composition, their compositions and the value of a composition…and the composer…. Take John for example… I can only really describe his software as a composition generator. He has programmed software to trigger random samples (the random samples mostly consisted of sample tank strings) and made a whole bunch of recordings. Stating that he programmed this software because he likes large tone clusters, I can only assume that his favourite recording out of 20 featured a lot of these along with the standard build and decay present in most music. Two students on and another piece of software that does similar things…in this instance it was Dave with his ‘self contained sampling unit with on board effects processing unit’. With the samples that Dave loaded in, I can see no value in this thing at all. Potentially, with different samples, the resulting ‘music’ might be more, uh, musical, at any rate, the end result is a product of chance and whimsy. So, what value can a piece composed in this manner could possibly have? If the end result hasn’t been premeditated in some way, if you just land on it by chance, can it still claim legitimacy as a composition and value as a piece of music?

Blogs - Black Holes of Time just like this one

It seems that by missing forum, I missed nothing of consequence as it consisted of two hours conversing on the subject of ....BLOGS So my thoughts on the things? Maybe they are a useful tool for spreading your message, promoting yourself or others, finding like minded people...the online blog provides a free, easy access platform to speak your mind, essentially becoming a virtual soapbox. I am sure there are a slim number of instances where this freedom to speak and distribute your thoughts amongst the growing number of people suffering blogitis (an overwhelming compulsion to vent your woes/joys or blabber your message freely). however, the most widespread use of the blog is meer self glorification. Most people use them as a kind of online, immensely public journal. Maybe, in a way, this appeals to people because it provides a easy, hit and miss platform to vent and seek counsel with your peers...maybe the perpetrators of these irrelevant online journals are meerly somewhat self obsessive (see the entire emo culture). Whatever, this overl;oad of personal information leads to a generation of people who know their friends better through reading their blogs and personal info than through conversation with them. It also lends itself the the growing practice of voyeurism in our society (ie the slew of reality tv shows bombarding our primetime telly). In a nutshell, I think that a 2 hour forum on blogs would probably have been a black hole of time just like the blog phenomenon it seeks to discuss.

On the surface, this appeared to be a forum about collaboration. Out of 6 speakers only 1 managed to tie in her shameless product plugging with any real advice…and anyway, I don’t think we were there to learn about collaboration at all, I think we just wanted to hear Mr Audiomulch speak his bit (and to witness awesome robot origami flowers).

Our Audio Mulch man was attempting to collaborate music and technology (not really such a radical idea really as instrument makers have been doing this since the first musical bows *footnote 1*). He wanted to create software that could augment sound in real time (IE a live performance orientated synthesizor)…the result…Audiomulch (a project which, incidentally, required collaborative efforts with 30 software engineers to get off the ground).

After the AudioMulch project, he became a collaborator in a much more ambitious music tech instrument design project….The ReacTable (apparently these won’t be
released for the mainstream any time soon because there is no market for them. PFFFFFFT!)

This instrument is a collaborative effort realised by people with a diverse range of skills. It is essentially a synthesizor but, every parametre is controlled by placing/removing and manipulating specialized objects on a big, flat, blue, round thing (I later found out that the ReacTable (probably) “sees” the objects courtesy of a scanner *footnote 2*). Even in it’s finalised form, used as a live performance instrument, the music produced by ReacTable benefits from team work.


1) David Moss – 2001 Victor Folk Festival
2) My mate Luc about 2 weeks ago

lisa wants a reactable (or, the blog we didn't need)

On the surface, this appeared to be a forum about collaboration. Out of 6 speakers only 1 managed to tie in her shameless product plugging with any real advice…and anyway, I don’t think we were there to learn about collaboration at all, I think we just wanted to hear Mr Audiomulch speak his bit (and to witness awesome robot origami flowers). Our Audio Mulch man was attempting to collaborate music and technology (not really such a radical idea really as instrument makers have been doing this since the first musical bows). He wanted to create software that could augment sound in real time (IE a live performance orientated synthesizor)…the result…Audiomulch (a project which, incidentally, required collaborative efforts with 30 software engineers to get off the ground). After the AudioMulch project, he became a collaborator in a much more ambitious music tech instrument design project….The ReacTable (apparently these won’t be released for the mainstream any time soon because there is no market for them. PFFFFFFT!) This instrument is a collaborative effort realised by people with a diverse range of skills. It is essentially a synthesizor but, every parametre is controlled by placing/removing and manipulating specialized objects on a big, flat, blue, round thing (I later found out that the ReacTable (probably) “sees” the objects courtesy of a scanner ). Even in it’s finalised form, used as a live performance instrument, the music produced by ReacTable benefits from team work.