26 research outputs found
Real-time emulation of the Clavinet
none3siopenLeonardo Gabrielli, Vesa VÀlimÀki, Stefan BilbaoGabrielli, Leonardo; VÀlimÀki, Vesa; Bilbao, Stefa
A digital waveguide-based approach for Clavinet modeling and synthesis
The Clavinet is an electromechanical musical instrument produced in the mid-twentieth century. As is the case for other vintage instruments, it is subject to aging and requires great effort to be maintained or restored. This paper reports analyses conducted on a Hohner Clavinet D6 and proposes a computational model to faithfully reproduce the Clavinet sound in real time, from tone generation to the emulation of the electronic components. The string excitation signal model is physically inspired and represents a cheap solution in terms of both computational resources and especially memory requirements (compared, e.g., to sample playback systems). Pickups and amplifier models have been implemented which enhance the natural character of the sound with respect to previous work. A model has been implemented on a real-time software platform, Pure Data, capable of a 10-voice polyphony with low latency on an embedded device. Finally, subjective listening tests conducted using the current model are compared to previous tests showing slightly improved results
Beyond key velocity: Continuous sensing for expressive control on the Hammond Organ and Digital keyboards
In this thesis we seek to explore the potential for continuous key position to be
used as an expressive control in keyboard musical instruments, and how preexisting
skills can be adapted to leverage this additional control. Interaction between
performer and sound generation on a keyboard instrument is often restricted
to a number of discrete events on the keys themselves (notes onsets and
offsets), while complementary continuous control is provided via additional interfaces,
such as pedals, modulation wheels and knobs. The rich vocabulary of
gestures that skilled performers can achieve on the keyboard is therefore often
simplified to a single, discrete velocity measurement. A limited number of acoustical
and electromechanical keyboard instruments do, however, present affordances
of continuous key control, so that the role of the key is not limited to delivering
discrete events, but its instantaneous position is, to a certain extent, an element of
expressive control. Recent evolutions in sensing technologies allow to leverage continuous
key position as an expressive element in the sound generation of digital
keyboard musical instruments.
We start by exploring the expression available on the keys of the Hammond
organ, where nine contacts are closed at different points of the key throw for each
key onset and we find that the velocity and the percussiveness of the touch affect
the way the contacts close and bounce, producing audible differences in the onset
transient of each note.
We develop an embedded hardware and software environment for low-latency
sound generation controlled by continuous key position, which we use to create
two digital keyboard instruments. The first of these emulates the sound of a Hammond
and can be controlled with continuous key position, so that it allows for
arbitrary mapping between the key position and the nine virtual contacts of the
digital sound generator. A study with 10 musicians shows that, when exploring
the instrument on their own, the players can appreciate the differences between
different settings and tend to develop a personal preference for one of them. In the
second instrument, continuous key position is the fundamental means of expression:
percussiveness, key position and multi-key gestures control the parameters
of a physical model of a flute. In a study with 6 professional musicians playing
this instrument we gather insights on the adaptation process, the limitations of the
interface and the transferability of traditional keyboard playing techniques
Copying, copyright and originality; imitation, transformation and popular musicians
With copyright becoming ever more important for business and government, this article argues for a more nuanced understanding of the practices and values associated with copying in popular music culture and advocates a more critical approach to notions of originality. Drawing from interviews with working musicians this article challenges the approaches to copying and popular music that pitch corporate notions of piracy against creative sharing by citizens. It explores differing approaches to the circulation of recordings and identifies three distinct types of creative copying: i) learning through imitation, ii) copying as transformation, iii) copying for commercial opportunity. The article then considers how copying is caught between a commercial necessity for familiar musical products that must conform to existing expectations and a copyright legislative rationale requiring original sounds with individual owners. The article highlights how legacies from a long history of human copying as a means of acquiring knowledge and skills leads to a collision of creative musical practices, commercial imperatives and copyright regulation and results in a series of unavoidable tensions around originality and copying that are a central characteristic of cultural production
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Growing cybernetic ears: transduction and performativity in the analogue and digital what have you
At a time when digital technologies have become ubiquitous in music making, and where the majority of research into music technology happens at the computational âcutting edgeâ, this practice-based PhD explores analogue technologies deemed, in the main, obsolete, anachronistic, or as quaint nostalgic throwbacks, and asks how a combination of technological, historical and practice-based research, focused through commitment to artistic outputs in the domain of music technology, might shed new light on the terms analogue and digital, and on the nature of the analogue-digital relationship.
Underlying much contemporary enthusiasm for âthe digitalâ are progress narratives that rely on both a succession logic (old analogue technology gets replaced by new digital technology) and an assumption of isomorphism (the digital technology does all the same things as the replaced technology, though often with âenhancedâ affordances). This thesis questions such assumptions along historical, philosophical and practice-based trajectories.
Key to these research trajectories is the trans-discipline cybernetics, in particular the second-order cybernetics of Gordon Pask, whose self-designation âphilosophical mechanicâ indicates the importance he placed on a cyclical, mutually accommodating thinking-designing-making. Pask presented a powerful practical methodology for the examination and creation of dynamical systems in flux, systems that evolve as a result of participant interaction, systems that can be seen to manifest self-organisation. Second-order cybernetics puts the emphasis on processes in interaction rather than positing pre-existing objects (including concepts) in a world âout thereâ. Cybernetics helps us to explore systems whose complexity and interdependence precludes the separation out into constituent parts, systems where control is shared across multiple mutually interacting dimensions, and where the observer is a committed participant whose actions, interests and biases cannot be divorced from the interactions therein.
Two other key concepts are: (1) transduction, which relates energy, information, patterns of growth, or other dynamical processes across media or between domains; (2) performativity, an interventional act that brings forth a world. Transduction is essential to an understanding of recording studio processes and practices: the microphone, signal processing and recording itself all rely on transduction. When viewed from a performative perspective, actions such as recording are found to be carried out very differently when the final stage of transduction is discrete (the case with the now ubiquitous digital audio workstation) or continuous (such as recording to tape). This difference is primarily due to the hyper-plasticity of digital audio, a taking of sound âout of timeâ. Rather than seeing this as an evolution of âprecursorâ analogue technologies, as most accounts have it, this thesis takes the perspective that this is a difference in kind, rather than one of degree, and explores that difference with a particular focus on emergent and intertwined cultural, embodied and technological systems, rather than on end products.
The second half of the thesis presents the compositional practice, ranging from experimental work on tape music composition and installation, through a series of modular synthesis live performances, to tape-based recording of pop music. The physical, gestural engagement with the resistant materiality of these technologies emphasises a very different cognitive engagement with processes of composition and production to that which happens with supposed âsuccessorâ digital technologies; assumptions of isomorphism, buttressed by skeuomorphic emulation, tend to occlude this cognitive distinction.
This thesis is offered as an act of cybernetic musicking â resolutely practical in orientation, with a wide-ranging, trans-disciplinary theoretical framework, and with the emphasis not on things but on ongoing processes in complex interaction with a world in constant becoming
How can a contemporary composer use film to enhance music?
There is a body of literature on music in film, and some analytical writing on music video, but almost no writing that approaches the subject from the point of view of how the film might support the music. My research question is, therefore, how can moving images help a composer to communicate music to an audience?
To resolve this question I first analysed a number of key music/film works and formulated a hypothesis that there are five modes where film can support music. These are by
âą First Mode: creating an ambience conducive to the appreciation of music
âą Second Mode: using filmic tools such as editing and camerawork to emphasise musical elements
âą Third Mode: supplying context about the work and its creation
âą Fourth Mode: embedding the music in a format that facilitates the musicâs appreciation
âą Fifth Mode: embedding the music into the narrative structure of the film.
To explore this hypothesis I created three music/film artworks that utilised the techniques above. These were a video installation, a film that creates a supportive ambience for a set of piano nocturnes, and a feature length music documentary that features a number of music videos.
In the conclusion I will state that through these works I have shown that these five modes do indeed enable film to support music
Rock Becomes Jazz: Interpretations of Popular Music by Improvising Artists in the 1960s
The advent of rock and roll changed the jazz worldâs relationship to itself and its musical public. The popularity of jazz, in decline since the rise of bebop in the mid-1940s, was further eroded by rock and rollâs rise to prominence in the mid-1950s. By the mid-1960s, the jazz world seemed to be faced with a choice: adapt to accommodate the burgeoning new genre or risk fading further into popular irrelevance. Many jazz artists chose to ignore rock, oftentimes viewing it as a simple-minded pursuit dominated by white artists stealing from black musicians. Other artists, though, chose to engage with the new music and bring it into the jazz world by interpreting rock repertoire. In a way, this trend was no different than the time-honored jazz tradition of interpreting contemporary popular songs. Interpreting rock songs and incorporating them into their repertoire was different, though, because of the many prejudices that jazz musicians held toward rock music and the relative simplicity of rockâs musical attributes.
This paper is dedicated to the in-depth study of jazz versions of rock music in the 1960s. By examining biographies and interviews, I highlight the various musical, commercial and racial considerations that were present for jazz artists during this era and seek answers to the following questions: How do jazz musicians deal with changing times, and how do their musical choices reflect that? What do these choices and processes say about their musical/artistic worldview and what non-musical considerations influence the decision making process? How do commercial considerations fuel the choices made by jazz musicians? How do these early interpretations of rock music in a jazz context pave the way for future crossover between the two genres? With these queries as a backdrop, I delve deeply into the the musical attributes of each selection, including form, key, tempo, meter, melody and harmony. Through these musical specifics and in conjunction with relevant testimony from the artists and observers, I arrive at conclusions regarding the interpretive methods and their relative commercial and/or artistic success.
Overall, there has been relatively little academic analysis devoted to the covering of rock music by jazz musicians, and this paper is intended to fill that void. The influence of rock music on the jazz world has been important in modern jazz, both in the jazz-rock fusion of the 1970s and the massive up swing of rock songs in the jazz repertoire in 2000s. Looking closely at the first attempts at combining jazz and rock provides a clear foundation for these efforts. Additionally, close study of 1960s jazz interpretations of rock music highlights certain musical, commercial and racial considerations that colored the choices made by artists in the 1960s and continue to influence artistsâ decision-making processes in the 21st century.unpublishedis peer reviewe
Controllers as musical instruments, controllerism as musical practice - practices of a new 21st century musical culture
This thesis consists of an ethnomusicological approach to the development of Controllers as
musical instruments, and conceptualizes Controllerism as a musical practice. I make a case for a
revision in organology that includes Controllers, and other instruments of the computer society, by
seeking out commonalities and providing comparative analyses between historical instruments and
modern Controllers. I then provide definitions of the term Controllerism; by discussing its origins,
history, musical logics, strains of musical practice, and current technological explorations. By situating
the Controller and Controllerism in a cultural and historical timeline, I have traced informing logics
that have led to the development of this new instrument and musical practice. Ethnography has been
undertaken with informants from Europe, America and Japan in order to ascertain generalized
understandings of the instrument and musical practice; and participatory action research undergone
in three separate artist residencies with the intent of determining common perspectives and
concerns of international Controllerists. A Portuguese case-study has provided a unique glimpse, by
comparison, of this emerging art-form and growing mind-set in modern music.Esta tese é uma aproximação etnomusicológica ao desenvolvimento dos controladores como
instrumentos musicais, e conceitualiza o chamado Controllerism como uma prĂĄtica musical. Defendo
a ideia de uma revisĂŁo no campo da organologia que inclua os controladores e outros instrumentos
da computer society, procurando pontos em comum e providenciando anĂĄlises comparativas entre
instrumentos históricos e controladores modernos. Apresentarei definiçÔes do termo Controllerism;
discutindo as suas origens, histĂłria, lĂłgicas musicais, vertentes de prĂĄtica musical, e as atuais
exploraçÔes tecnológicas. Situando o controlador e o Controllerism numa linhagem cultural e
histĂłrica, identifico as lĂłgicas que levaram ao desenvolvimento deste novo instrumento e desta nova
pråtica musical. Para tal, elaborei uma etnografia com informantes da Europa, América e Japão com
o objetivo de compreender noçÔes comuns sobre o instrumento e a pråtica musical; fiz também
pesquisa participativa em trĂȘs residĂȘncias artĂsticas, com a intenção de determinar perspetivas e
preocupaçÔes comuns entre Controllerists internacionais. Finalmente, através de um estudo de caso
em Portugal, providencio uma visĂŁo Ășnica, comparativamente falando, desta forma de arte
emergente e estilo de vida na mĂșsica moderna