Saturday 23 March 2013

pulse

in music and music theory, the pulse consists of beats[1] in a (repeating) series of identical yet distinct periodic short-duration stimuli perceived as points intime[1] occurring at the mensural level. "This pulse is typically what listeners entrain to as they tap their foot or dance along with a piece of music (Handel, 1989), and is also colloquially termed the 'beat,' or more technically the 'tactus'.

frippertronics


frippertronics is a specific tape looping technique used by Robert Fripp.[1] It evolved from a system of tape looping originally developed in the electronic music studios of the early 1960s that was first used by composers Terry Riley and Pauline Oliveros and made popular through its use in ambient music by composer Brian Eno.

frippertronics (a term coined by poet Joanna Walton, Fripp's lover in the late 1970s) is an analog delay system consisting of two reel-to-reel tape recorders situated side-by-side. The two machines are configured so that the tape travels from the supply reel of the first machine to the take-up reel of the second, thereby allowing sound recorded by the first machine to be played back some time later on the second. The audio of the second machine is routed back to the first, causing the delayed signal to repeat while new audio is mixed in with it. The amount of delay (usually three to five seconds) is controlled by increasing or reducing the distance between the machines.
fripp used this technique to dynamically create recordings containing layer upon layer of electric guitar sounds in a real time fashion. An added advantage was that, by nature of the technique, the complete performances were recorded in their entirety on the original looped tape.
in the mid-1990s, Fripp revamped the Frippertronics concept into "Soundscapes", which dramatically expanded the flexibility of the method using digital technology (delays and synthesizers).

ostinato


in music, an ostinato (derived from Italian: stubborn, compare English: 'obstinate') is a motif or phrase, that persistently repeats in the same musical voice, usually at the same pitch. The best-known ostinato-based piece may be Ravel's Boléro.[1]

an ostinato is always a succession of equal sounds, where each note has the same weight or stress. 
The repeating idea may be a rhythmic pattern, part of a tune, or a complete melodyin itself.[2] 
Both ostinatos and ostinati are accepted English plural forms, the latter reflecting the word's Italian etymology

strictly speaking, ostinati should have exact repetition, but in common usage, the term covers repetition with variation 
and development, such as the alteration of an ostinato line to fit changing harmonies or keys
if the cadence may be regarded as the cradle of tonality, the ostinato patterns can be considered the playground in 
which it grew strong and self-confident.

—edward e. lewinsky

sampling


in musicsampling is the act of taking a portion, or sample, of one sound recording and reusing it as an instrument or a sound recording in a different song or piece.
originally developed by experimental musicians working with musique concrète and electroacoustic music, who physically manipulated tape loops orvinyl records on a phonograph by the late 1960s, the use of tape loop sampling influenced the development of minimalist music and the production ofpsychedelic rock and jazz fusion.

twelve-tone technique


12-tone technique—also known as dodecaphonytwelve-tone serialism, and (in British usage) twelve-note composition—is a method of musicalcomposition devised by Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg (1874–1951). The technique is a means of ensuring that all 12 notes of the chromatic scale are sounded as often as one another in a piece of music while preventing the emphasis of any one note[3] through the use of tone rows, an ordering of the 12 pitches. All 12 notes are thus given more or less equal importance, and the music avoids being in a key. The technique was influential on composers in the mid-20th century.
Schoenberg himself described the system as a "Method of Composing with Twelve Tones Which are Related Only with One Another".[4] However, the common English usage is to describe the method as a form of serialism.
Schoenberg's countryman and contemporary Josef Matthias Hauer also developed a similar system using unordered hexachords or tropes—but with no connection to Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique. Other composers have created systematic use of the chromatic scale, but Schoenberg's method is considered to be historically and aesthetically most significant.
sound object / pierre schaeffer / 1959, 1977 

has a time scale that encompasses events of a duration associated with the elementary unit of composition in scores: the note. A note usually lasts from about 100 ms to several seconds, and is played by an instrument or sung by a vocalist. The concept of sound object extends this to allow any sound, from any source. To Schaeffer, the pure objet sonore was a sound whose origin a listener could not identify. A broader interpretation takes any sound within a stipulated temporal limit as a sound object.

Monday 18 March 2013

musique concrète

editing together recorded fragments of natural and industrial sounds / pierre schaeffer / pierre henry /  disk-cutting lathe / four turntables / a four-channel mixer / filters / an echo chamber / and a mobile recording unit / 1948

halim el-dabh & electroacoustic tape music

low-fidelity magnetic wire recorders in use since around 1900 /  AEG developed the first practical audio tape recorder / berlin / 1935

spread of tape recorders eventually led to the development of electroacoustic tape music / first known example was composed by Halim El-Dabh / The Expression of Zaar / cairo / 1944 









abrupt piece of advice

burial + soya milk = a feast for your senses.
first performer to record radio broadcasts and studio master recordings on tape / development of America's first commercially made professional tape recorder / Bing Crosby / the Model 200 
first practical audio tape recorder / berlin / AEG /  1935
employed electromechanical designs and they paved the way for the later emergence of electronic instruments /  Telharmonium / dynamophone / 1898–1912
earliest known sound recording device / phonautograph / 1857

Sketch of a New Esthetic of Music

"Only a long and careful series of experiments, and a continued training of the ear, can render this unfamiliar material approachable and plastic for the coming generation, and for Art."

                                                              - - -

Music as an art, our so-called occidental music, is hardly four hundred years old; its state is one of development, perhaps the very first stage of a development beyond present conception, and we—we talk of "classics" and "hallowed traditions"! And we have talked of them for a long time!
We have formulated rules, stated principles, laid down laws;—we apply laws made for maturity to a child that knows nothing of responsibility!
Young as it is, this child, we already recognize that it possesses one radiant attribute which signalizes it beyond all its elder sisters. And the lawgivers will not see this marvelous attribute, lest their laws should be thrown to the winds. This child—it floats on air! It touches not the earth with its feet. It knows no law of gravitation. It is well nigh incorporeal. Its material is transparent. It is sonorous air. It is almost Nature herself. It is—free!
But freedom is something that mankind have never wholly comprehended, never realized to the full. They can neither recognize or acknowledge it.
They disavow the mission of this child; they hang weights upon it. This buoyant creature must walk decently, like anybody else. It may scarcely be allowed to leap—when it were its joy to follow the line of the rainbow, and to break sunbeams with the clouds

 Ferruccio Busoni (1907)

Electronic music is music that employs electronic musical instruments and electronic music technology in its production. In general a distinction can be made between sound produced using electromechanical means and that produced using electronic technology.[1] Examples of electromechanical sound producing devices include thetelharmoniumHammond organ, and the electric guitar. Purely electronic sound production can be achieved using devices such as the Thereminsound synthesizer, andcomputer.[2]
Electronic music was once associated almost exclusively with Western art music but from the late 1960s on the availability of affordable music technology meant that music produced using electronic means became increasingly common in the popular domain.[3]Today electronic music includes many varieties and ranges fromexperimental art music to popular forms such as electronic dance music.

- Wikipedia