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An aleatoric electronic soundscape.
Do’Issusah
16 Saturday Feb 2013
Posted in music
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Those voices are actually my voice- electronically processed of course.
Early on in my explorations of new music, I ran across a fellow named Derek Piotr. I was curious about what he was doing, so I met up with him and interviewed him. The results are here: http://rainingacorns.blogspot.com/2011/03/dali-for-ears-sound-world-of-derek.html. As time has gone on, I realize that I gravitate most strongly toward the sound of “traditional” instruments, even if used in different ways. At the same time, I well understand how electronica allows for creativity to flourish where it otherwise might not (because of the difficulties, for example, in putting together and maintaining an ensemble).
Exactly. I am a traditional instrument kinda guy- “Kirchenglocken” was actually written for strings- bit I don’t play cello or viola (yet), and my violin playing isn’t nearly good enough to play what I’ve written. Maybe I can record it playing four guitars.
Much of this piece is me playing on guitar. Somewhere in there is me playing “Imagine” by John Lennon. There is also the orchestra I played in last year playing Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 23.
I also find that using granular synthesis allows me “anti-Ligeti” status, so I can create without “getting it right,” which frees me to move forward with the piece. I know little about composition, but these pieces exhibit the repetition, variation (subtly), and to some degree development I learned by close listening of Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven.
I am not committed to electronic composition (come to think of it, neither was Karlheinz Stockhausen! ), but it’s a tool I just learned and am exploring. Next week I start the songwriting course in Coursera. I expect you’ll hear a more traditional sound, even if it’s likely guitar music- but who knows?
By the way- did you notice how “Kirchenglocken” made the familiar sound startlingly unfamiliar? It seems to be what that piece is about. It turned 6/8 time into something unrecognizable, then when it switches for one measure into 4/4 it sounds weird, alien. The weird locrian mode polyphony gets punctuated in that 4/4 bar by traditional major chord harmony, and again it sounds foreign. Cage would be proud, as he tried to do the same with language. I was pretty pleased with that as a first time out.
Thanks for the tip! I’ll check him out.
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You know what? I’m going to take that as a challenge. Give me some time to work with it.
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I got it. I know how I’m going to do this. Going to take me some time but I can do it.
You got me thinking…
Eric Clapton talked about wanting his guitar solos to sound like the human voice. We connect with these instruments because they sound like us. No wonder you (and I) would gravitate toward them.
However, one thing Modpo opened up to me, as you know, is the aesthetic of Dada and its descendants. Dada was a reaction to the horrors of World War I. It has given me a way to cope with/express the horrors I see in the office every day- the absurdity of abject suffering caused in part by the arbitrary abandonment of an entire community of people written off for no other reason than race, class, and gender.
I dig Mozart- very much- but Mozart doesn’t fit my life the way I live it. Karlheinz Stockhausen- he may be hard to listen to, but his music could be a soundtrack for my daily grind. Do’Issusah sounds like my daily life, even if it is not a crowd pleaser.
I appreciate your taking the time to listen and comment. I value your opinion quite highly. I also appreciate your candor that this kind of stuff is not exactly your thing. 🙂 You’ve got good taste.
There is the potential for an amazing kind of alchemy, a magic with these electronic techniques that acoustic instruments (as much as I love them) can’t do.
Take the piece “Tides” I did over the weekend. It was done using a technique called granular synthesis, which is taking a sound file and chopping it unto microscopic bits and rearranging them- much like George Martin did with the calliope in the Beatles’ “Being For the Benefit of Mr. Kite” but on a miscroscopoic scale. I created three (or maybe four, I’ve forgotten at the moment) “voices” using granular synthesis from the same sound file, and composed the piece with them repeating and interplaying, borrowing what I’ve learned from studying Bach.
Now here’s the magic:
The sound file I used was the sample I included in “191 Heavy” of ATC trying to contact American Airlines 191 moments before it crashed on takeoff. It was the worst aviation disaster in US history until 9/11. You hear the controller saying “American 191 heavy, you wanna come back and to what runway? Oh shit, he blew an engine. He’s gonna lose a wing. There he goes, there he goes.”
What do you hear in these voices created through granular synthesis? My 7-year-old heard it instantly- “Airplanes!” Jet airplanes. It’s as if encoded in the sound of the controller’s voice is a ghostly alternate universe where the plane never crashed, and is still flying. It’s like being a little kid and looking at a mirror as a window into an alternate universe, if you could only somehow climb through the mirror.
This was an entirely unintended and unexpected effect, and it is something I would never be able to do with instruments, even if I were trying to.
Oh, I don’t know that I have good taste. I just have my taste, whatever it is–and it’s always subject to change. Two years ago I didn’t even know about contemporary classical music, for example. Don’t know that I accept that “traditional” instruments (for lack of a better word) sound like the human voice. It just seems oversimplified to me. But I do absolutely agree that different music speaks to each of us at different times. I do try very hard to keep my ears (and mind) open, and it’s always surprising what leaks in that I wasn’t expecting. I’ve just come to know that electronica rarely speaks to me–though occasionally, when it’s integrated with other elements, I’ve liked it better. (Do you know Saariaho’s work, BTW?) Now, as for crowd-pleasing, it shouldn’t be the measure anyway, right? Think of The Rite of Spring first time out! I heard a piece the other day that I really enjoyed and wouldn’t have expected to. The sound quality here isn’t great, but maybe you’ll get the idea (and knowing you, you’ll get ideas, too!): http://youtu.be/02BCAlLVy9A You know quite a bit more technically than I do about music, and I think that affects a lot how we listen. Someone with a good bit of technical knowledge can listen in a totally different way.
Well said. But The Rites of Spring was a landmark work…. I’m not breaking any ground here except for me personally. It’s just a start. Everything I know about music and composition is self-taught- and there’s a *lot* to learn.
I don’t concern myself with being a crowd-pleaser. I have the luxury of not trying to make a living off this stuff.
I have the highest respect for your taste and judgment. Your blog has taught me already, and for that I am grateful.
‘sounds’ like you are enjoying the class! I had to drop – it was out of my depth of understanding, but will revisit someday just to tinker. interesting links!
I’ve enjoyed it, and I’ve gotten something out of it. I wish we’d spent more time with the software and explored more what we can do with it. Good start though.
I was watching one of the Harry Potter movies with my kids last night. I recognized a number of sound effects as being the result of the kind of processes we’ve been using (granular synthesis, for example). I enjoyed that.