Collecting "samples"

Well, of course...! O_o

... and thanks for listening (I forgot).

CromaDiBrera wrote:

Well, sure...! O_o

I don't understand what you are referring to...

my sampled voice isn't there; if I were a composer and even just wanted to do something with my voice by sampling it, I would have to record it... and I am not saying this to judge the merits, but to say that everyone has their own fetishes, and if Dante wants to record his neighbor, let him!

TheSimon wrote:

I don't understand what you are referring to...

I am referring to the fact that listening gives an idea of how much even excellent samples are far from the real sound, although... I fear you might have enjoyed playing a nice joke, given the comparison on piano samples. I don't know if Vienna or others have come this far, but this certainly cannot be anything from EW; to me, however, this seems like the unmistakable sound of a violin that is irreproducible by a sample.

Yes, indeed no joke. It is truly a live recording, recorded directly. To be precise, the sarabande from Bach's second part.

TheSimon wrote:

Research could then shift toward the search for imperfection in sound or the possible imperfect intonation of the note to uncover the analog.

Think about it: the fractal model is, by definition, a snowflake; it's just that the value lies in the imperfection of the real snowflake and not the perfection of the theoretical model.

Speaking of which, in music, Human Playback functionalities have appeared precisely to try to re-establish this situation of imperfection, of non-perfect order.

TheSimon wrote:

there may be an imperfect rendering of sound also due to environmental factors such as humidity, especially for woodwinds and strings, or the absence of reverb and thus sonic dryness, or perhaps the opposite: too much natural reverb.

Between a perfect real performance and a perfect digital one (in the sense that it takes defects into account), something is always missing, for example "the air." I had opened a topic on Backstage King Kong

http://www.pianoconc...tage-king-kong/

with the very ambition of touching upon these themes; I must see if I can find the video ... because I think the issue is interesting.

You have any idea what libraries those people use? Their libraries are the orchestra itself that they have at their disposal. They don't even exist on the market, and yet after doing 99% of things digitally, they changed tactics. Why?

TheSimon wrote:

l'arte è fatta dagli uomini non dal computer.

If not perfectly played, the computer remains for now still a medium; it is not a thinking being. And even if you had written "art is 'performed' by humans and not by computers," today it would be hard to sustain; a part of art depends on electronics. The important thing is to be aware that behind a program there is a programmer, so whoever deludes themselves into composing using shortcuts ... is not a composer.

TheSimon wrote:

Speaking from the musician's point of view, personally I adapt to playing on digital pianos, while still realizing that I have to give up many things. One among many is the vibrato pedal, much of the polyphony of voices, and generally everything that makes a difference in expressiveness.

Returning to King Kong, even if in 20 years all this existed and today's shortcomings were filled ... something would still be missing.

Today we can listen to everything, perhaps we have listened to a lot ... and yet, as for live concerts, how much [is missed] by not seeing the instrumental gesture. The eye also wants its part.

But also touch, the air that moves—how many speakers would be needed? One per instrument? We would find ourselves facing 50 speakers, but we would lack the movement of the strings, the grit of the percussionist, etc.

I want to draw attention to this

TheSimon wrote:

The ear is therefore shaped to recognize only that which is perfect, and yet if we look closely at Michelangelo's paintings, approaching them one can see clearly that it is not a photograph. There you go, art is made by men, not by computers.

The ear is what commands, and this statement of yours goes hand in hand with those painting avant-gardes that arrive at making paintings as if they were photographs.

Surely we are in the sphere of aesthetics here, which usually does not depend 100% on composers/performers but also on the cultural condition that wants a perfect surrogate rather than an imperfect substance.

As Geppino wrote, a digital performance is better than an out-of-tune quartet.

But also as Thallo said, it's good that the originality of the material is preserved, and indeed a composer today works a lot in the direction of building their own sounds. Unfortunately, however, one must recognize that we no longer start from "0" as was done once with analog ... and in this, I see one of the reasons why there is still a certain superiority in the originality of analog over digital, which by the way also has its roots in the inadequacy of current means to control everything.

For now, the means are geared more toward sound technicians than composers.

Frank wrote:

Unfortunately, however, one must recognize that we no longer start from "0" as was once done with analog … and in this, I see one of the reasons why there is still a certain superiority in the originality of analog over digital, which, moreover, also has its roots in the inadequacy of current means to control everything.

For now, the means are geared more toward sound technicians than composers.

The entire intervention is interesting, but this is the point I share least (you were already implying it before, but in this sentence you expressed it peremptorily).

Counterpoint has educational value because it teaches how to find wide possibilities with limited means. Even if in a different way, the same applies to "classical" harmony exercises. The limits are self-imposed in an almost senseless way or have "historical" reasons.

The same argument can be made for electronic instruments. Someone who composes for electric guitar does so either because they are used to adapting their creative flair to a "limit" (which in this case could be the range, or the timbre of the guitar, or a commission from a guitarist, or the fact that they write for a band) or for, let's say, incidental reasons (they play the guitar themselves, it's the only instrument they have available, who knows...).

These choices have always been part of musical composition. Therefore, even if today we have the technology to create sounds from scratch, I see no reason why we should discriminate against the various possible organological choices. Discriminate against them in terms of value, saying that one is good and one is bad.

It resembles somewhat the issues that pitted the GRM in Paris against the studio in Cologne, namely musique concrète versus "structural" electronic music: the former used "objet trouvé", recorded sound entities whose origin, in theory, they did not discuss; the latter created synthetic sounds according to numerical models. Generally, those coming from the "academic" composition world consider the Cologne approach (Stockhausen) to be purer, while those coming from the rock-pop world prefer the Schaefer approach, partly because it is "easier," more maneuverable.

Some time ago, I had a discussion with my boyfriend regarding this. He knows "by hearsay" the existence of Max MSP, the famous multimedia management program created by IRCAM, a program with which one can create and manage sounds and entire multimedia events. He knows it by hearsay and, obviously, he doesn't have it and doesn't use it. On the other hand, he loves the world of instruments created through "circuit bending," namely instruments often homemade that are nothing more than controllers for a very limited series of sound effects, often sampled or synthesized, which however have their own reason for being within the instrument itself. An example for those who might not know this new world of organology:

the discussion was essentially: if with a program like Max MSP you can create almost anything, why do you need to spend 200 euros on a "bent" speak & spell? And he answered me that the issue is not always the sound but the object, like when you buy a beautiful guitar and want to show it off.

Even more so than with Game Boys, things become interesting if advanced controllers are taken that simulate neural networks and decision-making "games."

this is one of many possible examples, an object that creates music in a substantially autonomous way. The performer's decision-making capacity is limited, but certainly, if you know that instrument well, you can draw beautiful things from it. Even a percussionist's decision-making capacity is limited! There. The world of musical and organological fetishisms is infinite and has always been part of the world of music.

I experience it in a detached way, as a listener and observer, but if someone came to me and said "I have a fetish for Madonna's voice, I want to write forever only pieces that use samples of her voice," in a certain sense I wouldn't be surprised and I would evaluate their works by trying to adapt them to the current context.

In this context, I find no superiority from one side or from a thousand other parts, only more or less interesting differences.

Open content (youtube)

Open content (youtube)

Perhaps we could delve into this topic that I opened some time ago

http://www.pianoconcerto.it/forum/index.php?/topic/933-differenza-fra-analogico-e-digitale/