A mad musical scientist?

A friend of mine just sent me a link to this NPR program: The Mad Musical Scientist Of Burbank, Calif.

It turns out to be a short portrait of composer and sound designer Diego Stocco. His work is very interesting: he is really at the crossroads of several musical traditions. Trained as a violinist, and still a bass player, he acquired valuable classical musician skills. But he is also a heir of Pierre Schaeffer: he is a true Musique concrète living composer. As in many cases, the traditions collide to make him a great creative artist!

For instance, check out this 5 minute video showing parts of the creative process for a sound signature:

A funny thing is that I just mentioned Diego Stocco as an inspiring person when I was asked a few questions by Cycling '74, in prevision of the workshop I'm giving during Expo '74. Read this short interview before this live spectral processing workshop with Max.

And keep in mind that nobody needs any computer or any software tools to create good new music!

Electro-chamber music: a new course

A new option at the Montbéliard Conservatory

In French conservatories, some music students prepare the Diplôme d'études musicales (DEM), a diploma most often with a major in instrumental performance, with an academic level corresponding to a high school diploma. In addition to developing their performance and interpretation skills, they take additional courses in Culture musicale. Next week, I'm giving the first class of a new course counting for such a Culture musicale credit. I entitled it Electro-chamber music (or, to be precise, Électro-musique de chambre):

The electric guitar revolutionized the course of music history by revealing previously unexplored sonic colors. Is it possible to further expand the range of possibilities by integrating our classical music intruments with electronic and computer technologies? All technologies are at our fingertips today, but how best can we use them to serve music? Such are the topics explored throughout this course. Each student plays her or his usual instrument and experiments with different techniques to transform its sound.
Each class is split between theoretical matters (analysis of musical works and study of electronic or computer systems for sound processing) and individual or collective practice on electronically enhanced instruments. Among the techniques that we are going to cover: guitar pedals, MIDI, MIDI enabled piano, looper, the microphone as a sonic creation tool, digital effect boxes, samplers, and software tools such as Ableton Live, Cycling 74 Max, Native Instruments Reaktor.

Electro-acoustic instruments: already a tradition

As we see in this ad from the sixties, using electronic sound processing beyond the world of guitar players is not a novel idea. Enlarge the picture, and you'll read:

There is no substitute for Magnatone with exclusive stereo-Vibrato®. The highest highs and the mellowest lows, plus a sound as big as all outdoors. For guitar, cello, bass, violin and accordion, Magnatone's a must!

I must mention that the picture comes from this very interesting book on guitar effects pedals (sponsored link):

During this academic year, I'm going to let you know from time to time about what we are covering and experimenting with the students. We're starting with a "simple" effect : the delay... To be continued...

The noligraph & Sibelius 7

I'm delighted to read the new features in Sibelius 7, but I'm also very excited cause I just received my first noligraph!

Sibelius 7's exciting features

Well, I'm quite happy with especially 2 features in Sibelius 7 that make it a more professional program.

• First, it can now import and export Music XML files. It seems like a minor update, but for many users it will be a very useful one, and it just makes sense that one of the leaders in music notation be able to communicate easily with many formats, especially the most open ones.
• Second, I love seeing the possibility to import natively SVG graphic files into Sibelius. It means that one can now generate a pdf out of Sibelius that can include the full vector based quality of graphics, for instance generated with Adobe Illustrator or other similar tools. It is no trivial function, but one proving that Avid has not forgotten serious music notators after integrating Sibelius to their teams.

But what is a noligraph?

The noligraph was presented to me for the first time by composer Julian Anderson during my first year at the Harvard Music Department. But it's only 10 days ago I ordered one. Broekmans & Van Poppel and Thomann are two international dealers.

Paper is not dead, at least for me: I frequently take notes and draw mind maps on real old fashioned notebooks. I'll let you know if I use my noligraph it in the train, plane, or bus: I like this new tool, but we shall see how much new music I write with it!