spacebug | (no subject)

I was a good kid and got some work done on a new track tonight. Yaaay, for being good! MIDI has been surpassing my expectations in regards to remaining functional, and more or less predictable. How cool is that? Pretty darn cool.

I have a bit of a mental block when it comes to recording. As I make "structured improvisational" music, I dislike having something put down as a "permanent" version, even though it's mostly in my head. I think I've babbled about that before... but a lot of things kinda fall into it... there's perceived permanence, there's making a product, there's the commodification of art, blah blah blah. And just plain' ol' fear of rejection. Improv has a weird sort of intellectual security blanket to me. "What, you didn't like it? Well... it doesn't *always* sound like that... exactly..." Improv is kind of the antithesis to those people who go to orchestra hall with their score so they can follow along, you know? (No, really, people do this.) A lot of it, too, might be being hampered by possibilities. While it seems contradictory, in a lot of ways its easier to be creative when you force yourself to workin within stricter boundaries. Especially when you get into electronic music, when things can be tweaked and altered in such an amazing array of ways. Anyway.

I should reread 'The Bound Man", sometime- it's a short story on which I wrote my final paper when I took a European Literature in Translation course during my PSEO. I'd likely have new perspectives on it now. That class stood out as one of the best college courses I've ever taken; the teacher was enthusiastic and knew his material, the class was small, everyone did the reading, and we had really interesting discussions. If only all college classes could be like that.

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

I think its useful to think of old jazz 78s when you're committing improv to medium. They had a practical limit of about three minutes, so they'd frequently give the main themes, or just choose one to expound upon.

For further thoughts about the presentation of improv in fixed mediums, I recommend these two items:
http://www.cambridge.org/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=0511058012
http://www.ucpress.edu/books/pages/9137/9137.intro.html

Any time MIDI is functional at all, I have to pick my jaw up off the floor. Synch is really nice, though.

Neat. I may pick those up.

The most frustrating thing with MIDI is that I'll have it all set up and get repeat performances successfully, even after unplugging everything and replugging everything, restarting the 'puter, all that. And then I'll bring it to a gig and it still goes kerblooey.

I've found improv to be really good as a starting place for editing & composition. Usually it goes something like this: Improv a part & record it as audio or MIDI. If it's audio, then sit down and cut out the bits that suck or don't work, if it's a MIDI clip, copy & paste it, and then edit, expand upon, copy to other instruments, etc. Then process it further, usually w/ some sort of generative process like arpeggiation, slice it, automation curves, etc. Then I render it to audio and do more processing or editing as an audio clip. That seems like a good balance of improvised and composed. Sometimes I just sit down and write a melody using fruity loops or live from scratch. By hand. I guess it depends on the level of detail & control required. Alternately, sometimes I start with a generative process & select out the good bits. I guess I pretty much treat everything as raw material for further editing and processing.

Live seems to do pretty well with handling MIDI. It seems to be when you get multiple pieces of hardware that things really start to go to shit. Granted, about the only time I use it is for recording midi clips from a single keyboard. I'm not trying to sync up anything or use multiple channels, etc. It never fails to amuse? that MIDI has lasted this long as a single standard protocol. I don't think the circumstances exist today for everybody to agree on a single new MIDI like protocol. C'est la vie.

...and then I take those audio segments... AND I SMASH THEM INTO LITTLE BITS.

AND THEN I TAKE THOSE LITTLE BITS AND LIQUIFY THEM INTO THEIR COMPONENT ATOMS.

and then I take the atoms. ...And I SMASH THEM TOGETHER!

...To a 4/4 dance beat.

Awyeah.

Hehe. Sometimes it's a 7/8 dance beat, but yeah, that pretty much sums it up. We have to technology to completely destroy & rebuild it. We can make it faster, denser, more fucked up!

Or 9/16.

(no subject)

no subject

no subject

Improv

Re: Improv

Re: Improv

Re: Improv