four tiny drum machines from ALH84001 on Vimeo.

Cybernetics is poised to make a comeback. The theory is, everything from electronic circuits to plants and animals can be understood in terms of feedback loops, as organisms – mechanical or organic – respond to input from their surroundings. The father of modern cybernetics, MIT mathematician Norbert Weiner, was inspired by working on the guidance systems of missiles. His writing was picked up Louis and Bebe Barron, informing their organism-like sonic circuits, as used in the film Forbidden Planet. The word cybernetic itself comes from Plato. Plato was talking about human self-governance. But designed with cybernetic ideas in mind, technology, too, becomes self-governing and autonomous – and the sonic circuits, too.

Young designers like Eric Archer are to me the newest continuation of work like the Barrons’. Inside his lab, Eric and others are creating hardware that behaves like intelligent life. In the video at top, four tiny drum machines, equipped with insect-like brains and reflexes, network together wirelessly over infrared, responding to light by way of photocells. These tiny devices form a colonial consciousness.

Eric may be a mad scientist, but he isn’t keeping his work secret or proprietary. He’s sharing the tools, sharing his methods, and with a whole growing crew of sonic DIYers in Austin, Texas, inviting anyone to join the revolution under the banner of the Handmade Music series. (More on the upcoming event shortly.) If you’re not from Texas, a lot of this documentation is also appearing online.

Here are more of the creations, plus the simple but powerful circuit that makes it all happen.

And yes, there’s a lot of potential to wireless IR sync.

The drums have names:

Drum Machines (Eric Archer)
ASR mk I “pops”: two analog damped sine oscillators with photocell pitch control, 16 presets
ASR mk II “snappy”: analog white noise, photocell controlled filter, envelope + VCA, 16 presets
ASR mk III “twiki”: photocell tuned analog osc, photocell tuned LPF, envelope + VCA, programmable
ASR mk IV “boomer”: analog damped sine oscillator, long decay, photocell pitch envelope, programmable

But drum machines are just the beginning of what could eventually be wirelessly synced. First up, this autonomous bassline generator, created by 4ms Pedals

The Autonomous Bassline Generator creates deterministic bassline patterns in a sci-fi retro sound by generating melodies on the fly, based on a knob. It’s just an AVR (attiny44) chip doing all the work, plus an opamp to act as the filter (photocell). The blue button is Tap Tempo, or if you hold it down for 1 second, it syncs up to the pulses on the IR receiver (this lets you beat-sync multiple Andromeda Space Rocker modules). The red button lets you edit a single note in the melody. Pulse-width modulation is currently pre-set to a certain envelope, but that will become user-controllable soon!

Part of the “Andromeda Space Rockers” series of modules, see www.ericarcher.net for drum modules.

The 6-pin header board dangling to the right is an ISP header. Totally hackable!

“Ah,” you say. “But I have computers and things. I don’t just want a bunch of little drum machines running around my studio like so many electronic beetles while I furiously tap my tap tempo in Ableton. Can’t I sync thing up?”

Yes. Yes, you can. There’s already a MIDI-to-IR prototype in the works.

Four analog drum machines are synchronized with a desktop computer running Logic. Logic is playing a loop with TR808 samples. MIDI timecode from Logic is converted to IR Sync with a PIC microcontroller. The PIC flashes an infrared LED, providing wireless clock to a chain of analog drum modules. Each drum module has an onboard sequencer, analog sound generator, and IR Sync repeater. At the end of the video, the tempo is increased to almost 3000 BPM. In a separate test, the system played OK at 1000 BPM. Of course this tempo is ridiculous but it is a nice “torture test” of Nathan’s PIC code.

PIC stuff: Nathan Wooster
drum machines: Eric Archer

Our friends at Bleep Labs also have projects in the works.

Eric and 4ms have contributed the circuits at the heart of this.

This simple circuit handles infrared clock networking. (Click for the full circuit.) I’m assuming you know how to read this; we may have to put together an actual how-to tutorial for those new to electronics, too.

And 4ms has a version for interfacing with microcontrollers.

The Barrons would be proud.

For more on the Handmade Music series as it spreads around the planet, visit http://handmademusic.noisepages.com.

Part of the beauty of the iPhone from its launch date was the notion of a Mac you could fit in the palm of your hand. That makes it ironic that, for so many developers, mobile platforms in general have turned into a way to fragment software, to make it run fewer places instead of more. There’s something to be said for designing to a specific mobile device, but on the other hand, how many developers would want to restrict where their creations run? And particularly in music, isn’t the appeal of mobile creation the ability to have your tools work in more places? Maybe targeting just one gadget is the right choice for a given tool, but it shouldn’t be the only choice.

On the iPhone, the application Thump has plenty in common with a range of mobile music making tools. It’s simple but fun, a groove box with sequencing, subtractive synths, drums, and a set of basic effects, plus the ability to load your own samples and export songs.

Thump also demonstrates how simplifying sonic capabilities can produce musically-beautiful results, by focusing on the essentials and creating something with personality. Here’s a track by its creator showing off its sounds:
thump soundreel by mazbox

Well worth checking out the app on your platform of choice:
http://www.mrkbrz.com/thump/

What might not be immediately apparent is that under the hood, Thump makes use of the open source environment openFrameworks. As a result, the same code runs on iPhone, Mac, and Windows, as well as Linux. (It’s not distributed for Linux, but it could be. Hint, hint.) Creator Marek Bereza gives back, too – he ported the openFrameworks audio library to the iPhone, where it’s available to anyone.

Updated Marek notes in comments just what this means. The video below is, essentially, the same app. In place of the iPod screen, he has used a massive lattice of physical controls. A separate installation at the same show used a large touchscreen and simplified interface. And this really demonstrates what cross-platform means. Guy Kawasaki in the 80s mocked “ports” as a cheap wine. The idea is not to simply dump your code on a different platform and hope for the best – in fact, in this case, the changes from one platform to another were radical. The key is maximizing what’s essential, what really is not specific to a single device.

Physical Sequencer from Marek Bereza on Vimeo.

Creative Applications has a detailed write-up of the installation with more documentation.

If you’re interested in creating your own projects, oF has an elegant syntax based on Processing, but adapted to C/C++ coding paradigms and libraries.

I would recommend trying desktop development first as you’re learning, but when you do want to go mobile, setup is absurdly easy:

Setup instructions for iPhone

Having this as a foundation means more freedom for users and developers alike, the ability to run where you want, and a shared community of artists helping one another out. It does not mean sacrificing revenue, either – which is important, because revenue is often what enables (and encourages) developers to make new things. Here, we see a commercial mobile tool and distribution via the iTunes store, with free-as-in-beer distribution of desktop apps. But even the Free Software Foundation actually encourages charging for distribution – and to many people, the FSF is the most extreme example.

The bottom line is, you’re free to create what you want, where you want – and it doesn’t even have to have a price of free.

The use of openFrameworks is possible because the iPhone allows the execution of native code. Apple does not allow the Java virtual machine, which locks out many useful platforms and tools — including Processing. Naturally, that should not be the case with forthcoming non-Apple platforms based on Linux; more on that soon.

Thanks to Memo Akten for the tip — and for his exceptional documentation of iPhone openFrameworks development.

GPU-tiful and Cross-Platform

Updated Another framework I left out is the lovely libnui. The tagline says it all: “C++ API, multiplatform (Mac OS X, iPhone, Win32, Win64, Linux), 3D hardware accelerated GUI and more…”

On the iPhone, Intua’s elaborate Beatmaker software and David Wallin’s bleep!box have both been made with libnui. I want to single out bleep!box because of its UI – note how UI elements are simplified and scaled to the size of your fingertip. That’s something that, speaking of multiple platforms, could be equally important with touch hardware coming to Mac, Windows, and Linux platforms (some of it here already). I saw a huge fan of Windows tablets loving Propellerhead Reason on a tablet. He probably would be less enthused running Reason or Record on a touch interface; the UI elements are way too small.

bleep!box is also worth a look for the same reason as Thump: elegant UI, simple functions, and a lot of fun.

Pd, too

Pure Data, the open source patching cousin of Max/MSP, can also run on mobile devices. It’s currently powering the application RjDj, but because Pd is free, that could be just the beginning. In May, I wrote about the work being done by Hans-Christoph Steiner, who has been porting Pd even to ancient PDAs and iPods – including those, notably, without native floating-point capabilities (the kind of number crunching usually associated with sound).

Well, now Hans-Christoph is looking toward other, current-generation devices, too, kicking off with a workshop on making interactive sound on the iPhone using Pure Data. Here’s a taste:

OK, kids, you won’t believe how easy this is. Once you have Pure Data installed on your your iPhone or iPod-Touch, creating and uploading your own sound-processing and sound-generating patches is as trivial as copying a text file to your device! You’ll still need an Apple Developer License, but because Pd patches are treated as media files, they don’t have to go thru Apple’s elaborate code review — so, you can just dive right in, turning your phone into a pocket synth within minutes. In this 3-hour hands-on workshop, interactive sound whiz and Pure Data developer Hans-Christoph Steiner will lead you through all the steps.

Hans-Christoph will be talking Pd on the iPhone at a conference next month at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. That will also include Memo Akten and Zach Gage talking about openFrameworks. And for nearly-entirely open source hardware, there’s a tantalizing-looking workshop combining Android with Arduino, too.

http://artandcode.ning.com/

There’s quite a lot more to say about this, but I hope this whets your appetite.

And, of course, riding the train to Pittsburgh or your nearest university or open source workshop, now you’ll have Thump which which to make some thumping tracks on your iPhone.

SONAR 8.5, I’m sure at some point, was to be SONAR 9. There’s an enormous amount of functionality in this release. But I think the surprise is some of the stuff that won’t necessarily appeal to the widest audio production audience. Here’s a DAW that’s adding unusual new features for arranging tracks, putting an integrated arpeggiator on every track, beefing up its step sequencer (really), and dumping a bunch of class LinnDrum samples into the package. Those are the kind of treats we like in these parts.

SONAR is really a “DAW” in the traditional sense. It does everything. It doesn’t hide features. Given a choice between taking something out and putting something in, it puts the thing in. It has a lot of knobs and buttons. There are positives and negatives to the approach – it’s the reason some readers of this site return to software on game machines that has more in common with early Amiga software. But if you like the feeling of a packed studio, a tool like SONAR can be terrific. As much as I love Ableton Live for sound design and live performance, I find myself returning to something like SONAR for arrangement.

Even with its competitors packing in features, SONAR 8.5 is a tool that really loves MIDI, just as other software focuses on audio. And it’s one of the best-performing tools around. Because it’s so well-tuned for Windows, that means you can drop it onto a wide variety of PC hardware without spending a lot of cash. Most importantly, it could be the first software on any platform that convinces you to try a 64-bit OS – just at about the time you may be doing a fresh install of Windows 7.

Here’s a first run-down of what’s new in 8.5 that I’m personally most interested in:

MIDI lovers, step sequence and arpeggiate away. Every single instrument loaded in SONAR now has a step sequencer, and every track an arpeggiator. The new step sequencer has a lovely pane for controllers, deep control over each step, and probability controls. It could be reason enough to give SONAR 8.5 a try on its own. And yes, this does indeed take SONAR into FL Studio territory – but with a more conventional DAW bringing those kind of features together. FL users probably won’t be impressed, but if you longed for FL-style pattern sequencing but wanted to maintain an existing DAW, this could be for you.

Drum sound goodies. Session Drummer 3 has long been a nice virtual drum tool, and now improves routing and mixing to come closer to what it feels like miking a new drum. But let’s skip the acoustic kits and get straight to the electronic ones: yes, there’s an 808 and 909, as you’d hope given Cakewalk is now “Cakewalk by Roland” but there’s also a 707, a 727, and a Sequential Circuits Drumtraks and Linn Electronics LinnDrum. Oddly, you still have to look at a picture of a photorealistic drum kit – I’d like to see a visual representation of that LinnDrum, please. But it’s nice to have these sounds, unless you have a really big budget for eBay. There’s 2.5 GB of content, but I’ll skip to these files if I can.

Easier-to-edit audio. I gave Apple deserved props, I think, for making Flex Time’s implementation in Logic 9 elegant and allowing squishing of audio materials around. But what frustrated me about their tool was that you couldn’t take your warped audio and do other stuff with it. AudioSnap 2 could blow it out of the water. SONAR had this going before, but I frankly found some of the selection tools and interface a little off-putting. The UI has now been cleaned up, the Transient Tool makes it easier to grab trasients in your audio, and selection looks better. You can do tempo detection, mapping, and syncing, so that this is useful not only for smooshing around your recorded audio but also mapping it to a tempo. And most interestingly, the transients you find in Audio Snap can be integrated with the new Step Sequencer. There are also audio fidelity improvements for working with vocal, reed, and brass instruments.

A Media Browser brings files together. MIDI patterns, audio loops, grooves, and such can now be dragged-and-dropped into one place. That’s not a new idea, of course, but having custom presets for different locations is a welcome improvement (and why is it so hard to get other browsers to do that)?

A new way of improvising arrangements, “Matrix View.” A cell-based interface for non-linear triggering of audio and MIDI clips sounds like Ableton Live. But think of this more as an alternative way of trying out arrangement ideas. Because it loads from RAM only and not from the hard disk, and because SONAR is built more as a studio tool than a live tool, I don’t expect it to be a Live killer. But if you’re happy with the SONAR workflow and want to try out ideas in its environment, it could still be useful. (Cakewalk’s Project5 went a similar route, with similar results.) It’s just about the only copy I’ve seen of Ableton’s Session View, and it really does feel like a copy, so for that reason it’s probably the change I’m least interested in in SONAR. I do think there are other features here that are far more original, though.

You get strips for working with vocals and drums. For vocals, the VX-64 is a combination tube-emulation mic pre + de-esser + compressor/expander + tube EQ + doubler + delay + output strip, which I already loved after seeing it bundled with the VS-100 hardware. For drums, the PX-64 is a combination pre + transient shaper + compressor + expander + contour EQ + delay + output strip – so, roughly the same thing, with some drum-specific tweaks. Cakewalk has done a lovely job with these strips, and they could be the sort of thing that justifies SONAR’s investment. I can’t imagine not liking the PX-64 having enjoyed the VX-64, both for its audio quality and the ease of drag-and-drop routings.

Why you may finally go 64-bit. The BitBridge XR plug-in not only lets your 32-bit plug-ins work on the 64-bit operating system, but gives each of them 4 GB of RAM for up to 128 GB of RAM. That’s possible on the Mac side with Apple’s Logic – but only with its sampler, not with third-party plug-ins. And SONAR ships with a lot of 64-bit plug-ins in the box, not to mention that major vendors like Native Instruments are providing support.

Improved performance, Windows 7 ready. You can now hotswap audio and MIDI interfaces without restarting, and audio and stability are improved. And when you do get the Windows 7 upgrade – which, based on my research so far, you will want to do from either XP or Vista – SONAR has been rigorously tested. I don’t want to just repeat that without supporting evidence, though, so stay tuned for a separate story.

I still don’t think SONAR is for everyone – though, of course, I don’t really think anything is for everyone. (That’s the marketing people’s job, to claim that one product solves everyone’s problems.) Sitting in front of SONAR’s interface can still feel like getting into a jumbo jet cockpit. The Matrix View is not – and is apparently not intended to be – a replacement for Ableton Live’s live performance features. Open as SONAR is, I think it has new competition from the extensible architecture of Reaper. And, of course, all of this is meaningless to Mac users – though I hasten to add, while the Mac faces a tough 64-bit transition ahead, Windows users can grab SONAR, clean install 64-bit Windows 7, and possibly barely notice anything at all aside from a whole bunch of gobs of memory.

But I’ll say this: it’s funny how a few subtle changes can change how you think, but the combination of brilliant effects, this ridiculously-powerful step sequencer, and the possibility that AudioSnap really nails audio manipulation has me taking a second look at SONAR. Expect more details later this fall. (I’ll be writing this up for CDM and not Macworld for obvious reasons.)

Upgrades for existing SONAR 8 users are US$79 (Studio) – US$99 (Producer). If you purchased SONAR after July 1, the upgrade is free. For new users, SONAR is $499 for the Producer edition with the extra effects and instruments, or $299 for Studio without them. (But, really, I think you want the Z3TA+ synth; you’ll just have to trust me on that.)

Bored with mouse pushing and knob twiddling? The d-touch tangible sequencer / drum machine makes a cheap interface (with free downloadable software) for assembling sequences. Make some (attractive) blocks, set up a webcam, and plug into your computer. I took a first look at this tool last month, and noted its use in sequencing walnuts. (Yes, the ones that fall from trees.) Since then, the developers have been hard at work on updates. Enrico writes:

We just released the d-touch sequencer, a new, more advanced, audio application. In the sequencer you can record your own samples in real time.

We also have few updates for the drum machine, which should solve the activation problems we were having at the beginning.

Go grab the markers and the software, and you have your own webcam-based drum machine.

Should you decide to go beyond their free instrument, the underlying system is really quite sophisticated. Part of what makes it beautiful is that you can design your own markers rather than settling for predefined patterns, as with most similar marker-tracking systems. There’s even a tool for correcting problems in your design. The freely-downloadable analysis software is written in C/C++, but if you use another environment (like Max or Processing or Reaktor), you can simply pipe data to your tool of choice.

The drum machine and sequencer are available now, so go download them and let you know how you fare! System requirements: a printer, a webcam, and a PC/Mac. Enjoy!

http://www.d-touch.org/

For some hands-on impressions of working with these things, the excellent PC Music Guru has a great description of the experience. Or, if you read the language, there’s a Japanese-language hands-on blog entry.

The iPhone has become an almost absurdly-popular platform for music apps this year, even given more capable, more plentiful PCs. But to those who don’t yet “get” the appeal, talk to a mobile music addict: having the ability to be creatively musically in corners of time that would otherwise go unused, like a cramped bus ride, can be a beautiful thing. (Now, you start talking about taking away my PC/Mac experience, and I will start screaming in agony – but that’s a topic for a separate post.) The question is, what form should that app take? Today, I’ve got an iPhone round-up going as I clear out my news inbox, but that thread lies beneath all the stories…

I’m working on putting together a collection of truly productive, non-gimmicky/non-toy music apps now that the platform is maturing. But two apps released this week I think deserve special mention, and mention together – partly because of the different angle they take.

They’re both essentially handheld grooveboxes. They’re both relatively powerful, bringing desktop-style production to the platform. They’re both good options, and at this price, you might go buy both. But as I go off to test these two apps, I’m already struck by the contrast between the two.

One is the kind of app that we’re seeing a whole lot of on the iPhone, just as we once saw it in me-too apps on desktop computers. It assumes that the way to reach more people is to give them a whole bunch of canned loops that already sound like the styles they might want to play, and assume they’ll be pretty limited in their ability to do much with those loops.

The other of the two apps eschews the obligatory audio loops for real synthesis, and strips out the usual “let’s try to look like hardware” interface for something a lot more minimal and (I think) touch device friendly. That’s a design lesson that might well be applied beyond the iPhone, too.

First, consider the looped audio approach.

From IK Multimedia, GrooveMaker is a real-time app for manipulating audio loops. Interestingly, IK brought it over from the Mac/PC software. There are some powerful features, real-time control over audio, WiFi upload to your computer. It’s all well and good, so far.

The problem is that GrooveMaker is yet another app that assumes the only way people can have fun is to start with a bunch of canned loops and genres. GrooveMaker comes with hundreds of loops in house, hip-hop, and club styles. But that’s it – there’s no way to really easily start a track from scratch. (Update: Note that I should say you can at least sequence from scratch, but only with the stock content – which would have made GrooveMaker bigger news on this platform were it not for the release of iDrum and BeatMaker first.)

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not anti-sample. It’s not my own working style because it just doesn’t inspire me, but that’s a personal feeling, and not one I’d impose on anyone else. In fact, some of my best friends (ahem) are capable of doing things with sampled loops that blow my mind. The problem I have is with lowest-common-denominator thinking. In fact, I think synthesized tracks, tracks that give you real control over the sound, are often more fun for beginners.

Take, for instance, Smule. As founder Ge Wang discussed with CDM, their Ocarina and Leaf Trombone app are aimed really at non-musicians. But because these instruments use synthesized sound, people are free to really play with them and make whatever noise with them they like, rather than getting stuck with canned sounds to “remix.”

Now, perhaps a future version of GrooveMaker will make it easier to bring in other audio. Even then, it’ll have a lot of catching up to do with Intua’s far more powerful BeatMaker having been on the market for some time and offering features like integration with noise.io’s soft synth. But let’s talk for a moment about the flexibility of synthesis.

More Funner, with Synths?

bleep!BOX takes a different approach. Now, there have already been some 808 and 909 emulations on the iPhone. But you really have to see this instrument in action. Creator David Wallin has done some interesting work to make lots of sound parameters accessible.

David writes us:

I wanted to drop you a line to let you know that my iPhone groove box app is finally approved and live in the app store. It features 10 drum/synth parts (808 / 909 emulations of snares, hihats, etc and 4x 2-Oscillator analog synth parts). All sounds are generated realtime and are highly tweakable – no samples are used.

Compare the results: with the canned loop, you get something that sounds good right away – though it also sound predictable. It then actually requires a fair amount of effort to make that sound your own, if you succeed at all.

Using synthesized sound, on the other hand, you initially get, well, nothing at all. But you can very quickly get to something you’ve created yourself, even if your skill level isn’t all that high.

That’s an oversimplification, of course, but I think it’s at least born out in the design philosophies here; bleep!BOX allows the user to be more constructive than passive. (Audio manipulation techniques are capable of some tricks all their own – especially when you get into time manipulation and granular resynthesis. But that’s just the means to the end. There’s a difference between synthesizing music and consuming – or even passively remixing – music.)

I’m looking forward to spending some time with bleep!BOX as a sketchpad for beats. I’ll be interested to see how it might evolve to allow easier integration with desktop music workflows.

But notice what you can do with synthesized sounds – you can actually play. I think this is part of what made the Korg DS-10 such a smash hit on the Nintendo DS, even given the DS’ extremely constrained audio fidelity. (The iPhone – and, incidentally, Sony’s PSP – fare much better.)

Whether you’re a beginner or advanced user, “play” and expression are really what it’s about. A kazoo, for instance, doesn’t have canned sounds. It doesn’t come with presets. It can, frankly, embarrass you. But it’s fun to play, because you can feel a certain amount of freedom with it.

Ironically, I think it actually requires a fairly advanced user to have that kind of freedom with pre-canned loops. Aiming at a “lowest common denominator” is too often disparaged, when it can really mean aiming at a large public.

But maybe the reason “lowest common denominator” gets a bad name is that more advanced tools are often more fun. I’d love to see more work done on synthesized sound that’s really fun to play with.

The choice is yours, naturally. The two instruments:

http://www.groovemaker.com/
http://www.bleepboxapp.com/

So, iPhone/iPod touch users – now that the novelty has worn off, have you found apps you continue to use over time?

And, since you do come to CDM for opinions, anyone care to disagree with my take (or nod approvingly)?

ParamDrum TR Edition from Peter Dines on Vimeo.

Imagine a machine that lets you walk a thin line between control and chaos. You’ll be tweaking it, for sure – you’ll want to invest a sufficient amount of time shaping its sounds and adjusting its instruments to alter its flightpath. But once set in motion, it will give you variety and delicious insanity.

That’s the idea behind Peter Dines’ ParamDrum, a Reaktor drum machine with granular goodies inside providing sample manipulation and a set of clear sequenced controls for adjusting parameters. The “Param” bit refers to the parameters you’ll control – pitch + sample select + speed + size (of the sample) + smooth (granular) + swing. These parameters are unleashed against a sequence that you’ll likely never fully control – but that will never feel like it’s simply on autopilot, either. You can then load your samples into three players, which can be conceived as bass + clap/tom/snare + hat or something else entirely.

It may sound out of control, but “control” in the MIDI sense is essential. You can control step probability with MIDI velocity, tap in sequences with MIDI notes, and record playable automation with MIDI CCs from your hardware encoders. Pete has worked out a lovely template for Native Instruments’ Maschine controller, for instance.

ParamDrum, then, becomes a factory for variations. It allows you to iterate through plenty of results you don’t like to the one that’s perfect, for production or performance.

ParamDrum is a cheap US$12.50, though you do need a copy of Reaktor 5 (also included in Komplete) to use it. The upside is, it’s editable, and you get Pete’s immaculately well-organized patch macros, so it’s something you can modify easily or use as a model for your own patches.

Full details on Pete’s noisepages page, Modulations, which is also a new repository for his thoughts on sound design, Reaktor patching, SuperCollider learning, and other music technological geekery.

ParamDrum
modulations@noisepages

Planet ParamDrum

The other cool thing about ParamDrum in our throwaway technological world is that it’s already started to attract a little community of users.

Loopy C, master of strange sounds, has turned ParamDrum into his personal “hyperdrummer” for a track called Jah Frazzin Zooks, which he describes in a kind of experimental abstract poetry:

‘Frippish’, vari-tempo spectralisms meet Ornette Coleman-influenced electronica, hyperperformance machines jamming in the cafe at the end of the Universe (which for some reason look like fractal vaginas? (above)). Duo form.

The full track can be heard at his blog:
Jah Frazzin Zooks

Brettwiththedobro has a screencast (above) showing his own rig, with custom samples and the combination of Kore and Reaktor for control. (If you’re interested in the Kore and Reaktor combination, Pete’s previeous video tutorial is a great place to start.

This is a screen capture of Peter Dines Reaktor ensemble ParamDrum. I replaced the samples with my own kitchen/dobro sample map and hooked it into Kore to control various parameters. Fun, weird loops are a cinch.

Pete is also working with me on OpenSoundControl implementation in ParamDrum, which could enable cross-country ParamDrum collaboration, and via a project I’m building, visualization of parameters in Processing. Stay tuned.

Dream Theater keyboardist Jordan Rudess and noise.io developer Amidio have made a crazy-looking hexagonal sequencer for the iPhone. It comes with plenty of samples and factory sessions if you just want to play around, but I imagine the greatest draw for CDM readers is that it allows exporting your own files via a WiFi server application.

(Ahem… cough… Google Android and others don’t require any special app just to get files onto your mobile device. Sorry, something got stuck in my throat. Cough… ahem… can we have a real, live audio system in Android now, please? Whoops, throat thing happened again.)

This application also works with Beatmaker, so you now have a pretty nice studio of mobile apps on the iPhone and iPod touch. If your arms have been cramped whipping out your laptop on the Chinatown bus to Boston (now with 6″ of legroom), this could be a huge help.

More features:

• Stutter, chorus, and bit-distortion effects
• Seamless loop creation you can use with Beatmaker or your own favorite audio production tool
• Cell randomization

JR Hexatone Pro is US$9.99.

JR Hexatone Pro Site @ Amidio
Via the ever-up-to-date, ever green-on-black Matrixsynth

Now, this isn’t the only way to get your hexagon on with music sequencing. See previously:
Hexagonal Sequencer with vvvv, MIDI, Ableton, and Soon Wii, Camera Input
Music on the Game Grid: Interactive Arpeggiators Al-Jazari, reacTogon
Code Your Own Sequencer? Archaeopteryx Generates MIDI with Ruby

Here are the developer’s videos:

…including some preset examples:

Lastly, from Jordan himself, here’s a tutorial on sound programming with the tool:

Defining and re-imagining performance with computers and technology is an ongoing theme of this site. In a special guest column, artist Primus Luta goes deeper into that question with some of our favorite artists to look at practical and philosophical dimensions of playing electronics.

Today, the fruits of electronic musical labor can be heard in every corner of culture, from academic to niche to popular. Still, there remains a perceptual disconnect between traditional and electronic music, especially in the context of performance. With traditional instruments, performance proficiency can be measured as a physical accomplishment. Electronic performance, on the other hand, is generally understood as music made by computers. That poses a question: if the music is being made by the machines, what exactly does the musician do? To find out, I talked with some of the best electronic performers on the road, and got a glimpse of what exactly is going on behind the screen.

Live Rig: Mark de Clive-Lowe

From the Studio to the Stage

Historically, performance long preceded recorded music. Early recordings weren’t what we think of today as studio productions, but rather recordings of performances. Electronic music is a bit of an anomaly. While some early electronic compositions were created for live performance, most electronic music today begins with a recording.

Translating the high production values heard on a record into a live performance isn’t an easy task. It isn’t always possible to recreate the same aesthetic on stage, but it is important to make the connection.

“We can multi-track sounds in the studio,” explains 8 Bit Weapon, “but live, you are stuck with all the limitations the vintage computers, consoles and sound chips have to offer. So we have to trim down parts or add parts that are recorded by recreating them live.”

For Richard Devine, assembling the live performance begins in the studio with “trying to translate all the programmed MIDI data and song transitions into Ableton [Live]. Ableton is running the pieces of my tracks. I have hundreds of audio clips running in session view.” Onstage, this allows Devine to “mix and match breaks, intros, or builds for different tracks, and even manipulate how those are played if I select them. I can really do anything with the arrangement of the original track. It is now total remixing and producing on the fly.”

What this means for electronic performance is the ability to condense what could be days of production work into a performance piece of a few minutes. “It’s really similar to my studio process, on fast-forward!” says Mark de Clive-Lowe.

“We create tracks in the studio in the normal fashion,” says J Tonal of The Flying Skulls. “They get broken up in to drum and bass parts, which get played live on the MPC, melody and lead parts which get played on the MS2000, and samples and other melody parts which get broken down into [Ableton] Live clips and played from [an M-Audio] Trigger Finger.” These pieces are then used live to create what they call deconstruxions.

As Mark de Clive-Lowe explains, “the idea of reinterpreting and translating the same pieces to different audiences with different bands and setups is nothing new.” In other words, rearranging electronic music for performance contexts does have its roots in a larger musical tradition.

For some, this has resulted in working to restore the historical role of performance as the heart of a recording. “The experience of participating in a musical happening is ephemeral and never translates to a record,” says Tim Exile. “I have developed a number of paths of improvisation which you could consider scores… these are adaptive positive feedback responses to features of the musical environments I’ve been in. These features can be very local, such as the slight manufacturing error in one of the buttons on the control surfaces causing it to be slightly harder to hit to be sure of pressing it, to the very wide, such as the proliferation of a new genre changing the way audiences categorize and respond to certain musical structures.”

This interplay of the studio and performance feeds the creative loop to take a new shape each time the artist goes on stage. “Most of my studio output is mellow,” says Daedelus. “Most performances are riotous or at least dance-able. So finding relationships and movement in my own output is quite fun, and leads to disaster in the best nights.”

Is It Live Or Memorex?

When it comes to electronic music performance, is the music is being performed or played? As technology like Ableton Live evolves, the line between the two may blur to the point of irrelevance. As Tim Exile explains, “the discussion lies more in the boundaries between performance of compositions and improvisation. Most of what I see being played live these days seems of the live arrangement variation, focusing mostly on compression or expansion of set arrangements in response to the environment. This is live and adaptive and of the same genus as the style of performance exercised in DJing.”

Whatever the prepared sources, this adaptive style is undeniably a performance. “I can’t always reproduce the same exact show twice now,” says Richard Devine. “There are now so many different variables that can change or be manipulated.”

“I employ a lot of pre-made loops,” says Daedlus. “In some regards the legos are in a large box and I try to make spaceships or castles accordingly.”

“There are a lot of our songs that have a prerecorded studio version,” says J Tonal. “That gets played for about two minutes, and then we switch it up into a deconstruction and play a live remixed version of the same song.” Over top of backing tracks from their songs, Seth and Michelle of 8 Bit Weapon “play the Commodore 64 and 128 live like pianos, and use the Apple IIc as a mono synth in the same fashion. The Game Boy can do very basic live sounds and sequences.”

The Nucleus

At the center of any musical performance is the instrument. For electronic music, that instrument is the live rig. That rig can be a single laptop or an intricate hybrid of hardware and software; the possible configurations are limitless. Combining controllers, sound sources, mixing, and effects determines the breadth of available sound. The shape the rig takes becomes the defining point for the artist.

No matter how large, most rigs contain a center – a nucleus from which the soundscape is derived. For Daedelus that nucleus is the monome. “My preoccupation is with the Monome,” he explains, “especially MLR and added goodies tailored for use. I find it the most freeing from linear shackles, figuartive handcuffs, and my own preconceptions. It is improvisatory in the same way jamming in a jazz ensamble is, but with samples.”

Even if your rig is multi-faceted, the improvisational aspect is essential. As Richard Devine explains, his hybrid rig provides “maximum flexibility to change anything at any point in my show.” At the center is a MacBook Pro running Ableton Live 8 which syncs his three primary controllers. “The Monome is dedicated to doing random FM synth triggering with Max, and the MonoMachine is doing lots of synth and baselines, while the Machine Drum handles the huge analogue kick drums, and skeletal backbone percussion.”

Equally complex is the hybrid rig of 8 Bit Weapon. There’s still a laptop, but along with it they have “a Commodore 64 computer, a Commodore 128 computer, a Game Boy, a Apple IIc computer, Elektron Sid Station [containing a C64 sound chip], Nintendo Entertainment System, KORG microKORG vocoder, and a 12-channel mixer.”

While a laptop does all of the number crunching for Tim Exile, the true center of his rig is his two Behringer BCR2000’s and one BCF2000. “The 2-way control is perfectly implemented, and there are hacks around that allow you to use every single button on the surface. I’ve made my own context-sensitive control for layer switching in Reaktor. Pretty much all the state info I need is right there on the controllers.”

Mark de Clive-Lowe’s rig may look like that of a keyboardist with a Rhodes, Clavinet, and other synths. But what he calls “the heart of the show” is the MPC3000 he uses to program beats live. “The tactile interface means i can really get into playing the drum machine like an instrument.”

For The Flying Skulls, each performer takes different instrumental roles. Bringing those instruments together is the Rane Empath. “It operates like a master mixing console for several elements of the show: Snareface on the MPC, Jerome on the MS2000, and a channel from Live running on J Tonal’s laptop.” Using the Empath’s Flex-FX, they “get real-time access to over 100 effects that can be applied to any or all of the channels with touch-sensitive parameter control.”

Audience: Engaged

There is always the need to engage the audience. “This is crucial,” says Richard Devine. “You have to somehow connect with them. I usually try to play some songs that people know, and of course try to play out lots of new material that hasn’t been heard. I like to program large builds and breaks to take the audience on a roller coaster ride, if you will.”

Leading the audience through the performance is no easy task with all the variables in a complex rig, but getting the audience to link the performance to what they are hearing aurally is its own reward.

“Movement is as important as sound in this respect,” says Tim Exile. “I’ve noticed that audiences respond well when they make connections between movements and sounds which they’ve never made before. So if they can see you directly controlling a sound structure which they’d only heard devoid from its kinetic correlate before (a lot of electronic sounds) then they will have a transformative experience.”

“They are seeing a full studio production created at break-neck speed live on stage in front of them,” says Mark de Cliv-Lowe. “They go on a journey via the music – the rhythm, the harmony and the melody.”

Artists can adapt the journey by feeding off the audience. “They are the ocean currents,” says Daedelus muses. “Fighting directly against [them] is useless. I mean, you can tack the ship against the prevailing winds, but you don’t get very far. I like having a direction, but watching and listening and being willing to go elsewhere.”

This doesn’t eliminate the value of more traditional ways of audience engagement. “Definitely always have a mic to talk to yer crowd,” advises J Tonal. “We like to make sure the audience is on the same page as us,” 8 Bit Weapon shares. “We check in from time to time between songs using fun banter.” There is always room in any musical performance for fun banter, but Daedelus warns, “never let audience members try to speak to you in drug-addled states during performance. It is a careless whisper, no Wham reference.”

There Will Be FAIL

With all of the amazing things we’ve been able to do with technology, we’ve yet to perfect the anti-fail science. If only repairing a crashed hard drive were as simple as changing a guitar string.

“I’ve had MPC’s blow up and melt down right before and during gigs,” recalls Mark de Clive-Lowe. “I have played many shows,” says Richard Devine, “where my computer had crashed right before I was to play or I had some hardware sync problems.”

“We have sent the Sidstation back to Sweden for repairs 2 or 3 times,” 8 Bit Weapon recalls. “A drunk club patron tore it right off the stage and it slammed on the floor.”

Managing these inevitable situations is as much a part of the performance as anything else. “The biggest skill for a live performer,” Mark de Clive-Lowe says, “is to be able to take a mistake and flip it so it was never a mistake.” “When you have only a short amount of time to play — when something goes wrong, you have to have a back up plan, which may be having another computer ready to go on standby or another piece of hardware that you can use to play,” says Richard Devine. “There is nothing worse then flying around the world to play a show and running into technical problems.”

But perhaps the absolute worst scenario is, as Tim Exile says, “not being in the right mood. There’s very little you can do about that. There are no other mistakes.”

Primus Luta is a musician, technologist and a writer. When not working to finish his Heads Project, he’s trying to convince himself he’s got it in him to write that book he always wanted to write.

Primus Luta’s blog on noisepages, featuring computer music performance techniques, Plogue Bidule tips, and a lot more:

http://plpheads.noisepages.com/

See the companion video gallery for this story, featuring live performances from the artists interviewed. [about to be posted]

Daedelus

Richard Devine

Tim Exile

8 Bit Weapon

With the fabulous ComputeHer on visuals, using her Apple II.

Mark de Clive-Lowe