As with most things in life, I suspect that the truth about Animoog somewhere between the hype and the reality. Is Animoog a great I synth? Absolutely! I would expect nothing less from the Moog. Am I going to toss out my hard synths and soft synth and wait for the I revolution to usher in a new world of synthesizers? Don't hold your breath.
The Animoog is the best sounding I synth I have heard. I give it a 10+ for that. For creativity, also a ten plus. It makes great use of the touch pad and great video to make for a stunning performance environment. The ability to see visually what is happening with the sound and to see the waveform is a fantastic idea. Again 10+
Ok, that is as far as I go on the hype side. In terms of filters it's limited and it only has a single filter. If it were a sot synth, this would not be overlooked but I synths seem to get a pass. It has very limited filter types. When I saw the filters in Abynth, I thought I had gone to filter heaven.
The envelops are simple ADSR types and they can't be assigned. There is also only a single LFO. Being able to select continuously between shapes is nice but the shapes themselves are standard fair. As far as I can see you can't make your own and you can't see them outside the oscilloscope.
Am I expecting to much for an I synth? That's my point. I Moog wants to use I synths to compete with soft synth, IMHO they failed. If they wanted to make a fantastic I synth that raises the bar for I synths and does some really impressive things, then they have done a fantastic job. In the end, I guess it's a matter of hype or function.
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Too Many Knobs
I ind it interesting when I think back to how my style of composing and playing music has changed. I used to just find a preset I like, one of my own or sometimes a factory preset, and then play music with it. The art was in the notes and a limited amount of control (velocity, pitch bend and mod wheel). Knob turning was left to tweaking presets before the performance of the music.
With a DAW like Ableton Live its certainly possible to tweak parameters in real time and have the DAW record those changes. But dealing with a large number of parameters in real time is a daunting task. For this reason, a number of software synths now offer performance controllers. A convenient set of knobs or sometimes XY pads with which certain key parameters can be changed in real time with the idea that these changes are part of the musical performance.
Native Instruments did with this Kore which I always thought was a great idea but sadely Native Instruments has decided to drop Kore. Each Kore instrument has a limited set of controls. A similar idea is built into Massive and Abynth from the same company. Camel Audio's Alchemy has a performance controller section with a controller that looks very similar to Kore's that allow you to morph between different settings of the perofmance controls. Albeton Live itself offers instrument racks with performane controllers.
These only serve as examples of a capability that I am sure has been built into many soft synths. So we see now the musican also acting as conductor. So the art of the sound designer, musician and conductor/orchestrator have now been combined.
With a DAW like Ableton Live its certainly possible to tweak parameters in real time and have the DAW record those changes. But dealing with a large number of parameters in real time is a daunting task. For this reason, a number of software synths now offer performance controllers. A convenient set of knobs or sometimes XY pads with which certain key parameters can be changed in real time with the idea that these changes are part of the musical performance.
Native Instruments did with this Kore which I always thought was a great idea but sadely Native Instruments has decided to drop Kore. Each Kore instrument has a limited set of controls. A similar idea is built into Massive and Abynth from the same company. Camel Audio's Alchemy has a performance controller section with a controller that looks very similar to Kore's that allow you to morph between different settings of the perofmance controls. Albeton Live itself offers instrument racks with performane controllers.
These only serve as examples of a capability that I am sure has been built into many soft synths. So we see now the musican also acting as conductor. So the art of the sound designer, musician and conductor/orchestrator have now been combined.
Sunday, September 25, 2011
I'd Give It a Ten But You Can't Dance to It
I am writing this latest blog post to provide some impression, thoughts, conclusions and other such meanderings on what I experienced in Heugenot this year at the Electro-Music festival. I have been to the festival now for two years although I trucated my first visit. What impressed me the most about the festival is that I found a group of people who did what I do that is make "electronic music'.
"Electronic Music" has been around now for a long time but clearly defining what exactly it is is perhaps left to better philosophers than me. However, what was clear to me was that what I was listening to at this festival was not "dance music". If anyone came to the festival expectiing dance music and for example listened to Richard Lainhart would be sadly out of there musical element.
I am a would be student of Electronic Music history. I believe it has its roots more in classical music than any pop movement although the difficulty with defining it today is that is has been entrangled with pop and yes, with dance music. But the odd thing is that for the most part, those who write it don't write dance music. I know I am not making sense here but I guess what I am trying to say ever so badly is that while some people who make other kinds of music would call themselves electronic artists there is an "electronic music" that is a true genre however broad and ill definted. That genre is what I heard at the Electro Music festival and why I felt at home there. With people who where trying to do a version of what I do whatever that is.
A little side note here with a purpose. Its funny. I support and truely appreciate what music therapists do. They seem so together in clearly defining what they do to the point of having a certification process. I also appreciate the difference between therapist and artist and at times, I also find that desire to clarity everthing in music therapy a weakness as well. It seems closed in on itself and unable to benefit from other directions that might help expand it and allow it to grow.
No I come to the point of this blog. The "whatever that is" part. One thing that can be said of classical music is that through each era, each incarnation, each century there has been a way to define it. A set of methods, practices, ect. As music came to the 20th century, those practices began to dissolve. Despite the attempts of serialism, classical music took many different directions including it's spinoff, "Electronic Music", at least that is how I see it.
But now we have what? Drone music, space music, new age, krautrock, experimental, ok, i'm not going to give an extensive list but you get the idea. Defining what it is that we do is very difficult. But more than that, talking about it is even more difficult. If you want to talk about Bach you pull out sheet music. There it is. OK, sure, there is some degree of interpretation but for the most part what a classical composer composes is sheet music (to illustrate a point).
What an electronic artist does is programming, finding new instruments, finding new controllers, layering sounds, again, the list could go on and on. So where to we from here? I don't know but perhaps this blog is an invitation to some to start talking about what is is that we do as electronic artists so that we can pull out the electronic music equivalent of sheet music (at least metaophoricaly) and for the reall great music proclaim: "I'd give it a 10 but you can't dance to it" and so it goes...
"Electronic Music" has been around now for a long time but clearly defining what exactly it is is perhaps left to better philosophers than me. However, what was clear to me was that what I was listening to at this festival was not "dance music". If anyone came to the festival expectiing dance music and for example listened to Richard Lainhart would be sadly out of there musical element.
I am a would be student of Electronic Music history. I believe it has its roots more in classical music than any pop movement although the difficulty with defining it today is that is has been entrangled with pop and yes, with dance music. But the odd thing is that for the most part, those who write it don't write dance music. I know I am not making sense here but I guess what I am trying to say ever so badly is that while some people who make other kinds of music would call themselves electronic artists there is an "electronic music" that is a true genre however broad and ill definted. That genre is what I heard at the Electro Music festival and why I felt at home there. With people who where trying to do a version of what I do whatever that is.
A little side note here with a purpose. Its funny. I support and truely appreciate what music therapists do. They seem so together in clearly defining what they do to the point of having a certification process. I also appreciate the difference between therapist and artist and at times, I also find that desire to clarity everthing in music therapy a weakness as well. It seems closed in on itself and unable to benefit from other directions that might help expand it and allow it to grow.
No I come to the point of this blog. The "whatever that is" part. One thing that can be said of classical music is that through each era, each incarnation, each century there has been a way to define it. A set of methods, practices, ect. As music came to the 20th century, those practices began to dissolve. Despite the attempts of serialism, classical music took many different directions including it's spinoff, "Electronic Music", at least that is how I see it.
But now we have what? Drone music, space music, new age, krautrock, experimental, ok, i'm not going to give an extensive list but you get the idea. Defining what it is that we do is very difficult. But more than that, talking about it is even more difficult. If you want to talk about Bach you pull out sheet music. There it is. OK, sure, there is some degree of interpretation but for the most part what a classical composer composes is sheet music (to illustrate a point).
What an electronic artist does is programming, finding new instruments, finding new controllers, layering sounds, again, the list could go on and on. So where to we from here? I don't know but perhaps this blog is an invitation to some to start talking about what is is that we do as electronic artists so that we can pull out the electronic music equivalent of sheet music (at least metaophoricaly) and for the reall great music proclaim: "I'd give it a 10 but you can't dance to it" and so it goes...
Friday, September 2, 2011
What's Old is New Again
I think sometimes in a world of quickly moving technology we often believe that if we just keep moving forward that things will improve. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't but as I a writing this blog, I am listening to an instrument made my Hammond called the Novachord. This instrument is truely haunting and beautiful. It reminds me of another beautiful instrument called the Ondes Martenot. It seems a strange turn of events that just recently these instrument have been revived both physically and in sample form. Hollow Sun and Sonic Couture both offer sampled versions of the Nova Chord and Sonic Couture has a sample Ondes. There is also the French Connection which is an actually hardware CV controller that works like the original Ondes. No doubt the design for the Haken Continuum is at least inspired by this instrument.
A Twitter friend reminded me recently in a great blog just how useful "old school" techniques can be. In her case, she found a variation on a "old school" roladex a very effective way to keep track of business cards. Both the Novachord and the Ondes Martenot are both very old school and yet, by modern standards perhaps they don't have the range of many modern synthesizers but they also don't have the annoying property that they also sound like every other synthesizers. In a musical world that claims to be cutting edge, I often find that the real game if you want to make the big bucks is sound almost like everything else but put a little twist in it, not to much, so your music gets a notice.
For me, I have been enjoying some instruments from the past, "old school" instruments that don't sound the same. I guess I like them because I feel inspired by them. Hopefully I can use them in my music in the future and break away from the pack by going back to the future, sampled "old school" here I come.
A Twitter friend reminded me recently in a great blog just how useful "old school" techniques can be. In her case, she found a variation on a "old school" roladex a very effective way to keep track of business cards. Both the Novachord and the Ondes Martenot are both very old school and yet, by modern standards perhaps they don't have the range of many modern synthesizers but they also don't have the annoying property that they also sound like every other synthesizers. In a musical world that claims to be cutting edge, I often find that the real game if you want to make the big bucks is sound almost like everything else but put a little twist in it, not to much, so your music gets a notice.
For me, I have been enjoying some instruments from the past, "old school" instruments that don't sound the same. I guess I like them because I feel inspired by them. Hopefully I can use them in my music in the future and break away from the pack by going back to the future, sampled "old school" here I come.
Monday, August 15, 2011
Monkey See, Monkey Do
Anyone who follows my tweets may have noticed that I have been posting a lot about some pretty esoteric instruments. Glass harmonicas, Cristal Baschetts, glass bowls, Boomwhackers and PVC instruments, bowed gamelons and other exotic and unusual instruments. So why am I so interested in these instruments? For a few reasons. An important one is that they are not expected. Modern pop musical culture creates entire genres from certain sounds, the hi gain distortion guitar sound of metal, the short percussive sounds and rhythms of hip hop or the deep bass of dub step. It's natural for us to like things that we are familiar to us and to copy one another.
One also does not need to look only to pop music. In some sense, classical music is based on copying styles and following the rules, coloring within the lines. Even serialism is an attempt to recreate a new set of rules. However, the great composers worked within a certain traditional framework but they did color outside the lines, sometimes way outside. 20th century classical is an example of this. It was not uncommon for these composers to use unusual instruments or even make their own. Messiaen looked to birdsong, eastern rhythms and instruments. Harry Partch made his own instruments.
Looking to the east for inspiration can also be found in jazz musicians who looked to the eastern musical tradition for new scales or the Beatles who introduced the sitar to listeners used to a stricly pop diet.
What I often find difficult in coloring outside the lines is that some listeners can't get past the difference. Handel for example was more popular in his time than Bach because he wrote music that was familiar and pleasing to the ear.
As for me, while it may not get me as many listeners, I refuse to imitate and monkey other musicians. I look to them for ideas but I don't let my music be limited by any genre. So, I hope that explains my unusual choice of instruments.
One also does not need to look only to pop music. In some sense, classical music is based on copying styles and following the rules, coloring within the lines. Even serialism is an attempt to recreate a new set of rules. However, the great composers worked within a certain traditional framework but they did color outside the lines, sometimes way outside. 20th century classical is an example of this. It was not uncommon for these composers to use unusual instruments or even make their own. Messiaen looked to birdsong, eastern rhythms and instruments. Harry Partch made his own instruments.
Looking to the east for inspiration can also be found in jazz musicians who looked to the eastern musical tradition for new scales or the Beatles who introduced the sitar to listeners used to a stricly pop diet.
What I often find difficult in coloring outside the lines is that some listeners can't get past the difference. Handel for example was more popular in his time than Bach because he wrote music that was familiar and pleasing to the ear.
As for me, while it may not get me as many listeners, I refuse to imitate and monkey other musicians. I look to them for ideas but I don't let my music be limited by any genre. So, I hope that explains my unusual choice of instruments.
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Glass Works
I have rarely reviewed any synthesizers or sample libraries but I wanted to at least say a few words about Sonic Couture's "Glass Works". "Glass Works" is a library of Kontakt instruments based on three rather unique and fascinating instruments. Instruments that so fascinate me that I am still in the midst of doing research on them and there is a lot out there to look at.
One instrument, the oldest of the three, owes its origins to a little musical trick that children learn when they are young. That if you take a crystal wine glass, wet your finger and rub it around the edges, you get a most pleasant sound. By varying the amount of water in the glass, the frequency of the tone changes.
Many musician's and composers toyed with this idea but perhaps the most renowned is Benjamin Franklin who actually designed a very effective design and made this instrument more accessible. Composers such as Mozart, Beethoven, Handel and Richard Strauss all wrote compositions for it. The rather mysterious figure of Mesmer better known for his hypnotic explorations also played one and attributed to it certain unusual mysterious effects.
Then we move to 20th century American classical music and the wild and sometime delightfully wacky world of Harry Partch. Partch not only composed music but made his own instruments including an instrument called "The Boo" and the instrument that made it into the "Glass Works" library, "The Cloud Chamber Bowls".
You can give them a try here. Have fun!
musicmavericks.publicradio.org/features/highband/cloud.html
Finally moving onto "Le Cristal Baschet". An instrument which is as much instrument, art and acoustics experiment all wrapped into one, a statement in itself. It is designed by Frances Baschett based on chromatically tuned glass rods:
They have been used by various composers including, just to name a few, Thomas Bloch (who has written for many interesting instruments including the Ondes Martenot), Toru Takemitsu, Francois Bayle (who interestingly enough studied with Karlheintz Stockhausen, Pierre Schaeffer and Olivier Messiaen). Messiaen wrote music for the Ondes Martenot (which can also be found in one of Sonic Courture's libraries), Luc Ferrari (influenced very much by Edgar Varese). Clearly one can see the strong connection in that twilight between 20th century avant guarde and modern electronic music (pre electronica)
So that's a sort of brief tour of these instruments. What I find interesting is that fact that Le Cristal Bachett is really more of a concept if you will. Each Cristal Baschet sounds different related to the shape. Art and music seem to be strangely joined here as well as science. Here is there web site:
www.structuresonore.eu/
What surprises me here it the influence of Pierre Schaeffer who believed and wrote about a philosophy about how to categorize sound based on a broader philosophical school of phenomenology (of which I am an advocate). So many ideas seem to intersect here, so many intellectual and musical streams joined in a complex weave.
What makes glass instruments unique is that they are "non linear". I could give you a lot of definitions for this that would only make partial sense. What this really means is that a simple action such as moving ones finger over glass, can create a complex sound. I pulled a file of a glass harmonica off of Freesound last night and then magnified it. I was blown away. It is highly complex. Elements of AM and FM and waveshaping. Some of the papers I have read on the glass harmonica range from wavegides, to resonators to complex non linear physical models. The proof is really in the listening and all of these instruments have a haunting sounds.
Of course, Sonic Couture has now made it possible to change them in real time and create complex performances. I am impressed by this library of sounds not just because it sounds good but that it reflects a depth of thought that I rarely see from other synthesizers and sample libraries.
So, that is my humble review or reflection. Call it what you want to if you get a chance, read about these instruments. I think you will be amazed or dare I saw enchanted, mezmorized and haunted.
One instrument, the oldest of the three, owes its origins to a little musical trick that children learn when they are young. That if you take a crystal wine glass, wet your finger and rub it around the edges, you get a most pleasant sound. By varying the amount of water in the glass, the frequency of the tone changes.
Many musician's and composers toyed with this idea but perhaps the most renowned is Benjamin Franklin who actually designed a very effective design and made this instrument more accessible. Composers such as Mozart, Beethoven, Handel and Richard Strauss all wrote compositions for it. The rather mysterious figure of Mesmer better known for his hypnotic explorations also played one and attributed to it certain unusual mysterious effects.
Then we move to 20th century American classical music and the wild and sometime delightfully wacky world of Harry Partch. Partch not only composed music but made his own instruments including an instrument called "The Boo" and the instrument that made it into the "Glass Works" library, "The Cloud Chamber Bowls".
You can give them a try here. Have fun!
musicmavericks.publicradio.org/features/highband/cloud.html
Finally moving onto "Le Cristal Baschet". An instrument which is as much instrument, art and acoustics experiment all wrapped into one, a statement in itself. It is designed by Frances Baschett based on chromatically tuned glass rods:
They have been used by various composers including, just to name a few, Thomas Bloch (who has written for many interesting instruments including the Ondes Martenot), Toru Takemitsu, Francois Bayle (who interestingly enough studied with Karlheintz Stockhausen, Pierre Schaeffer and Olivier Messiaen). Messiaen wrote music for the Ondes Martenot (which can also be found in one of Sonic Courture's libraries), Luc Ferrari (influenced very much by Edgar Varese). Clearly one can see the strong connection in that twilight between 20th century avant guarde and modern electronic music (pre electronica)
So that's a sort of brief tour of these instruments. What I find interesting is that fact that Le Cristal Bachett is really more of a concept if you will. Each Cristal Baschet sounds different related to the shape. Art and music seem to be strangely joined here as well as science. Here is there web site:
www.structuresonore.eu/
What surprises me here it the influence of Pierre Schaeffer who believed and wrote about a philosophy about how to categorize sound based on a broader philosophical school of phenomenology (of which I am an advocate). So many ideas seem to intersect here, so many intellectual and musical streams joined in a complex weave.
What makes glass instruments unique is that they are "non linear". I could give you a lot of definitions for this that would only make partial sense. What this really means is that a simple action such as moving ones finger over glass, can create a complex sound. I pulled a file of a glass harmonica off of Freesound last night and then magnified it. I was blown away. It is highly complex. Elements of AM and FM and waveshaping. Some of the papers I have read on the glass harmonica range from wavegides, to resonators to complex non linear physical models. The proof is really in the listening and all of these instruments have a haunting sounds.
Of course, Sonic Couture has now made it possible to change them in real time and create complex performances. I am impressed by this library of sounds not just because it sounds good but that it reflects a depth of thought that I rarely see from other synthesizers and sample libraries.
So, that is my humble review or reflection. Call it what you want to if you get a chance, read about these instruments. I think you will be amazed or dare I saw enchanted, mezmorized and haunted.
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Crossing the Streams
I realize that I have used the term "crossing the streams" a number of times now on my blog and in my tweets. An explaination seems long overdue so here goes. First, two other expressions I use are related: "moving outside the box" and various allusions I make to the movie "The Matrix" (one of my favorites). I am not that crazy about the other two but the first was great.
What I like about the movie is the idea that one's own mind can become a kind of prison. While I am just using this idea as an analogy I do think that we get stuck in ruts in whatever profession or art form that we we are involved in. I can't tell you how many times I have heard someone tell me that the reason that something should be done a certain way is because that is the way it's always been done and that is a kind of matrix. It limits creativity and in music, that is 90% of the ballgame.
To give you an example, I love the scene in Amadeus when Salieri, after killing his rival Mozart, is asking his therapist if he recognized a few songs. The one he recognized was Mozart's who he despises as a kind of musical creature. The song he did not recognize was Salieri's. Why? Because Salieri's was in the box. It was not bad music but it tried to stay in the lines. In music lines become cliches and music becomes stale if it does not break "out of the box". To break out of the box (or the matrix), the music an/composer must free his/her mind of old cliches. I truely believe that most pop music today is some of the most cliched music every. One person likes a certain sound and then follow it and then it becomes a genre. For example, I just recently learned what dubstep is which is really just a certain sound.
Now realize that I am a gear head and techno geek. I have three hardware synths and who knows how many soft synths and effects not to meantion Moogerfoogers and a few other guitar pedals. Moogerfoogers are not really guitar pedals, they are more like modulare synth modules but I won't get into that here. I also have a few mics and field recording equipment. What I try to do in my music is get out of the box. Now don't get me wrong, if you don't know where the box is, then you risk music sounding totally unintelligible. Believe me, more than once I have crossed that line. In some sense, to know how to go somewhere, you have to know where you have been. It's why I try to study music both its history and its methods. I always am open to learning from the works of the great masters be they classical composers, jazz music ans, rock musicians or the many other talented people making all sorts of wonderful music.
So to get away from the lines, you have to make a bridge. You have to plot a course. That is where all the techno stuff comes in. A ship for example can't just drift aimlessly. It has to plot a course so I watch demos and read manuals and ask questions. "What if I did this" is a common one.
Some of you might know about Alvin Lucier and Karlheintz Stockhausen. One of my mentors if only on paper and in sound. Both Lucier and Stockhausen asked the musical question: "what if I do this" but with musical compass in hand. They had some idea where they were going.
Another movie I really like is "The Perfect Storm" except for the ending. I actually hate the way the movie ends. Not every fisherman in a terrible storms died. I love the spirit of the captain who wants to chart deeper waters which in this movie is the Flemish Cap. You can look it up but its way of the coast of Canada and known for its good fishing but also bad weather. So finding better ways of doing things means risk.
So when I make music, I go out to the Flemish Cap of music as I believe Lucier and Stockhausen did. Well, not every time. Sometimes I stick closer to port. Not every time I go into deeper waters do I find what I want. I get a great idea but sometimes the reality and the idea don't match and I just turn around and come back to port. Music to me, at least the experimental music I write, is musical fishing. It's moving way outside the lines and trying to find a good catch, something that people will listen to and say wow, that's taking me somewhere I have never been, into uncharted musical territory.
So to get there, I try many tools. Psychology, psycho acoustics, technology, music theory, harmony, music history, even math. I don't draw what I see as arbitrary lines between these disciplines. I am not interested in creating a matrix to capture my mind but rather, searching for deeper musical waters and trying to create a new musical ocean in which others can also explore either by listening or creating themselves.
So "crossing the streams" is really about erasing lines not creating them. It's why I keep inviting music therapists and others into my world of music. I am trying to share what I have experienced good and bad. And hopefully, by breaking down those lines and sharing experiences, the music, music therapy and many other disciplines can benefit and we can fish in deeper seas.
What I like about the movie is the idea that one's own mind can become a kind of prison. While I am just using this idea as an analogy I do think that we get stuck in ruts in whatever profession or art form that we we are involved in. I can't tell you how many times I have heard someone tell me that the reason that something should be done a certain way is because that is the way it's always been done and that is a kind of matrix. It limits creativity and in music, that is 90% of the ballgame.
To give you an example, I love the scene in Amadeus when Salieri, after killing his rival Mozart, is asking his therapist if he recognized a few songs. The one he recognized was Mozart's who he despises as a kind of musical creature. The song he did not recognize was Salieri's. Why? Because Salieri's was in the box. It was not bad music but it tried to stay in the lines. In music lines become cliches and music becomes stale if it does not break "out of the box". To break out of the box (or the matrix), the music an/composer must free his/her mind of old cliches. I truely believe that most pop music today is some of the most cliched music every. One person likes a certain sound and then follow it and then it becomes a genre. For example, I just recently learned what dubstep is which is really just a certain sound.
Now realize that I am a gear head and techno geek. I have three hardware synths and who knows how many soft synths and effects not to meantion Moogerfoogers and a few other guitar pedals. Moogerfoogers are not really guitar pedals, they are more like modulare synth modules but I won't get into that here. I also have a few mics and field recording equipment. What I try to do in my music is get out of the box. Now don't get me wrong, if you don't know where the box is, then you risk music sounding totally unintelligible. Believe me, more than once I have crossed that line. In some sense, to know how to go somewhere, you have to know where you have been. It's why I try to study music both its history and its methods. I always am open to learning from the works of the great masters be they classical composers, jazz music ans, rock musicians or the many other talented people making all sorts of wonderful music.
So to get away from the lines, you have to make a bridge. You have to plot a course. That is where all the techno stuff comes in. A ship for example can't just drift aimlessly. It has to plot a course so I watch demos and read manuals and ask questions. "What if I did this" is a common one.
Some of you might know about Alvin Lucier and Karlheintz Stockhausen. One of my mentors if only on paper and in sound. Both Lucier and Stockhausen asked the musical question: "what if I do this" but with musical compass in hand. They had some idea where they were going.
Another movie I really like is "The Perfect Storm" except for the ending. I actually hate the way the movie ends. Not every fisherman in a terrible storms died. I love the spirit of the captain who wants to chart deeper waters which in this movie is the Flemish Cap. You can look it up but its way of the coast of Canada and known for its good fishing but also bad weather. So finding better ways of doing things means risk.
So when I make music, I go out to the Flemish Cap of music as I believe Lucier and Stockhausen did. Well, not every time. Sometimes I stick closer to port. Not every time I go into deeper waters do I find what I want. I get a great idea but sometimes the reality and the idea don't match and I just turn around and come back to port. Music to me, at least the experimental music I write, is musical fishing. It's moving way outside the lines and trying to find a good catch, something that people will listen to and say wow, that's taking me somewhere I have never been, into uncharted musical territory.
So to get there, I try many tools. Psychology, psycho acoustics, technology, music theory, harmony, music history, even math. I don't draw what I see as arbitrary lines between these disciplines. I am not interested in creating a matrix to capture my mind but rather, searching for deeper musical waters and trying to create a new musical ocean in which others can also explore either by listening or creating themselves.
So "crossing the streams" is really about erasing lines not creating them. It's why I keep inviting music therapists and others into my world of music. I am trying to share what I have experienced good and bad. And hopefully, by breaking down those lines and sharing experiences, the music, music therapy and many other disciplines can benefit and we can fish in deeper seas.
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