101–110 of 117 posts
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My trombone is lousy at reproducing the sound of a cello, but I don’t consider it inferior. More to the point, the synthesizer has more options for expressiveness through change in timbre, glissando, microtones, etc.
But nobody made the claim that everything is possible with a trombone.
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It depends on what synth you're using, and how you're controlling it. Most synthesizers and controllers are profoundly lacking in expressive control, and of course a synthesizer that just plays back a recorded sample of a real piano isn't going to sound as good as being in a room with the real thing. Just because the mainstream synthesizer world has been sort of stuck in a rut for 40 years doesn't mean this is the be…
I don't have a good analytical response to this. Your comment doesn't pass the smell test for the following reason: I am a fairly serious jazz guitarist, and it seems to me like most great guitarists can be quickly identified by ear after playing three notes: Charlie Christian, Joe Pass, Blind Willie Johnson, Mary Halvorson, Django Reinhardt, etc. In some cases just one note is enough: B.B. King, Wes Montgomery, T-Bo…
Vangelis and the CS-80 is maybe an exception, though even if his songs are very recognizable, probably a lot of people could convincingly imitate him.
Maybe Wendy Carlos could count too.
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The quoted section of the article is pretty out of touch with modern music. Many (most?) genres of EDM place the importance of timbre and texture above harmony and melody
That was mentioned in the article. > Timbre is even more crucial in contemporary genres such as electronic dance music and rap. EDM, said Swoger-Ruston, is really “experimentation with timbre.” The widespread use of sampling means the sample, not the note, is increasingly the basic unit of music.
> "Timbre’s role in music has always been underrated, or even ignored, probably because it is an intangible that’s difficult to describe, hard to categorize, and so far, immune to measurement. " In the mid-to-late 1800s, Herman Helmholtz was building spectrographs of musical sounds by listening to them through a bunch of resonators of varying sizes that acted as band-pass filters, and recording how loud each harmonic…
"Helmholtz concluded that the spectral description of a sound had the most straitforward correlation with its timbre.... For instance the qualitative description of 'brilliant' or 'bright' characterizes spectra that have a great deal of energy at high frequencies [e.g. brass instruments] ... A spectrum with little energy in the even-numbered harmonics characterizes the particular timbre that is produced by the clarinet in its low register...." (2nd Ed. Section 2.6)
Understanding that each instrument produces a spectrum of harmonics peculiar to it ... and that those harmonics have relatively different pitches and amplitudes and evolutions ... that vary with how the instrument is played ... is key to quantifying its timbre.
(At first, not an easy thing to grasp let alone quantify. But Partch made a lot of progress!)
> Another way to think about timbre is by comparing instruments. In an old stand-up bit, Steve Martin strummed the banjo and mused, “You just can’t sing a depressing song when you’re playing the banjo . . . You can’t just go, ‘Oh, death, and grief, and sorrow, and murder.’ Anyone who's played Outer Wilds should disagree with this.[0] To say we can't describe timbre is a bit misleading, because there are concrete math…
Edit: I was thinking of The Outer Worlds, not Outer Wilds btw
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But nobody made the claim that everything is possible with a trombone.
Is there a synthesizer that claims anything is possible?
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I don't have a good analytical response to this. Your comment doesn't pass the smell test for the following reason: I am a fairly serious jazz guitarist, and it seems to me like most great guitarists can be quickly identified by ear after playing three notes: Charlie Christian, Joe Pass, Blind Willie Johnson, Mary Halvorson, Django Reinhardt, etc. In some cases just one note is enough: B.B. King, Wes Montgomery, T-Bo…
There are a lot of famous guitar players, but there really aren't a lot of expressive controller players. I don't know of anyone who is famous for playing the Linnstrument, or the Osmose, or Continuum. Vangelis and the CS-80 is maybe an exception, though even if his songs are very recognizable, probably a lot of people could convincingly imitate him. Maybe Wendy Carlos could count too.
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Very cool. I will have to join "mod wiggler" lol. I have been out of it so long muff wiggler is now mod wiggler. Come on, that is absurd. Muff Wiggler was the best name ever.
Yeah.... no. Why audio-nerd forums were ever so infantile as to brand themselves with "muff" and "slutz" isn't much of a big mystery, but we haven't lost anything of value by seeing those 'cute' names off. I'd like to chat about synthesizers with fellow nerds without feeling rightfully embarrassed about the name in the header.
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Yeah, well frankly most EDM fucking sucks and that's pretty much why. Your average cool guy "producer" doesn't know the first thing about intervals, counterpoint, or even basics like triads or major/minor scales. But they sure can twist knobs in a way that makes neat sounds!
> Yeah, well frankly most EDM fucking sucks and that's pretty much why. Your average cool guy "producer" doesn't know the first thing about intervals, counterpoint, or even basics like triads or major/minor scales. But they sure can twist knobs in a way that makes neat sounds! That's a pretty harsh objective take for a highly subjective topic. A lot of people like it - myself included. Just because you don't like it…