ARP2600 - Fundamentals of Music Technology - Cyborgstudio.com

PREFACEto the second editionOver the course of two years of teaching music technology, I have stumbled (mostly blindly) uponseveral observations as to which students are generally successful in their studies of electronic musicand which students generally fall by the wayside. It seems that it is the students who have a passionmusic technology are the students that are most apt to succeed. This observation would seem reallyrather obvious at first, but the more one contemplates it, the more ramifications it has.First, students need to make a commitment to music technology if they are to study it. Although thereis a great deal to know about other musical instruments, piano for instance, relatively little has changedin the design and playing technique of the piano in the last ten years. In the music technology industry,the last ten years have seen one revolution after another including the rise of the home MIDI studio,digital audio recording for the average musician, and finally, the rise of the complete home projectstudio which is actually able to compete in terms of quality with major production facilities. Becausetechnology is evolving at such a rapid pace, students must be even that much more dedicated to the taskof mastering as much information possible. In this wonderful day of instant information, gatheringinformation is no longer the great challenge to the student, but rather taking time and finding the energyto master all of the information which is at the student’s fingertips.The second observation I have made is that some students wish to learn about music technology in the‘better-faster-cheaper’ mode, which accomplishes little. To these students, understanding the mechanicsand theory of one oscillator frequency modulating another is a complete waste of their time, andthey would much rather just call up a preset on a modern synth which will in their minds do that workand thinking for them. One must understand that there are always greater possibilities when one canunderstand the theory of synthesis which stands behind the sounds, and when a musician is given fullaccess to all of the parameters of sound available instead of three knobs for ‘realtime control’ and abunch of ROM presets sporting today’s latest flavors.Indeed, there is nothing wrong with using preprogrammed musical patterns and combining them withother sounds to create a new kind of music, but there is a fine line between a musician and a technician.While the technician assembles premade parts and works logically with machines to produces sound, amusician will actually create new loops and adds the dionisian element of the creation of new sound.As synthesists, computer operators, composers, arrangers, and music technologists, it is important tokeep both the hat of the technologist and the hat of the musician at the ready so that we may freely andreadily switch between the two. Perhaps that is the most important part of music technology: It is notabout being one-dimensional or about confining oneself to a single role. It is about exploring all of thepossibilities and about trying all of the parameters. When access to parameters is denied, either bycompanies who produce equipment advertised to fill the role of pro gear or by people who shut outdifferent possibilities in music technology, it is the music that suffers.xii