Tusker

Yes, when it happens which thankfully is not often, it's because of insecurity. The band Queen put a No Synthesizers! label on four of its albums: But it seems the band was insecure because a Melody Maker writer had written that they had synthesizers in the band, suggesting they were pop and not real rock. Synthesizers were new and nerdy, and Queen wanted people to give credit to Brian May for his hard work. (A brilliant guitarist and sound designer.) But the band also wanted to appear cool to rock fans. With NME (another British rag) attacking Freddie Mercury's "cosmic castrato" it was important to appear rootsy rather than nerdy. Once established, Queen embraced synths and happily made pop hits with them. As you said, it's mostly in rock and when it happens, it stems from insecurity. Many of those insecurities are products of a particular time and thankfully are fading.

I guess I hang with Anglophiles? And we listen to the World Service? We love Lillibulero too ... 😄

The launching of Guitar World in 1980 and the apotheosis of the guitar to heights of fetishization, is both a symptom and a cause of anti-keyboard sentiment in Rock music. The guitar after all is an everyman's everyday instrument. It was hardly seen in the concert hall till the 20th century. But the anti-elitist elitism of rock music flips the script. Street cred is cred and who cares if we guitarists are secretly stealing techniques from every other "elite" instrumentalist, from Paganini to Miles? I work with guitar players who are often far better musicians. I learn profound things from them. The less they have drunk the kool-aid, the more they have invested in music and the more rewarding the interaction.

I've found that great music is great music, regardless of genre. If you can capture the imagination of your listener, if you can take them on a journey, if there is a human connection, then it's great music. For that listener. When I was a teen, Aunty Beeb used a portion of Dave Grusin's Mountain Dance to introduce one of her radio shows. It was just a snippet but what a earworm! I'd wait for the show, just to hear those off-beat arpeggios. Imagine my joy to one day find that the entire track was just as cunning, imaginative and skillfully performed. It was and still is great music. YMMV.

A little festivity from my little gang of noisemakers ...

In most DAW’s like Cubase and Logic, you can scale how much the controller (MIDI CC) affects different parameters. Typically you can set a minimum and a max value, and the DAW software will create a linear interpolation. This is done through the MIDI Transform plugin in Cubase and the MIDI Modifier plugin in Logic. I’d love to see nonlinear patterns one day but meanwhile if you want the same knob twist to open the filter by 20%, increase the Resonance by 10% and dive-bomb the pitch by two octaves, these tools will let you do that.

I am afraid my response is not going to measure up but here goes ... If the sound is modulating from soft and smooth to grainy and edgy there is something more than a filter sweep in operation. Possibly a granular effect overlaid with other effects. The edgy aspect could be cause by a little saturation. These days, a single controller (the super knob) can affect multiple parameters (cutoff, overdrive, granular crossfade) in multiple circuits (filter, granular effect, saturation effect). These effects are often blended in, like spices in a barbecue mix. So if your question is, "can I get a similar spice mix using Cubase, Plugins and a Controller?" The answer is absolutely, but you would do the work in Cubase and the plugins. If your question is "can I get an identical spice mix using Cubase, Plugins and a Controller?" Unfortunately probably not without getting your hands dirty. Some of these recipes are quite unique and Yamaha pays great sound designers good money to build a bank of interesting sounds. The world of plugins absolutely contains the types of sounds you are looking for. From your description it sounds like a transition sweep which is frequently used in glitch music. Sometimes they are called risers and falls. Dash Glitch on Youtube does a good job of demonstrating those types of sounds and the tricks used. It's a large universe of sounds however and you are looking for something particular it seems: a needle in a haystack. There are many ways of achieving similar results, like using nutmeg instead of cinnamon. I have italicized some words to help you in your search. Alternatively, if you recall the Montage patch name, one of us here might be able to dial it up and we could take a listen. Hope this helps.

I agree with you that Anthony Marinelli is a treasure for those of us who care about synths. Arguably the Synclavier and Fairlight introduced digital sampling technology to music. That technology is ubiquitous today so we don't think very much about it. Like electricity, we just assume it's going to be there. Pat Metheny and Frank Zappa were able to understand its revolutionary significance and it made a difference for them. A friend of mine worked for NED when it was just a couple of Dartmouth professors. When Arturia's Synclavier V came out he had this huge memory lane experience and told me some of his stories. I'll never forget the grin on his face...

Thanks for bringing the Turkic / Western European musical border into the conversation. It's a fascinating world and I agree the main fault lines are around choral+satb tuning schemes versus solo+drone tuning schemes. The latter allows more elaboration of pitch due to simpler texture. This is also illustrated by Craig's point about Indian scales which can afford to be more ornate. The history of central Europe is fascinating to me in these turbulent times as cultures rediscover old fault lines. I am intrigued by how tightly the musics dovetail with Islamic, Orthodox and Catholic faith traditions. It's interesting to see Turkic influences in the "Polovtsian Dances" which are performed for Prince Igor when he is an honored captive of the Cuman peoples. Composer Borodin stays conservatively within the "western" tuning scheme however, providing just enough exoticism for his Russian listeners to create a "world music" of his time. 😅 Rimsky Korsakov's "Song of India" employs a similarly conservative exoticism. The Mighty Five composers of St. Petersburg appear to have held a similar rule: don't mess with pitch and you too can be successful he ha. 😄

Craig's story reminded me of an altered tuning attempt by a band I am otherwise quite fond of: Deep Forest. I had mixed feelings about this song so I listened to it again. This is what I am hearing ... - At about 1.30-142 the male singer (what a voice!) ends his statement of the melody with an important motif => (14321) - At 1.48 he repeats it (14321) - At 2.03 when the female singer does her rendition of the melody the comping instrument (a plucked string instrument) uses an alternate tuning. I like this. - When she ends her statement of the melody at 2.50 with the 14321 motif, it is picked up by a reed instrument with an alternate tuning (and significant vibrato) To me this is jarring. - Instruments in altered and standard tunings then provide a call and answer. I find this jarring. - The voices come back for a romantic finale. I've realized that for a) deviations from tuning norms, need to have a clear artistic purpose and b) it's tricky to find that sweet-spot between meaningless and jarring. Much of this may be culture dependent. It's a lovely song. I am just not sure the altered tunings are doing it any favors.

I think it's possible to speak with many different styles of piano voices and a variety of sources, ranging from acoustics to stage pianos to synth workstations to software, etc. I have used all those kinds and love them. At the moment, I am using Pianoteq 8 Standard edition with the NY or Hamburg Steinway for most purposes. For singer songwriter style ballads or atmospheric pianos I sometimes use the U4 upright. What I like most about Pianoteq is the ability to tailor the velocity response very precisely to my touch. I add a bit of early reflection with Liquidsonics 7th heaven instead of the Pianoteq reverb because I usually find that the room I am playing in has its own reverb. So I am creating just the sound of the stage area with the reverb to humanize the piano.

The closest thing to useful microtonal I've encountered is in Joseph Collier's In the Bleak Mid-Winter. Most of it is tonal. You'll want to wait till 4.30 to hear the payoff of a microtonal modulation into G half Sharp major.

I would seek earlier to play with better players. Preferably two levels up from me. They schooled me by the power of example without saying a word.

Thanks!! Very cool of them to offer a free plugin. 😎 Just wondering if this offers anything more than the standard tremolo / pan plugins in a daw. Faster rates? The LFO wave-morphing is unusually different? Try it and see? 😅

In the Dallas Symphony Hall, the organ is perched above the orchestra and interacts beautifully with it.

I like his willingness to multi-process too. Takes the pressure off a single plugin. So good for EQ, Comp and Saturation. Also a fan of subtle tilt eq (1-3 db per oct)

This was the gateway drug for me. It's synthesis and the musical story cannot be told without it.

There's room both for folks who see sound design as novelty and others who see sound design as essential to the story which is being told. There's a rough parallel to the role of sound in movies. Movies are an expensive, risky cultural artifact. Because of the mammoth budgets, there's a well established conversation about the roles the elements play. In movies we distinguish between diagetic sound (sound that is from the story world) and non-diagetic sound (sound that is outside the story world). Non-diagetic sound can include the soundtrack, the narration, and any sound effects used to amplify emotion. In a movie like the Kings Speech the non-diagetic sound is less important. In Blade Runner the story cannot be told without it. I love both movies! Similarly in some kinds of music, synthesis is just a decoration or a minor element. In other kinds of music it is central. For me, synthesis is resonating at it's highest purpose when the story cannot be told without it. I can respect people who feel differently and work differently.

Love the sampled attack approach. 👍 Yes it's fun and that's the point. There is tremendous "wastage" in synthesis. It's more "efficient" to write for established sounds. I was getting to know U-He's Filterscape VA and ended up with a choir sound but calling it a choir sound would do it a disservice. Filterscape has basic oscillators and filter, but it does have a filter bank from heaven, which can do your formants and sizzly bits with precision. So I made a sizzly sound and remembered how to "choir-ize" it: make the attack messy with a touch of portamento, add that famous human vibrato. Thank you Isao Tomita. So now I can take the listener smoothly from an outer space white noise sizzle to Faure's Requiem and back again. Will it get used? Can't think of a reason. But if I want to tell that story, there is now a way to tell it.

Hifi speakers aren't used anymore. It's AirPods or the car stereo now. Apple Music is the source.

When blending modeled instruments or samples with real horn or string players, I am increasingly finding that imaging tools like Expanse 3d can help narrow/locate my instruments so they don't hog the sound stage. Just a touch of early reflections will help the blend without creating a wall of sound or a reverb bath.

100% agree that speakers are the weak link. The non-linearities in acoustic resonators (grand piano bodies, trumpet bells) grab the ear. Lavoix de luthier is doing some interesting stuff with his Onde and Pyramide and there is the granddaddy, the Leslie. In this video, Grégoire Blanc chooses to play the theremin through a Pyramide speaker because sometimes a box speaker won't do. Edmund Eagan's demonstration of the Onde is the most convincing for me. It may not be for everyone. Maurice Martenot built two other resonant speakers: the Metalique has a gong resonator and the Palme has string resonators. These add even more character but are not in production as far as I know. Perhaps a little too much flavor? Perhaps someday ADSR's and LFO's will be routed to speakers to move baffles or drivers? Let's see what happens.

I've been pursuing sonic novelty in synthesizers for decades and so have an interest in this subject. I've utilized everything from sync, to fm to granular to resynthesis to modular. I've exhausted the tools and I too am exhausted. Have I been pursuing a phantom? My current conclusion is similar to dB's. What makes a sound interesting is the interesting music we make with it. The musician's job is not to make sound. It's to make meaning from sound. But what is meaning? The principal channel through which humans understand meaning is story. And so every song is a story. Every solo is a story. Every melody, every rhythm, every harmonic progression has a journey. Will new sounds help me to tell ancient stories in new ways? Or help me to tell new stories? Humans generally tell three kinds of stories. The cohesive (traditional) plot, the multi-plot and the anti-plot. In music, the most traditional story is what most people want. It has a character (a melody usually, it can be a texture or a rhythm or some other unit of meaning) and the character goes through a journey. Often it returns home, transformed. Without transformation there is no story. In the multi-plot, things are fragmented. This can be likened to cyclical musical styles where patterns co-exist and co-evolve. Examples are gamelan or multi-sequencer modular music or Steve Reich's minimalism. It can also be likened to repetitive patterns in art which have no central focus: artists like Klimt or Albers or Escher. In the anti-plot, absurdity reverses the conventions and breaks the fundamental rules of story. True absurdity is rare in music. We do a deceptive cadence and are mightily pleased with that. Music after all is among the most conservative of art forms. Despite the occasional revolution it aims primarily to comfort rather than to challenge. As you go from traditional to non-traditional story forms, your audiences decline. You'll see bigger crowds rolling up for Steve Perry than for Steve Reich. Still, Brian Eno used a nontraditional story form and one little DX7 to create a small but dedicated fanbase didn't he? And he broadened our conception of what music can be. So there is room for novelty, if we couple it with imagination. I am not suggesting we all make ambient music, only that we find new stories in sound. Synthesizers and their cousins are infinite relative to all other instruments which have ever existed. But whether that matters is up to us musicians and the stories we dare to make from them.

Are you getting a X-Air mixer feed for yourself personally? And does it add much to your setup time? Was it tricky doing drawbar control with the sliders or did you adapt naturally?

Mike, Tim Minchin can make me laugh before he says a word! A great show. 👍 Musical theater and pop tours illustrate that hardware and software are reliable these days. Taylor Swift's Eras tour was impressively analog. I thought I saw four polysynths. 😎 Yes my daughter dragged me there and my eye wandered. 😅 That's a fun show! A group like keyboardTEK will set you up with books and sounds so the musicians can focus on what's really important. Congratulations to your daughter! That's awesome.