Must . . . update . . . blog . . . .

Greetings:

Still enjoying Cassis. Special note to anonymous (mediocre euphonium player from a small Texas town) . . . identify theyself. Hope you are doing well.

On other notes: Heading off to Helsinki at the end of next week to perform Meditation at the Sibelius Academy with, well . . . a harpist. Yet another note, I will be giving my fellow's talk next week, so I am trying to get things together for that. Peter Sinclair has been kind enough to invite me to present at Locus Sonus upon my return from Helsinki to talk about SARC and what I am doing here at Camargo. Which we come to next . . .

I am working right now on trying to model a musical metaphor, that of the composer-as-explorer, navigating through compositional space. Compositional space could be thought of as a multi-dimensional area where music resides, defined by details such as timbre, frequency, event, etc. So, there are limits to what the composer can realize in each composition, defined by the limits (or the contents) of this compositional space. For example, if you are going to write a composition for alto flute and congas, well, you can only do those things and work within a range of possibilities that are defined by the characteristics of the alto flute and congas (range, timbre, envelope, etc). Thus, one of the most important questions a composer faces is, how will he/she populate the compositional space. What will he use. Of course, in electroacoustic music this becomes very important, especially if one subscribes to the Schaefferian sounding object idea where a composer collects, creates, delineates a set of sounds, a collection of discreet events with which he/she intends to play. So, the early explorations of this idea are based around improvisatory practice upon a two dimensional grid.

I am currently working with five collections of sounds. For example, I have five folders on my desktop here that contain an assortment of 25 sounds each . . . 25 samples, 25 little recordings, 25 sound objects . . . however you want to identify them. Inside a Max/MSP patch (a configurable software environment for controlling sound) I have created a simple 5x5 grid, kinda like a mini-checkerboard. This grid represents a collection of 25 (5 x 5 = 25) sound objects. So, this grid becomes a subset within compositional space . . . a very basic subset along a 2-dimensional x/y axis. As you run your cursor over the grid, the corresponding sound object will 'play'. So, this is 'event' space, or perhaps, 'timbre' space. (I think eventually 'event' space will become more of a 'meta' space as the definition of event changes . . . this is a note to me, not necessarily anything the present reader needs to follow in order to trace this idea.) With timbre space defined, the composer can begin navigating in search of sound combinations . . . of course, at present the system only allows one to move through space linearly. This is to say, that a composer/performer/whatever has to move from one grid space, one grid block, to an adjacent grid block on his/her way to another grid block . . . kinda, you can't move from your front porch to the sidewalk without walking through the front lawn/garden. Thus, there should be ways to move from grid A to C without going through B. Here I start blabbering/imagining musical worm holes, alternate dimensions, timbral hyperspace, and string theory . . . it's beyond my comprehension now, but once I work with a few theoretical physicists on this project, maybe we can do it. But, I digress, for now the project runs in two dimensions . . . cartesian, linear, predictable for the most part. (ie, I need to mention that musical spaces, compositions, should be developed that are basically relative, that is, they are different depending on what dimension you are viewing them from . . . thus, the composition is forever changing as your perspective on it changes . . . wow.)

So, all this say that I'm not THERE yet. So, I have five of thes 5x5 grids being played/performed/activated simultaneously. I developed a mixer that crossfades between these musical sets, kinda like having 5 stereos going and turning them up and down simultaneously . . . well, then we start to get crossfades between set A and set B, somewhere in between these sets is a subset which is part set A and part set B. It is a combination, we could call it A.5, A-and-a-half or A+B/B (I don't want to go there, but it intuitively seems correct, maybe). Anyway, I am trying to create space (subspaces, rather) between these sets.

This all being said there are other spaces besides 'timbre' space, there is probably a 'gesture' space with subsets of 'onset' and 'sustain' space; there are probably 'processing' or 'transformative' spaces where events are processed/transformed into other entities (kinda like a machine extruding raw material into alternative shapes). Spaces are also performed, that is they are interfaced by performers, someone actuates the space; thus, there is a 'performance' space. I think you can begin to fill in the ideas.

So, eventually, we build a giant three dimensional virtual reality representation of this system, have a few beers and take it out for a test drive. In in end, it's just for music -- any large institution care to get on board with this one? I will teach for you, do research, write papers, make music . . . etc.

Thanks for letting me get this all out in an open forum.

jason