SQ Pre-study. Info, links and pre-studies exploring all in electronic chambermusic for exciting new Sound Quartet projects.
exploring electronic chambermusic in the tradition of musique concrete and electroacoustic music
This blog follows in the trail of the music worldmaking of Sound Quartet, gathering knowledge of artistic and technical nature explored on the road towards new and exciting electroacoustic chambermusic soundworlds. It is aiming towards exciting fullblown projects about electronic instruments, EAM composition and real-time synthesis. It's organised for the Sound Quartet ensemble with participation of many interesting composers and musicians. The idea for the blog apart from artistic research is to explore organising workshops, talks and concerts in conservatories, musicschools and scenes around Europe, and to examine if artistic works and projects can be arranged as residencies at institutions like Elektronmusikstudion Sweden and similar.
The Blog is run by Sound Department AB and Thomas Bjelkeborn. Future updates also www.facebook.com/soundquartet
Thomas Bjelkeborn Co-founder of IDKA and the PUSH festival Gävle. Running the concert series Fridays PUSH at Fylkingen Stockholm. Composer, musician and researcher.
the BLOG
Tuesday 28 sept 2021 Three generations of midi controllers and experimental ways of playing electronic sounds and real-time transformations through synthesis and various filters and whatnot. Looks like the baby blue is maturing into a darker shade of colour. The use of the 90's midiguitar with experimental diy extensions slowly faded in the early 2000'nds towards more and more software dependent tools like the wii's and today MPE controllers like the ORBA is surfacing. It's always nice to try new ways of interacting with synthesis and computers even thought the ORBA (in a limited way) is a self sufficient soundmaker.
Sunday 23 aug 2021 How do you control your electronic sounds? MPE promises to be the new path towards greater musicality in electronic controllers and keyboards. As a former guitarplayer the Artiphone Intrument1 adds an interesting spice to the mix. Trying to imagine what software synthesis could be in the hands of a semi-guitar soloist. There is a big challenge in developing software related links for the transition between the fingers through the multidimensional MPE midi controller in relation to an ever expanding electronic sounduniverse. All aiming towards a stringlike playing sensitivity hoping to reach new depth in expressibility further mimicking some of the acoustic instruments strongpoints of fast sound transformability. Easier said than done.
Tuesday 11 may 2021 Initial tests of Sonobus plugin shows great challenges for rehearsals when internet networking over international borders. Musicians Paul Pignon in Jordbro Sweden and Jukka Kääriäinen in Helsinki Finland did a tryout of Sonobus and found the latency to be up to 1000 milliseconds. Paul Pignon summed the test as not so promising due to the induced delay being too high for any music to be performed in the way expected. But is there a dimension beyond the normal aesthetic and musical boundaries? Can we change our mindset and find new ways for musical worldmaking?
Thursday 6 may 2021 Is your computer running screaming hot? Glitching audio? Composing electroacoustic music or playing live-electronics puts high demand on your computer. The much celebrated OSX Turbo boost seemingly speeds things up but if you do realtime synthesis you need to be cautious how hot the processor is running. If too hot your sound will glitch because the processor hit the brakes, it's called thermal throttling. If you suspect you have this problem try Turbo Boost Switcher Pro. Limiting the processor speed actually can give you "more" headroom for your beautiful electronic sounds.
Monday 26 apr 2021 Happy faces all around as exciting artistic ideas is discussed. Can we really do music playing over a network, Sweden to France. So far tests imply great challenges induced by latency and sync problems. We concluded to team up one-on-one for further test and sum it up in a meeting during latter half of may.
Wednesday 21 apr 2021 Do you need an extended version of airplay? Airserver got some interesting tweeks, and a 30-day free trial. Make a wireless hub for your soundsystem and projector, or get your ipad on your computers desktop.
Wednesday 14 apr 2021 How about doing the numbers on a different machine and let yours shine..... running into useful spinoffs, same same but different. Could this plug-in to server host be a future solution to low latency interaction?
Wednesday 7 apr 2021 Sending controllers via UDP, a nice way to use Max/MSP or M4L as a go-between between computers, audiointerfaces and controllers. In this test we sent midi/OSC on UDP and audio on a digital link. Fun and easy, and yes there was some interesting music done.
Thursday 25 mar 2021 After an intensive period with an seemingly endless array of tools for musical net interaction, we'll take a break for easter, see you in a bit....
Wednesday 24 mar 2021 Another twist on remote music work. Check this lecture from PD wiz Miller Pucket on how he's built his interface for net realtime one-on-one work with a percussion player. Here is also a great sum from CDM.
Tuesday 23 mar 2021 The list gets longer with net-tools for remote web sound work. Through Stanford Uni you can get - Jacktrip, audio only. Or get acquainted with the nicelooking freeware project - Sonobus. Our comin-up One-on-One music session, Bjelkeborn in Stureby versus Tibblin in Södertälje, is getting swamped with possibilities.
Monday 22 mar 2021 Adding to the list of network audio tools. In the end of this discussion it´s suggested to use Skype for multichanneling of sound, or to use the OBS studio to patch it together. Wow, the lists growing for the coming interplay over the web, we'll get right back at ya´.
Sunday 21 mar 2021 Even more on net interaction tools. 1st a work-in-progress that needs compilation of assets, dl.netreceive/transmitt. And another based on the steady NDI protocol, Jit.ndi external for MAX/MSP/Jitter. So let's throw them into the mix for the coming tests, stay tuned for results.
Saturday 20 mar 2021 More on tools for musical web interaction. 1st has been around for a while, Network audio transmitter with MAX/MSP source code. The 2nd is rather new, Jamulus. So we'll add these for coming tests of musical exploration on remote by Tibblin and Bjelkeborn.
Friday 19 mar 2021 Mentor Kåre Hjelm SPL prod AB, source of big knowledge and state of the art audio tech. Adviser since 30 years for Thomas Bjelkeborn´s big scale projects, like Touchdown Hultsfred festival 10-years, The dancing Excavators for the new Museum of modern Art Stockholm and the Solitude Silence at Nuit Blanche Paris. Now he's giving us input and contacts for a flying start.
Thursday 18 mar 2021 What tools to use for musical web interaction? Beta projects try direct sound-to-net connections for "zero" latency, eyeing the beta Aloha from ELK. But we'we started tests of Zoom with Martin Jonsson Tibblin in his Södertälje studio and Thomas Bjelkeborn in Studio84 Stureby.
Wednesday 17 mar 2021 The first online meetup on how to organise the Pre-study and what artistic ideas to research on. We decided to look for webtools to do online ensemble soundwork and to look into possible partner institutions.
