A Sound Synthesis Adventures: Absynth + Kore 2, an Artist’s take
I seem to be inside of strange place where instead of actually producing music I’m… kinda like designing the building blocks of music production projects…. Or I’m programing synthesizers anyway.
I’m in Absynth 4.. Seems like the last time I sat around programing Absynth.. it must have been a couple versions back.. In any event, I find myself digging down deeper.
Because all my programing is now “Synthesizer X + Kore” there’s a kind of.. strangely different way of thinking about synthesizers. I’m a software synth guy, you must understand.. so I’m not used to having a lot of hardware controls via which I can get expressive with a synthesizer.. So I’ve never programmed a synth with the notion of “if you move these 8 knobs, and 8 buttons you’ll find this groovy expressive potential in this sound.”
Absynth.. Is interesting in that.. It’s one of the first synthesizers I ever kind of fell in love with programming. Absynth’s expressive potential for ambient music.. for evolving sound scapes.. is just awesome. And there’s something about programming it that gets my imagination going like no other.. It’s all a bit more like creating a sonic puppet then a conventional synth patch.. In the sense that you’re going in and finding different ways it could be expressive.. as a part of how you program it.
Latter that night
The patch I’m currently working on, as I write this post, is one that I’m not real sure if it’s usefulness as an instrument.. I mean I have no idea how it could fit into my work.. but I will say.. its fun as hell playing with… perhaps I can take a swing at trying to express what I mean by this….
Conventionally.. I don’t really use compressors or EQs.. or I didn’t until recently.. and I’m still at an early stage of learning how to integrate them into my work. Now conventionally EQs and Compressors are… well like the most important tools of mix engineers. EQs and compressors help you to shape various aspects of your mix.. But how I usually do it is.. in the choice of what instruments I use.. Another words.. how I shape the things EQ and Compressors shape.. I shape by things like what instruments I use.. which is.. in a lot of ways.. kinda better.
A day or so latter:
You used to be able to just embed these.. but I can’t work out how to do that since they changed last.fm a little bit.. in any event.. here’s a direct link to a track called A Short Trip To Another Day. (clicking on it will open it in a new window.) The reason I link to this track is.. is it’s an example of something created based off.. well the same sorta spirit I’m working in now..
I’m jumping around in this post a little.. so try and bare with me..
A Short Trip To Another Day was one of my first attempts at programming Absynth.. The program I created was.. one that I didn’t really know how I would be expressive with it.. or how it would work in my music.. So the process of creating A Short Trip to Another Day was one of exploring how it might fit into my work..
Working in this sorta way.. I think it pushes you in different directions then you might other wise work in.. which can result in more interesting work.. and I have to say that this might be one of my favorite tracks.. and so it illustrates what I’m talking about in this entry.
Ok.. so…
As I was saying before.. I never used to use EQs or Compressors in my productions.. and um.. EQs and Compressors are tools via which to craft a mix.. and they indeed are tools that I could use in order to exert some control over the sounds created by my synth programs..
So.. looking forward from where I’m at at this moment.. I see growth potential in my music, along a few different lines..
- There’s the process of learning to program various synthesizers and the power of custom sound libraries.. and all there implications… This isn’t a totally new concept.. but we are learning to program new synths / new versions of synths.. ad exploring new possibilities along these lines.
- There is the issue of the hardware / software control.. thinking about sounds as puppets.. with various ways of getting expressive with our sounds.. that are much more complex in how they might be expressive.. then normally found in my work.
- There is the subject of how to use EQs and Compressors in my work.. where they might make my work better, or perhaps make my work not soo much better.. but it is about the exploration of what there roll can be.. which is in large measure a more artistic thing then a conventional technical thing of.. the way things are conventionally done by people.
- There is the possibility of using Kore 2 for “Super Instruments,” which is to say.. You create a patch.. that combines any number or synthesizers and effects into one giant “super instrument” and what that could bring to the table.
In talking about these possible directions.. for growth.. We are talking about how this work could become enriched.
Latter that night, over tired (after a synth programing catastrophe)
I started in on a new Absynth program today. What happened is.. I figured out how to have the.. well performance sliders, lets call them.. things I’d probably control via the Kore 2 controller.. modify envelopes. This would be a fairly simple thing.. but it’s enough to get me excited… With envelopes you can create rhythms… and you know.. these rhythms could evolve over time.. but also you could have different parts of your synth program playing different rhythms of different lengths.. that loop.. So its like.. well lets just say that’s pretty cool for the way I like to work.. (though I don’t normally use synth patches that include rhythms)… but the polymeric possibilities are very exciting to me..
Anyway….. So you can take one of these rhythms.. and you can make it so that one or another performance control alters the tempo of the rhythms… and in one patch.. you could have a lot of rhythms… So what I wanted to do is build in some way of controlling the relative amplitude of different rhythms, as well as there tempos… and also just kind of throw some fun stuff on the fire. Now.. .
Ok, groovy enough.. But allow me to attempt to explain what’s exciting to me about this.. out side of just the usual “and these are the reasons polymeric stuff is good for ambient music styles.” We’re actually not just talking poly-metric… where talking poly-tempi… Another words.. we’re have multiple tempos going on inside of a single synth patch… I guess it’s like you have the main tempo.. that’s the tempo of the project your working on.. and everything is synched to that tempo.. and you can shift that tempo around if you like.. but that’s like “the conductor tempo.” But.. you could have.. various instruments that… while being able to start out with an obvious relationship to that tempo.. can go off the rails in one way or another.
The difference between music and noise is probably your ability to recognize a pattern… And for patterns to be interesting.. they probably need to reach an optimal state between simple and complex, with respect to ones ability to recognize them…
A few days latter
Ok, I’m going to leave it off right here.. without finishing this, cause other wise it probably wont get posted.. but at least its an interesting look at what I’m up to.