The Theory and Technique of Electronic Music

Covers the use of electronic techniques to record, synthesize, process, and analyze musical sounds. Focuses exclusively on electronic music using a computer. Requires knowledge of mathematics through intermediate algebra, trigonometry and complex numbers.

Tag(s): Signal Processing

Publication date: 30 Dec 2006

ISBN-10: n/a

ISBN-13: n/a

Paperback: n/a

Views: 32,471

Type: N/A

Publisher: World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.

License: n/a

Post time: 21 Mar 2007 09:13:40

The Theory and Technique of Electronic Music

Tag(s): Signal Processing
Publication date: 30 Dec 2006
ISBN-10: n/a
ISBN-13: n/a
Paperback: n/a
Views: 32,471
Document Type: N/A
Publisher: World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.
License: n/a
Post time: 21 Mar 2007 09:13:40

From the Preface:

This is a book about using electronic techniques to record, synthesize, process, and analyze musical sounds, a practice which came into its modern form in the years 1948-1952, but whose technological means and artistic uses have undergone several revolutions since then. Nowadays most electronic music is made using computers, and this book will focus exclusively on what used to be called "computer music", but which should really now be called "electronic music using a computer".

Most of the computer music tools available today have antecedents in earlier generations of equipment. The computer, however, is relatively cheap and the results of using one are easy to document and re-create. In these respects at least, the computer makes the ideal electronic music instrument--it is hard to see what future technology could displace it.

The techniques and practices of electronic music can be studied (at least in theory) without making explicit reference to the current state of technology. Still, it's important to provide working examples. So each chapter starts with theory (avoiding any reference to implementation) and ends with a series of examples realized in a currently available software package.

The ideal reader of this book is anyone who knows and likes electronic music of any genre, has plenty of facility with computers in general, and who wants to learn how to make electronic music from the ground up, starting with thehumble oscillator and continuing through sampling, FM, filtering, waveshaping, delays, and so on. This will take plenty of time.

This book doesn't take the easy route of recommending pre-cooked software to try out these techniques; instead, the emphasis is on learning how to use a general-purpose computer music environment to realize them yourself. Of the several such packages available, we'll use Pd, but that shouldn't stop you from using these same techniques in other environments such as Csound or Max/MSP.

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