(Music)-Tech Tuesday
ObjectsMusicians may be smaller larger than they appear: Music schools whose budget cuts has affected their ability to bring in performers for concerts and master classes may now be able to hold the same classes online with EchoDamp, a free software developed by the University of Southern California that promises to preserve sound quality over a high-speed internet connection. According to an article in The Chronicle of Higher Education, the software, developed by Brian K. Shepard, an assistant professor of composition at Southern California’s Thornton School of Music, maintains ” a sonic environment online that is musically effective.” One of the problems musicians tend to have with video conferencing or web streaming, Shepard told the Chronicle , is because there is often a delay or echo as a result of the music having to travel hundreds, or thousands, of miles. Shepard said EchoDamp expands the spectrum of sound a laptop can capture, along with digitally removing that echo.
It seems schools may also be able to use this to record the master classes, which would be great for music students who happen to miss the performance or a class. But somehow, I don’t think this will bring Yo-Yo Ma to my living room. I can dream.
No bassoonist? No problem: As students increasingly use technology to compose and record songs, professors and professionals are finding ways to help them use digital performers, too. A great article in the Christian Science Monitor, titled “Symphonies gingerly embrace digital performers,” explores how professional conductors and composers are allowing digital performers and conducting programs into the opera houses, and how professors are trying to let them into the classroom. Interestingly enough, Shepard (from the news item above) is in this article too, explaining which subtleties students can replace with computers — and which they cannot. The article in it’s entirety is well-written and complex for me to try to simplify/recreate here, but a few revealing quotes:
“Paul Henry Smith, a composer and developer of the Fauxharmonic Orchestra, says the development of cheap disc space and affordable processors has allowed sampling libraries to grow more refined, both in the number of instruments allowed and the shades of tonal quality available. Although Mr. Smith says hearing an acoustic orchestra “is still the best thing you can do” to hear symphonic music at its highest level, he says his device is a “viable, expressive instrument.”
Mr. Shepard says digital orchestration is best used not to replace acoustic instruments but to add new sounds that composers living centuries ago had never imagined. “I love the orchestral instruments, but I also love the sounds that are created electronically. I don’t see it as an either/or situation,” he says. “I certainly hope [digital media] will expand our [aural] color palette.”
And lastly, something I don’t consider music: J-school students at Columbia University rapping about ethics. Amusing, but I’m glad this guy is pursuing journalism.
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