I had a neat idea as I was driving to a gig. I get really fed up with the recordings (stack of cd’s) in my car as I’ve listened to them so many times, and every time I listen to them, they are the same!

I thought, why not make a recording that sounds different every time you play it?

Sound crazy? Well, it’s really quite possible to do, and wouldn’t be very hard.

Usually when a band records a song, they might do multiple takes, say 4 or 5 takes. For certain sections of the song, such as an instrumental solo, it would be cool if it would sound different every time. The artist or recording engineer could “program” the song to play a different, random take for a certain section of the song, each time the recording is played, or combine together parts of any of the takes in a new or somewhat random way. A single solo section could be further broken down into segments, such as a certain number of bars, and each segment could be swapped in with a different take, as the music is played.

There are a bunch of extensions to this idea:
- if this is on a website, allow the user to save their particular performance that they heard, and share it with others (and rate them, etc)

- instead of a purely random choice of the takes, the user could give input into the choices such as “I’d like a really upbeat and lively version of this song”, or “I’d really like a version of this song with a longer sax solo and less Britney”.

-if the “intensity” of the performance was hooked up to a foot pedal (e.g. the recording would become more excited as the pedal is depressed lower, and more relaxed as the pedal is released) an actual live musician could play along with such a recording, while controlling the intensity of the background recording, and have the background music follow his/her performance.

Please – let me know what you think!! And please take this idea, expand on it, and develop something new, as I mostly have time to think these days and not implement something, even so cool as this!

Geoff

One thing I really love about digital media, and media in general, is the power to repeat.

Jazz musicians learn the language of jazz by repeated listening and transcribing of recordings. Writers learn from closely re-reading books, poems, or articles. Video editors and filmmakers learn from closely analyzing and re-watching TV commercials, short films, or movie scenes.

With basic TV, you can’t repeat – you have to blindly accept all the images that are being force-fed into your mind. Digital TV has given control to “Pause” live TV, and to some degree repeat.

Youtube is awesome because there is no limit to how many times you can repeat a video – just click the play button again.

Streaming radio annoys me because I find I really only enjoy a song once I have heard it 5 times.

Live concerts sometimes frustrate me – I find I don’t have the brainpower to remember or perceive all the complexities of a live concert, but if I had a video recording or even an audio recording I could absorb everything the artist is trying to convey.

Of course I love live music for the spontaneity and feeling the presence of the performers.

Without the ability to repeat I feel helpless. With it, I can master my role as an audience member in perceiving art and media, and truly improve my own ability to create.

I tried out my new video camera (a Panasonic AG-DVX100A) and filmed my stuffed animal frog which I bought at the Daiso Japanese dollar store in Richmond, BC, Canada.

The very same evening, I christened my green friend with the name of TonyFrog. So here is TonyFrog’s debut performance on video.

The rather “epic” classical music for this video was composed, orchestrated, and recorded by me, about 5 years ago. I used Cakewalk Sonar and the Edirol Orchestral module, along with my Yamaha P-80 keyboard hooked up to my PC via MIDI. I always intended for this piece to be used in a film, and its time has finally come! The credits music is another song that I wrote, an electronic dance music piece called Birds in the House that I recorded with my synthesizer (Korg MS-2000B) and mixed with some drum sounds from the Roland Virtual Sound Canvas (VSC).

The video was recorded in 60i mode and recorded directly into iMovie on a Mac using Firewire. I used a white balance card to calibrate the color settings (using the AWB button on my camera). I had to increase the Gain Boost on the camera to Medium because of the low light, and used the Auto Iris setting. I used iMovie to edit the footage and pick out parts which would go along with the music. Starting from the beginning of the music track, I edited clips to fit with the rhythmic and thematic changes in the song. I added a few effects such as a ripple and blur, just for fun.

Hope you enjoy the video!!
Until next time,
take care!
-Geoff Peters

I am currently writing a short film (under 10 minutes). Meet Robo Robert. He’s an eccentric fellow who loves a good chip and defrag. Suprisingly well connected, RR plays chess, goes for walks, and even takes care of the mouse. Robo’s life is simple, but something is missing. Something electric. One day, RR goes to a park for a chat with Lindy. Their exchange will change his outlook forever.

(Actors and helpers needed – inquire within)

Mad TV is one of my favorite comedy TV shows. They are not afraid to explore touchy subjects such as racism, politics, class divisions, and commercialism, and they do it in an hilarious and smart way.

Here is a sketch where Apple’s Steve Jobs introduces their latest product, the iRack. It is a funny and astute commentary on the Iraq war, at the same time poking fun at the consumer culture and hype surrounding Apple.

This sketch is from MADtv Season 12, Episode 16.

The actors are:
Steve Jobs (Michael McDonald)
Announcer (Nicole Parker)
Audience members (Crista Flanagan, Jordan Peele, and Keegan-Michael Key)

I feel like writing down a few thoughts about Macs. So here goes:

I used to think that Macintosh computers were “dumbed down” because they only have one mouse button. (Well admittedly, you can use a PC mouse with a Mac if you want to use a second button). I remember the days of 386′s and Windows 3.1 when the Three button mouse was the coolest thing.

I started using computers on the first Macintosh (and even a bit of Apple II+ before that). Then I switched to PC’s and never looked back (so I thought) until a few weeks ago when I realized that I couldn’t record music anymore with PC’s – their latest firewire drivers (Vista) don’t work very well with my fancy MOTU 8-Pre audio interface.

So I bought the White Macbook; it cost around $1300 including tax from London Drugs. It made a very good first impression – everything worked instantly and I was able to get up and running really fast. And I love the design of the laptop: how it looks and how it “feels” when I use it. I am quite happy using the single mouse button for casual things, and then plugging in my Zero Tension ergonomic mouse when I am going to do some more intense clicking.

iMovie is amazing; it makes video editing a breeze, and Logic is so much better than Cakewalk. Long live the Mac laptop!

Browsing the Apple site, I found an interesting article on how A.R. Rahman, the famous Indian movie composer, used Logic Pro to create the soundtrack for the movie Slumdog Millionaire.