Re: [microsound] tools-mediums-questions++ - was: Re: [microsound] Csound/DirectCSound/PD

[Jeremy Markowitz <jeremymarkowitz@xxxxxxxxx>]

Tools may have an inherent process in them, but it's
my belief the process the artists chooses in using the
tools forms the post-cultural message.  If you are not
putting any thought into the method in which you
create music, that will be reflected.  The process you
choose in how you make music will individuate your
message beyond what tools you choose.  Music can be
made by a group of executives at Sony, or it can by
made by script that someone has written, or both. 
Because certain drum machines or software have
processes designed in them which direct the user
towards a certain methods of music-making, there is a
tendency to use this method like one would use a
preset.  But even here there are choices left up to
the user -- including contexts and meta-languages
among listeners, not to mention individual sequences,
harmonic combinations, etc.  The artist always has a
choice to short circuit an intended process or attempt
to do something that the software or machine can't
quite accomplish without a "glitch."  Is the glitch a
function of the tool or the process in which the user
is trying to use the tool?

The final product is a result of many processes which
can minutely alter the final product.  Some may be be
completely unintended.  The method of cultivating the
unintended with the idea of making editoral choices
based on an aesthetic is still a process.  Tools can't
really do this by definition -- if a tool is designed
thusly, its output will be intended.

Here is a myth about a musician:
Before he had a guitar, B.B. King first honed his
musical yen on a fencepost which had a piece of wire
attached to it.  The only way he could extract
different notes from it was by changing the tension of
the string, which produced a certain "bending" of the
notes.  When he finally obtained a guitar, he found
that if he pushed the string up or down while holding
it to the fretboard, he could obtain a similar sound. 
The original design of the guitar did not take this
method into account.  Pitch was intended to be changed
by using frets or a slide.  But B.B. King is
mythologically credited with inventing the
"string-bending" technique.  This method has since
been copied by guitarists worldwide.  Even so, the
sound of bending of notes between B.B. King, Albert
King, or Tony Iommi is distinct.  What is the message
of this process?  On the most primal level, the sound
is evocative of a human or animal cry.  It reflects
the process of finding a pitch without the use of
culturally demarcated stopping points and the resonant
effects of altering string tensions.  Contextually,
the product is then historically derivative of music
called "the blues."  Can blues music be made with the
same process of pitch bending, or does it require a
guitar?



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