Acoustic Synth Screen Recording

via taskent99:

Live recording and screen capturing with Steim Cracklebox, Keypad Cigar Box Synth and BugBrand Board Weevil.

In this video, violinist Jon Rose controls ring modulation with the K-Bow, a Bluetooth enabled sensor bow for string instruments, turning Maurice Jarre’s Lara’s Theme, from Dr. Zhivago, into atonal sheets of sound.

The ring modulator rate is controlled by the distance of the frog of the bow to the strings, and held by the bow’s grip pressure sensor.

At STEIM, Amsterdam, 04/2009.

Visit www.keithmcmillen.com for more information on the K-Bow.

via bthrew

In this video demo, violinist Jon Rose controls feedback with the K-Bow, a Bluetooth-enabled sensor bow for string instruments.

Filmed at STEIM, Amsterdam, 04/2009.

Image: Paul Lindeboom

Saturday Synth Porn: This is a great shot of the Kraakdoos, or Crackle Box, designed by Michel Waisvisz of STEIM in the seventies.

The main concept of the Crackle Box is that the human body becomes a vital part of the electronics (or the other way around) while playing it. It is a touch and pressure sensitive device that squeeks and makes a lot of noise when played with.

If you’ve used the Crackle Box, leave a comment with your thoughts!

February 17 – 22, 2009
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis, MN.

If you’re a Twitter user, you can follow the events on Twitter.

Details below.

Douglas Geers & Ali Momeni, Artistic Directors
J. Anthony Allen, Producer
Phillip O’Toole, Technical Director
James P Hunglemann, Nightlife Curator

2009 Featured Artists

STEIM
STEIM (the studio for electro-instrumental music) is the only independent live electronic music centre in the world that is exclusively dedicated to the performing arts. The foundation’s artistic and technical departments supports an international community of performers and musicians, and a growing group of visual artists, to develop unique instruments for their work. STEIM invites these people for residencies and provides them with an artistic and technical environment in which concepts can be given concrete form. It catalyzes their ideas by providing critical feedback grounded in professional experience. These new creations are then exposed to a receptive responsive niche public at STEIM before being groomed for a larger audience.

STEIM – 40 years in live electronic arts by Takuro Mizuta Lippit / Artistic Director of STEIM

For the last forty years STEIM, STudio for Electro-Instrumental Music, Amsterdam has been the leading institution in research, development and facilitating live electronic music and arts. Many unique instruments and tools have been created over the years; Blackbox Modular Synth System, Crackle Box, SensorLab, The Hands, LiSa and JunXion are just to name a few. STEIM has also functioned as an active hub of ideas and people, becoming a safe house for an international community. Today, STEIM continues to support artists through it’s artist in residency program, educational program and concert series.

This presentation will introduce the general history of STEIM and it’s work method through various examples of artists and projects. Recent activities will also be presented as well as the challenges that the institution faced in 2008.
Visit the STEIM website…

Kanta Horio
Kanta Horio studied acoustics and sound art at the Kyushu Institute of Design in Fukuoka, Japan. He present audio performance using physical phenomena with electronic devices, kinetic objects, and assorted self-built gadgets. In recent presentations he has explored installations too. He has performed widely both internationally and throughout Japan. Alongside his performance activities, he organizes some unique events such as “dorkbot tokyo – people doing strange things with electricity”.
Visit Kanta Horio’s website…

David Wessel
David Wessel studied mathematics and experimental psychology at the University of Illinois and received a doctorate in mathematical psychology from Stanford in 1972. His work on the perception and compositional control of timbre in the early 70’s at Michigan State University led to a musical research position at IRCAM in Paris in 1976. In 1979 he began reshaping the Pedagogy Department to link the scientific and musical sectors of IRCAM. In 1985 he established a new IRCAM department devoted to the development of interactive musical software for personal computers. In 1988 he began his current position as Professor of Music at the University of California, Berkeley where he is Director of CNMAT. He is particularly interested in live-performance computer music where improvisation plays an essential role.
Visit David Wessel’s website…

Douglas Ewart
The kaleidoscopic talent of Douglas Ewart has expressed itself in so many forms–instruments that double as sculptures, music that combines the traditions of four continents with fresh inventions, masks and costumes fit for rituals ominous or joyous, death-defying improvisations combining master musicianship and acting-that the whole might be mistaken for the work of a small culture rather than one man.
Visit Douglas Ewart’s website…

Puzzleweasel
Puzzleweasel is the sonic output of Peter Dahlgren. Originally swedish, the puzzleweasel was brought up around europe in Zürich, Amsterdam and Stockholm and now resides in Aarhus, Denmark. Where he started churning out his music in 2001. Fueled by years of dance floor attendance at raves and jungle/ dnb venues he started sculpting away at his intricate take on beat programming. Quickly getting recognition for his uncompromising sound and overwhelming presence on stage.
Visit Puzzleweasel’s website…

Wafaa Bilal
Iraqi artist Wafaa Bilal is a professor at Tisch School of the Arts, New York University. He has exhibited his art world wide, and traveled and lectured extensively to inform audiences of the situation of the Iraqi people, and the importance of peaceful conflict resolution. Bilal’s dynamic installation Domestic Tension placed him in front of a paintball gun which people could shoot at him over the internet, 24 hours a day. The month-long piece spurred online debates and intense conversations, garnering the praise of the Chicago Tribune, which called it “one of the sharpest works of political art to be seen in a long time” and named him Artist of the Year in 2007. Newsweek called it “breathtaking.” But it is the resulting dialogue that Bilal seeks, as an artist who feels he does not have the privilege to create work that is not political. In the face of a war that stretches on, the 2004 deaths of his brother and father, the violence in his own history, Bilal seeks to imbue his audiences with a sense of empowerment that comes from hope in the enduring potential of humanity. In fall 2008 City Lights published “Shoot an Iraqi: Life, Art and Resistance Under the Gun,” about Bilal’s life and the Domestic Tension project.
Visit Wafaa Bila’s website…

Ray Lee
UK sound artist Ray Lee’s bewitching sonic sculptures become an extraordinary choir that produces mesmerizing drones and whirls of light in a carefully shaped hourlong sound /theatrical performance. An indescribable experience, Siren incorporates 30 large metal tripods at varying heights with rotating arms that generate electronic tones. In near darkness, two performers set each arm in motion, building a dramatic, immersive spectacle of choreographed movement, light, and sound while the audience is free to roam the McGuire stage. Siren was a hit of the 2007 Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
Visit Ray Lee’s webite…

Pole
Although you won’t find his name in their catalog, Stefan Betke has been closely associated with the Berlin-based Basic Channel label and BC artists such as Maurizio, Monolake, and Vainqueur. Like those artists’ bassy, dub-laden reductions of techno and house, Betke’s work (appearing so far on the Kiff SM, Din, and Mute labels under the name Pole) has been all about doing more with less — snaps, clicks, crackles, and smudgy bass atmospheres occupy the whole of Pole 12- inches such as “Tanzen” and “Raum Eins/Raum Zwei,” as well as Betke’s aptly titled series of CD releases issued by Kiff and distributed to American audiences by Matador. Where most Basic Channel releases cling fearlessly to the throbbing momentum of 4/4 minimalism, however, Betke draws complex, intricate rhythms from the crisp analog haze, layering rich, ghosted melodies over multitracked tape hiss and a barrage of syncopated skips and stutters. Betke’s nom de plum derives, as usual, from a sound- processing device — the Waldorf 4 Pole-Filter, from which issue the strained creaks and crackles that identify and characterize his music.

Speedy J
Jochem Paap, aka Speedy J, is a Rotterdam-based techno musician whose polished blend of melodious electro-pop with a harder, more Detroit- fueled edge has been among the most highly-praised of post-rave European techno. The Dutch rep in Richie “Plastikman” Hawtin’s Plus 8 label, Paap was equally well-known as a club DJ (his nom de record is in reference to his prowess on the cut) before deciding in 1997 to curtail his DJ engagements and focus on his music. His 1993 debut LP, Ginger, was an engaging blend of ambient textures and hard, crisp beats, and was immediately smacked with the “intelligent dance music” tag, aided by the inclusion of a pair of tracks on the first volume of Warp’s influential (Artificial Intelligence) series. Paap has since released several follow-ups under the Speedy J moniker (G-Spot, Public Energy No. 1, A Shocking Hobby) and two solo albums in an ambient series for Fax titled Vrs-Mbnt-Pcs 9598 (just re-insert the missing vowels for a quick translation). He’s also recorded a scattering of material as Public Energy for Plus 8, as well as for his own Beam Me Up! label before discontinuing the latter in 1996.

Guerino Mazzola
Author of over ten books and over 90 papers in the fields of Arithmetic, Topology, Category Theory, Algebraic Geometry, Mathematical Music Theory, Brain Research, Computergraphics in the Arts, Performance Theory, Computer Musicology. Mazzola is an internationally recognized jazz pianist. Production of several LPs and CDs; composition grants of the City of Z¸rich. Extensive tours as a jazz pianist in Europe, USA, Corea, Japan, Indonesia, and Mexico.

Scott Pagano
Scott Pagano is a filmmaker, motion designer and spatial reconstructionist. He is a leading edge exemplar of the current digital vanguard reinventing the fine art as well as pop art worlds. He is a visionary and acclaimed Creator Director and Designer in the interactive visual storytelling arts that are being more and more demanded by feature film and video gaming audiences. His motion art works and music videos have been screened in venues ranging from, movie theaters, fine art galleries, international film and music festivals, and MTV. Working with some of the most innovative artists in the Music and Film worlds, Scott has created abstract and conventional digital artworks that push the boundaries of audio- visual composition and process combining a dynamic mix of cinematographic and synthetic imagery. The narratives streaming in his video artworks lay the foundation for the storytelling of a new age.

Keir Neuringer
Born in New York in 1976, KEIR NEURINGER is active as an improvising saxophonist, a composer of electronic and acoustic music, and a vocal performer. His output ranges from pulse-based electronic music, through free jazz and experimental electroacoustic improvisation, to notated compositions for contemporary classical ensembles. He also writes texts and makes videos and installations critical of the destructive behavior of the dominant culture. In 1999 he moved to Europe and spent ten years, during which time he was a Fulbright scholar at the Academy of Music in Kraków and a master’s degree graduate of The Hague’s experimental interdisciplinary ArtScience Institute. It was during these ten years that he cultivated a personal and intensely physical approach to solo saxophone performance that both honors and eschews many diverse music-making traditions. He also cleaned offices, worked as an undocumented helper at a children’s daycare center, and curated the audiovisual program at contemporary art platform <>TAG. Keir Neuringer collaborates with a wide and undefined network of musicians, including Rafal Mazur, Ensemble Klang, Joel Ryan, DJ Sniff, Carlos Iturralde and Matt Bauder. He has performed and exhibited works in the US, Mexico, Israel, Turkey, South Africathroughout Europe. He lives in New York.

Also Featuring:

Danceband, Second Life Avatar Orchestra, Beatrix*JAR, and many more!

junXion v4 Features:

• recognition and usage of 8 types of Input Sensors
  • Human Interface Events, such as joystick X-axis, mouse scroll wheel, touch screen Y-axis
  • MIDI Events, such as MIDI note events from Port 1, Mod. Wheel events from Port 2
  • Timer Events, internal data generating processes, up to 100 Timers can be used
  • OSC (Open Sound Control) Events via network
  • WiiRemote Events, the popular Wii controllers support (on bluetooth machines)
  • Audio Events, as level and pitch tracking sensors
  • Arduino Inputs, simply reading the sensors connected to an Arduino board and using junXion to process these
  • Video Inputs, use live video image to extract a ‘Video Object’ out of movement, color recognition, etc
• being resolution independent, junXion v4 can handle any input data up to 16-bit resolution
• one Input Sensor such as ‘joystick X-axis’ can be connected to multiple Actions, thus generating multiple MIDI/OSC events
• multiple Input Sensors can be connected to one Action, so for example several switches of your joystick can trigger the same Action
• (auto) scaling of the incoming data
• straight mapping from the incoming data into one of the available MIDI/OSC events
• remapping of the computer keyboard and mouse to MIDI/OSC events
• creation of analog style sequencers using junXion’s Timers
• MIDI output port or OSC network port selectable per Action
• the possibility to simultaneously connect up to 15 USB input devices and route them to separate or common MIDI channels/ports (for example: you can for instance ‘play’ Ableton Live with two joysticks and the computer keyboard)
• external MIDI input data can be merged with junXion’s MIDI data or reprocessed and even turned into OSC messages
• save/recall user defined configurations
• editable table based response curves for the translation of gestures into MIDI controller data
• an extended set of data conditioners and conditional data routing (for example: passing a threshold by moving a joystick will first trigger a note and than send its further movement data as MIDI controller data)
• ‘Timers’ for timed data streams triggered and ’steered’ by external input devices (for example: use for simple sequencing)
• ‘Audio Events’ as sensors, for each audio input junXion can extract the Level and Pitch to be used as input data.
• ‘Video Events’ as sensors, for each in junXion’s video object editor definable Object you get six different input sensors, such as x and y position.

System requirements

• junXion v4 runs on any Macintosh computer with OS X 10.4 or higher.

junXion v4 can be ordered online for € 75 at the KAGI online store. Registered junXion v1.4 users can update to v4 for € 60. Users with a registration code for junXion v3 can use the same code for v4 – no upgrade is necessary.

A demo is available.

Michel Waisvisz, leader of the STEIM foundation in Amsterdam since the early eighties, has died.

From the STEIM obituary:

Michel Waisvisz died peacefully in his home last night after fighting the mean cells in his body for the last eight months.

He was born on the 8th of July 1949 and lead STEIM as Director for 27 years. He left us on a day when artists and friends from around the world gathered downstairs to perform for a full-house season-closing concert.

Michel was a musician, visionary and occasional gardener – touched by sound and forever happy to be surprised. He was the source of an enormous surge of energy that continues to flow through STEIM into the world.

We will miss his touch, crackle, inspiration and constant improvisation of the now.

Michel Waisvisz’s Bio:

Michel Waisvisz is a creator of live-electronic music and electric theatre. He is the composer and also the performer of his music.

By making electronic sound tangible through the invention of instruments such as The Hands, The Crackle Box and The WEB, and staging the first theatre play ever entirely performed by real living robots (”The Slungels” Holland Festival 1981), Waisvisz is widely praised as an authentic creator and performer in the electronic performance arts. His approach is typically based on the re-animation of carefully deconstructed technology. As such the Crackle Box is a very early example of ‘glitch’.

Michel Waisvisz has moved and worked independently; he is mainly self-taught; he has a reputation for being a forerunner; as a performer he can steer up ecstasy with clinical technology. One critic wrote, describing his impact: ‘Waisvisz’ performance causes an itch in a part of the brain where we cannot scratch’.

In the late seventies he choose exclusively for live performance; since than he did not publish any of his performances on CD or other media. Until very recently he wanted his electronic music only to exist in the reality of the concert hall.

Waisvisz toured internationally and played in a great variety of social entourages: from the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, various clubs and smaller venues in Europe, the Mutek festival in Montreal, the Philharmonie in Berlin, the Exploratorium in San Francisco, the inflatable Colourspace in London, The Kitchen in New York, big open air rock/jazz festivals in Rotterdam and Moers, church towers in Groningen and Utrecht to a subway station in Hannover and a dungeon in Bologna. In the summer of 1996 at the inauguration of the new tower of the IRCAM in Paris he performed on the square next to the Centre Beaubourg and created music with the sounds contributed by passing audiences and street musicians. He also performed in a packed 2500 seat hall at a Shinto sponsored festival in Nagoya in Japan. In the main auditorium of the Louvre in Paris Waisvisz performed a live film sound track to the original version of ‘The Hunchback of the Notre Dame’

Over the years Waisvisz also collaborated with many artists: he worked together with amongst others: Najib Cheradi, Laurie Anderson, DJ Spooky, Truus de Groot, Shelley Hirsch, Maarten Altena, Lodewijk de Boer, Moniek Toebosch, Richard Teitelbaum, Fausto Senese, Steve Lacy, Shusaku, Peter Brotzman, Frans Zwartjes, Patrizia van Roessel, Willem Breuker, John Cameron, Misha Mengelberg and many others. He also performed ‘Operation LiSa’ a collaboration with the audience: this is a piece that is entirely based on sounds sampled live from the audience and turned into music on the spot.

He received commissions for compositions by The San Francisco Symphony, the IRCAM / Paris, WDR studio for electronic music in Köln, Art Rock Festival Frankfurt, Centro para la difusion de la musica contemporaneal in Madrid, Viitasaari festival Finland etc. Recently he made a music work collaborating with the audience. The piece was entirely based on sounds by the audience recorded and manipulated live by Waisvisz.

He is the founder of Physical Philosophy. In Physical Philosophy, instead of using spoken or written language, the phenomenon of the physical act of manipulation of instrumental objects is considered the shortest and most precise expression of the axiom’s of philosophy. ‘The act is it’s metaphor; the act overrules its description’.

Besides his work as composer Waisvisz has created series of instrumental inventions. Amongst them The Crackle Box, The Hands and The WEB take a prominent place . The Hands is an instrument that consists of small multi-sensor keyboards attached to the hands. By moving arms, fingers and hands one can play an entire electronic ‘orchestra’. The instrument was a breakthrough in a time when electronic music was still merely a studio-art. Waisvisz motivates the physical approach in the design of this electronic music instruments by stating that machines are precise with numbers, but the human hand is more precise with musical time. Before the World Wide Web existed on Internet Waisvisz developed The WEB as a musical instrument. Waisvisz envisioned the concept of a mechanical web, with each thread as a sensor, as a physical metaphor for handling the big quantity of information needed to manipulate electronic sound in an organic and human way. In Waisvisz’ musical WEB an extended complex of wire-sensors that are inter-connected in a WEB-structure can be manipulated by a single finger movement. By feeding the many sensor signals to a computer music system one person can create and manipulate complex combinations of electronic sounds in an extremely spontaneous and intuitive way.

Many variations on the these instruments and other ideas have been bundled in the Touch exhibition. This exhibition entirely consists of instrumental objects that can be played by the audience. Since the seventies various incarnations of this successful exhibit have toured Europe and has proven to be a great inspiration for other initiatives in the field. It receives firm attention from school teachers, their pupils and researchers in education.

Waisvisz also developed – together with Frank Baldé – software for live electronic performance. The Lick Machine and LiSa (and recently also junXion) are widely known for their unconditional dedication to instantaneous musical en sonic exploration.

He initiated – together with Tom Demeyer and Steina Vasulka – the development of Image/ine, an image sampler/manipulator that has become the forerunner of VJ software’s like Arkaos, Nato, Jitter and Isadora.

As an organiser Waisvisz has contributed to, or founded, many of the new music festivals and electric art manifestations in the Netherlands:

Claxon Sound Festival, Pandora’s Music Box, Rumori Festival, STEIM’s ‘Secret Concerts’ etc.

Waisvisz has lead the STEIM foundation in Amsterdam since the early eighties. Since than STEIM has become a major international research and development centre for new instruments for live electronic music and also the visual arts, and international meeting place for those who work in electronic performance and new media culture.

Steim is the Amsterdam-based electronic music lab best known around here for inventing the Cracklebox. They’ve done a great deal more – lots of work on experimental interfaces, touch, gesture etc. And now, Steim is in trouble:

Things are not well at STEIM. We are in the danger of losing our structural funding from the government, based on a review from the advisor board which called us ‘closed and only appealing to a niche audience’. The outlook isn’t exactly bleak, but at the moment our future is unclear.”

If you’re part of the ‘niche audience’ for Steim (i.e. you enjoy doing interesting musical things with electricity) then please click here and spend two minutes filling out an email form to write a letter to the Dutch government. Thanks!