The semi-bad news is I spent a considerable amount of time a year or so ago researching how people notate their synthesizer patches, never coming to a conclusion that I felt was (yet) substantial enough to write about. That is, how they draw, or photograph, or otherwise annotate for future reference the combination of cables and knobs, sliders and (increasingly) menu settings of their modules.
The not unrelated good news is, having done that work, I had developed some fledgling ideas as to how to accomplish such a task, ideas I drew upon this evening when my camera failed to record audio for what would have been the day’s Buddha Machine Variation.
The second of the images below is how I transcribed some menu settings (on the ER-301 module, using the Feedback Looper unit). I was, apparently, especially (presciently?) primed to take these notes, because the first of these two images is something I wrote in a notebook last night when an idea for today’s patch first suggested itself. So, these are the before and after. What’s missing is the middle, the actual recording.
This was an experiment in exploring the device as a whole: not just as a set of loops contained in one object, but the sequence of those loops, and the way the loops progress as a result of the object’s design. All the previous Buddha Machine Variations to date have involved one loop per machine. Here the multiple loops of such a device, one from the second-generation of Buddha Machines, are heard not just in sequence, but in overlapping sequences. They’re considered as a suite.
There are three subsets of whatever loop is playing at a given time. Each is a subloop: one three seconds, one four seconds, one five (in the ER-301 module, using the Feedback Looper unit). Each of the subloops is extracted from a different narrow band of the audio spectrum (via the FDXf module). As the piece proceeds, the button on the side of the Buddha Machine is clicked. One or more of the subloops begins recording the new audio almost immediately, but there is some time before the preceding loop is entirely eradicated. At the very end, the audio cable is pulled out of the Buddha Machine, and eventually all the subloops give way to silence. (This was less sudden when rehearsed, but it works OK here. I’ll be trying this all again with a slightly different approach.)
For further patch-documentation purposes, here is a shot of the synthesizer:
Video originally posted at youtube.com/disquiet. There’s also a (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLAgCxRbmR1MIM4mCYe17nERi9xeEWAD2w) of the Buddha Machine Variations.
One loop from the fifth generation Buddha Machine, little snatches of it glitching out in a semblance of correlation. At first all that’s heard is the unaltered audio of the source loop. That’s the fifth channel of the mixer (lavender cable). And then one by one, the first through fourth channels of the mixer are introduced. Each is set on a mico-looping procedure of the source loop, varying individually between roughly 100 and 300 milliseconds. They are each set to record over whatever was there before, meaning sometimes there will be silences. And finally, once the main source audio is turned off in the mix (at 1:45), all that is heard is this combination of microloops.
If you’re familiar with the ER-301 module, here’s some additional detail: The unit being used is the Feedback Looper. There are four of these running individually. Each is taking a square wave from the Batumi as its on/off switch to record. In addition, each is taking the next channel’s on/off as its trigger to (un)engage (the fourth channel looks to the first channel, squaring the circle).
That runs for quite awhile, and then at 2:55 the relative pace of the four square waves are altered. This has an impact on when the individual loopers are triggered, and then at 3:09 the Batumi is switched from “free” mode to “quad,” and the levers adjusted further.
For further patch-documentation purposes, here is a shot of the synthesizer:
Video originally posted at youtube.com/disquiet. There’s also a (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLAgCxRbmR1MIM4mCYe17nERi9xeEWAD2w) of the Buddha Machine Variations.
This is my weekly(ish) answer to the question “What have you been listening to lately?” It’s lightly annotated because I don’t like re-posting material without providing some context. In the interest of conversation, let me know what you’re listening to in the comments below. Just please don’t promote your own work (or that of your label/client). This isn’t the right venue. (Just use email.)
▰ The always exciting Madeleine Cocolas is back with a new full-length, Ithaca (Room40), filled with percolating, emotional music. The compositions blend elements that folks who listen to techno and classical minimalism might think of as their own, and will learn they have to share nicely with others. A standout is the stately “The Heart Doesn’t Lie (Except When It Does),” a slow solo piano work that is generous with its pauses.
▰ A who’s who of experimental musicians from the San Francisco Bay Area collaborated with Tim Walters on *Shatter in Place*, a fundraiser for Bay Area Safety Net (“a non-profit designed to help support artists in the Bay Area during the COVID-19 crisis”). A highlight is “Multiplication Street,” which makes the foment of Lisa Mezzacappa’s double bass available, as with all the other contributions, to serve as “electroacoustic source material” for Walters’ artfully mercurial transformations. The other contributors are Myles Boisen, Kyle Bruckmann, Brett Carson, Tom Djll, gabby fluke-mogul, Phillip Greenlief, and Gino Robair.
▰ “Adagio for Mellotron and Modular Synthesizer,” at once both patient and tensile, features the latter by itwasthewires and the former by Marco Lucchi. Lucchi’s collaborations have been a highlight of my SoundCloud stream [lately](https://disquiet.com/2020/03/23/flacholet-meierkord-separasjon-lucchi/).
▰ A single-instrument performance on a sampler is never truly a single-instrument performance, not when you consider what was sampled. In the case of r beny’s lush, dreamy “Vestals,” this includes piano, strings, and synthesizer material. The video was recorded live for Do It Yourself, Together, a streaming festival put together by Synthstrom Audible, the company that makes the Deluge, the instrument he’s playing. Synthstrom was supposed to have some concerts (live, in person — remember those?) back in March, where every performer would just use the Deluge. They were, of course, cancelled due to the current circumstances. I was really looking forward to one [scheduled for March 21](http://forums.synthstrom.com/discussion/2624/oakland-ca-usa-march-21-2020) in Oakland, California, across the Bay from where I live, but it didn’t happen. R beny was among those scheduled to perform that evening.
▰ The new weekly Robert Fripp series of quiet instrumental tracks each come out at what seems to be 2am if you live in California, which is a more humane 10am in England. The gorgeous third entry, recorded back in 2006, was released this past week. Somehow his account still has under 8,000 subscribers.
One loop from the first generation of the Buddha Machine, which turns 15 years old in 2020. The loop ends up with three variants in the mixer, channels one, two, and five. The fifth channel (lavender cable) is just the straight audio out of the Buddha Machine (a little noisier than usual, perhaps because the batteries were going). The first channel is the output of the Muxlicer, which switches between eight variants on the audio: six are spectral bands (from the FXDf), and two are channels of the granular synth (the position of which, in the Smog, is shifting regularly). The Muxlicer is going at a steady pace (clocked by the Dixie II, starting when the Muxlicer’s switch is flipped at :28), but the sequence is random thanks to an inbound sine wave (from the Batumi). The second channel, which kicks in at 3:24, is a tiny fragment of a loop that is constantly being overwritten, and it’s set off from the Muxlicer’s beat by a slight, almost half-second delay, which at first gives the contrast a sing-song quality, but eventually disappears as the amassed swell occludes virtually everything. And that’s about it, except that at 4:25 a slow wave is introduced to gently alter the volume of the original, channel-five track.
For further patch-documentation purposes, here two shots of the synthesizer:
Video originally posted at youtube.com/disquiet. There’s also a (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLAgCxRbmR1MIM4mCYe17nERi9xeEWAD2w) of the Buddha Machine Variations.
