Today Tuesday 29th September 2009, The start of the something remarkable and of course uber confusing. As a class we take a look at Super Collider the next step in Music Production. Super Collider is from what I percieve a computer program that allows a user to program in events and characteristics of music so that a computer can create it for example a simple melody or even a complex symphony. In effect writing a score in a computer literate notational form and then giving it to the computer to read and write it with Piano, Bass, Synthe sounds etc. To make things nice and confusing the desired notes and sounds all need to be written in code, native to SuperCollider.
Where to start? Well if you imagine a 128 key, 8 Octave Piano or Keyboard, from the very 1st key far left (which is C)and you count each key including all the black notes from 1-128. The 1st C is (1) and C Sharp is (2) D is (3) D Sharp is (4) and so on. Middle C is (60) So in simple terms you can ask the computer to generate a sound based around the chosen key therefore you can ask the computer to play a whole series of notes e.g. 60, 67, 88, 73 so on and so on.
Many Great Electronica Artist like Aphex Twin & Julio d’Escrivan use SuperCollider to generate complicated and diverse Electronic Music. SuperCollider can be used on its own or in Conjuction with Sequencing programs like Logic.
Through SuperCollider alone you can generate all sorts of wierd and interesting soundscapes and Musical patterns as you can control the nearly every aspect of the sound.
The following video shows an Aphex Twin track created using SuperCollider and from what I have seen so far, this would have taken quite some time to program but never the less very inspirational. I hope I can get my head round its complexity and use it as a creative tool.
When you take a first look at SuperCollider it all looks like computer programming and thats exactly what it is the difference is SuperCollider can instantaneously produce a result. A simple code can make your computer generate a sound. SC opens with 3 windows; the Post window a preprogrammed page that executes command that you tell it i.e. generate sound (UGen function) a simple Sine-Wave or some White-Noise, Pink-Noise etc and 2 windows called Local-Servers which the Post window connects to, the sound excites from these Local-Servers.
The manual control page opens through SC’s Post window by holding Cmd & pressing (N). On this blank text file page you can type code to execute or “call” in SC terms a certain feature or response. Although this code has to be written in a language that the Post window & SC can understand. {So normal English language is out the Window} postln;
The following image shows the 4 Windows:
As you can see in the Window the one named “Execute” the following code is written {SinOsc.ar(400,0.3)} .play. If I place the text marker at the end of my code and hold the Shift/Fn key and then press the Return key the Post window will initiate the Local server to generate a sound based on my command. { This Curly bracket opens the Function, (SinOsc) means I want a Sine Oscillation initiated, (ar) is for Audio Rate and with out this no sound will be heard. Next an ( open bracket allows me to edit the sound of this chosen Sine Oscillation, so 400, is 400Hz (pitch), 0.3 is for Volume 0 = no sound 1 = is full volume so 0.3 is 30% full volume. This is followed by a ) close bracket and finalises the detailing. The } close curly brackets finish the function. Lastly the .Play obviously ask the Post to play the sound. To conclude this short report using various forms of the example code you can build up complex and or simple rhythms and melodies to use in a computer composition.
For more information visit http://supercollider.sourceforge.net/
The Future’s Bright, The Future’s OrangeNoise .play;
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