Posts tagged precision

The RCA Electronic Music Synthesizer (1955): The Synthesis of Music (“Blue Skies,” by Irving Berlin)

This clip is from a series of 45s released by RCA to accompany the announcement of its then-new Electronic Music Synthesizer. In it, the narrator guides you through the creation of a synth version of “Blue Skies,” by Irving Berlin. It’s fun to hear someone talk about synthesizers from a time when the technology was so new. (So new, in fact, that the tunes on it were still sequenced using a player piano-like roll.)

What I find craziest about this is how fragile the song sounds at the end, like the oscillators are always about to fall out of tune, and the rhythm is about to come undone. With so much talk about the objectivity and precision of machines, it’s nice to hear machines sounding so close to the edge of failure.

You can listen to mp3s of the whole box set here.

(via Chris Ariza)

György Ligeti: Continuum (for barrel organ)

A quick followup to a previous re-blog from acousmata.

Ligeti’s Continuum, as played on a barrel organ. The barrel organ offers more precision than the human harpsichord player of the original can offer, but the quality of the notes from the organ is already more continuous. The harpsichord benefits from sharp, bright attacks. I also have the player piano arrangement now, so maybe that will have to go up sometime soon…