Hi All,

Gather round for a drink (virtually) and just take a minute or two for some comments.

I've noted both at The Bar and in other areas how we seem to be treating our electronic instruments more like our PCs and less like an extension of our own feelings, moods, etc. I, for one, am as guilty as hell, as I'll look at a piece of music and if it appears too complicated, I'll 'step record' it. No harm there but you just loose the human quality of the piece. The same can be said of most TV and movie themes. However they're recorded or sequenced it still sounds too 'exact'.

So, next time you sit down and decide to play or record a piece, have a drink, cigarette, whatever and try to let whatever's left of your human side come through and maybe, just maybe, we can teach some of the boffins what the digital age can, and cannot, do.

Enjoy your drink,

Mark

[This message has been edited by Mark, Michie & Luce (edited 01-16-2005).]

If you step record you should really should quantize with a groove template or with some sort of humanization treatment that takes some of the mechanical preciseness out. Personally I alway prefer to record sequences in realtime and then quantize to just a percentage rather than put everything precisely on time. That way I can keep some of my original feel but correct the occasional note that was starting to slide a little too far off time. If the track sounds natural without quantizing I will leave it alone and perhaps tweak the odd note by hand. I just decide on a track by track basis.

Because I play guitar as well, playing a realtime guitar track over a tight quantized performance tends to make the overall sound seem natural. You could do the same with just keyboard by playing one of the prominent parts ( pick one that you are able to play comfortably and leave the more difficult lines to the computer ) in realtime over a sequenced backing and that would be enough to impart a human feel to the track.


[This message has been edited by Nigel (edited 01-19-2005).]

I hear ya, Mark. Nigel's points are right on the money (oops, almost said mark). It depends, though, on the stuff you're putting together. I mean if it's techno or such, then mechanise the hell out of it.