[sdiy] Control Interfaces (was Wakeman)

[Don Tillman]

   > Date: Tue, 8 Jul 2003 19:54:14 +0200 (CEST)
   > From: Rainer Buchty <buchty at cs.tum.edu>
   > 
   > > There are no yogi skills required to control more than a few
   > > parameters while playing an instrument. Look for instance what violin
   > > or wind instrument players do all the time.
   > 
   > The violin player usually controls two parameters with one hand (pitch and
   > pitch bend), and another two with the bow (staccato/legato, "expression").
   > 
   > Similarly, the wind instrument player applies the basic note information
   > with his hands, additional pitch control is provided through the blow
   > pressure. In addition, "expression" can be added by the way the instrument
   > is blown (volume, "modulation effects").

I've said this before, but what the hell...

I'm a guitarist.  When I play a note on a guitar, there many hundreds
of different ways I can play that note, and all these are readily
available without even thinking: pick up, pick down, sliding the pick,
using the side of the pick, picking at an angle, plucking with my
fingers, picking toward the bridge or toward the neck, palm muting, my
own variation of palm muting, tapping, hammer-ons, pull-offs, bending
the string, vibrato, left-hand muting, slides, harmonics, and so on.
Some of these techniques are less direct, like how the musician
interacts with feedback, buzzes, resonances and other mechanical
issues.  The number of variations and possibilities of expression is
really huge.

On top of that, some guitarists have their own personal playing styles
that are so part of their technique that a listener can easily
recognize the musician in one or two notes (Metheny, Fripp, Hendrix,
Holdsworth, Morse, etc.).

The same is true with violins, saxes, basses, pianos... pretty much
all musical instruments.

Claiming two parameters on one hand and two parameters on the other is
an extreme and deceptive oversimplification of the situation.  And it
will keep you from building a real musical instrument.

  -- Don

-- 
Don Tillman
Palo Alto, California
don at till.com
http://www.till.com