Patrick K.-H. (laptop, post production) / Oleg Makarov (laptop, MIDI-controller) / VJ Kirsan @ Alt+E fest, II Moscow Biennale for Young Art, 16.07.10 ev [1]

[1] http://vimeo.com/groups/46846/videos/13433516

Very few people may have attended this Malta Steiner gig, but hopefully we can bring it to a wider audience on the internet. His description on the video page is pretty classic.

It was windy,cold and wet, few people, monitors kept collapsing, in short: a typical Hamburg streetfest. I expected the worst, a new low in my career, but it was fun and good test of equipment.

Please note the small black netbook which ran the whole show, together with Archlinux and a realtime kernel. Csound replayed the loops from the studio, process them and provided synthesis for my solos. Right now I am booking some shows, perhaps Notstandskomitee comes to a place near you. [1]

I think we can all commiserate with Malta on this, and applaud him for toughing it out and playing a nice set!

[1] http://vimeo.com/12716797

Ben Carey sends word of his latest project in Max. Apparently, he is building a Max patch that granulates an audio file based on GPS data and accelerometer data from an iPhone.

GPS data controlling the mix between stereo outputs of a 4 buffer polyphonic sampler;
Sampled iphone accelerometer data controlling movement through the four sound files;
some other algorithms (offscreen) controlling and triggering other aspects of the sampler and effects processing…

I can’t wait to see this in performance.

[1] http://benjamincarey.wordpress.com/blog/

This is an abridgement of the live concert at Gates of Heaven Synagogue on July 6th, 2010, filmed by Peter Mackie. I’ve edited together a few moments from that performance to show the variance within our set of about 40 minutes. This is a combination of original compositions, guided improvisations, and free improvisations. Hopefully I’ll get more footage from this concert up soon. [1]

[1] http://vimeo.com/groups/46846/videos/13258317

Via AVM

New Music Hartford strikes again. Nolan Stolz (drums, electronics) played with Matt Sargent (guitar, laptop) and Todd Merrell (laptop) for an epic three hour electroacoustic improvisation at ArtSpace in Hartford Connecticut. This concert took place last December 18th, but internet citizens just got the videos yesterday.

CrashSpace hosted a night of hand made music on June 25th 2010. Among the performances was a Concerto for Three MakerBots composed by Frank Capodieci.MakerBot’s are 3D printers that create objects out of plastic, but in this case the extruder portion was removed and the stepper motors were driven at different speeds to create music. [1]

If you like that, then you will enjoy Symphony #1 for Dot Matrix Printers by [The User].

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKIjBvWoaF8

Via MAKE

This prototype interface was specifically designed to be used by multiple users at once, which is an interesting implication of multi-touch interfaces.

Initially based on only mouse and keyboard interaction and single-user oriented interaction paradigms, it now provides multi-user oriented alternative interaction methods thanks to the rapid improvements in technology. However, the technology providing the user those opportunities expects the user to learn a new language. Multitouch interfaces are among these new languages through which more than one user can interact directly by using their hands without a mouse or a keyboard.

In that context, the following project presents Squatouch, which carries the human-computer interaction to a higher level by providing a tangible interface that is alternative to traditional graphical user interface. [1]

[1] http://squatouch.alptugan.com/

Via C74 Projects

In the latest issue of the Canadian Electroacoustic Community’s online journal, eContact, Dylan Menzies unveils the O-Bow. The O-Bow uses an optical flow sensor, like the one on the bottom of your mouse, to sense speed, direction and angle of motion.

The O-Bow is a bow controller consisting of an optical flow sensor mounted to measure the bow speed and horizontal angle with high resolution. The bow can be anything with a grained surface, such as a wooden stick.

Development of the O-Bow was prompted by the lack of robust, and inexpensive bow controllers. Synthesized string instruments frequently appear in recordings, yet the quality of articulation is very limited for such expressive instruments. Bowing is a fairly easy skill to aquire, whereas fingering and vibrato are very difficult. Combining the keyboard with bow allows a musician previously unskilled with string instruments to quickly produce much better articulation than using a keyboard alone.Controlling vibrato with bow angle or key pressure avoids the need to control vibrato directly.

From a less utilitarian viewpoint, bowing is a very natural and expressive mode of control. It deserves to be integrated better into the modern world of electronic sound, including that which is more removed from authentic strings.

So far the O-Bow has been used with a simple one-sample synthesiser as shown in the following video. More sophistocated synthesis is being developed, including physical modelling. [1]

[1] http://www.zenprobe.com/dylan/project/obow/index.html