11 Dec
2006
11 Dec
'06
8:54 a.m.
Hallo,
Orm Finnendahl hat gesagt: // Orm Finnendahl wrote:
Frank, you can't be serious!
I had a smiley behind the URL. I'm not saying that playing a video
game *is* making music. This is obvius in the video: The sounds coming
from the machine are coming from a recording and don't have anything
to do with how the kid is hitting the buttons.
And apart from common belief, the sportive aspect is
not really the
hard part of playing an instrument: Yesterday a friend of mine came
over to check out my new Grand Piano. Unlike me he is an (admittedly
exceptional) professional pianist and it was quite frustrating to hear
him play a piece lying on the note stand, which I had been studying
before he came. After 20+ years of training I'm more or less able to
play such a piece, but to hear the subtelties of his dynamic and
harmonic control was mind blowing, especially as he was sight reading
a virtuoso piece from the 19th century, (which took me quite a while
to learn). Telling him my frustration he told me that he can relate to
that quite well as he experienced the same when he had lessons with
his his former teacher (who had studied at the Paris Conservatoire at
age 12)...
To add to my blasphemy: Maybe I would feel similar if I was trying to
play that japanese game machine and then that kid would come along and
obviously play it much better than I can.
One should not underestimate how much added value really great gamers
often put into their playing style. Some people add decorations to
their virtual movements not because it would be required to win the
game, but just because it's cool. This still doesn't make it it Cool
Jazz, but it shows, that even in gaming there can be more than just
the sportive aspect of winning.
But my main point is, that game-inspired interfaces may be able to
show new ways for computer music instruments besides the usual
approach which is hooking a midi keyboard with some knobs to
ZynAddSubFx which in the end then is nothing more than an organ small
enough to be carried in a bag.
Getting visual feedback from the computer, making the machine respond
"intelligently" to human input, creating new metaphors and symbols
beyond note and velocity - all this is happening in games already.
True, the intention is different, but the techniques are similar, and
in my view your Pd interface for improvisation isn't too far away from
that. Fijuu or Chris' Eargates make this connection really obvious for
example by using a game engine (Ogre in Fijuu) or a game controller
(Eargates) with game-like feedback visuals.
Ciao
--
Frank Barknecht _ ______footils.org_ __goto10.org__