Category Archives: the cosmos

everything that is && everything that isn’t

The Zeroscillator

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Cyndustries Promotional video used at the NAMM Show Anaheim California 2007. This oscillator is amazing!

Video by Cyndustries.

I agree with the video description. The Zeroscillator, by Cyndustries, is amazing! And I really, really want one. I never knew FM synthesis could sound so great. Since the whole process takes place in the analog domain, the Zeroscillator doesn’t have the same issues as digital FM does with aliasing, which allows for timbres not possible with digital FM synthesis.

This unit is my highest priority for when I upgrade my Doepfer sometime in the future.

BT’s Studio Robbed

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“I wish that I was addressing our community under different circumstances.

Unfortunately an event has occurred that in my opinion warrants a unique approach that ends not only in a solution for the situation that I have found myself in but also takes a fresh look at how we can help better serve our entire community as a whole. I have been robbed of much of my current gear, for both recording and three different live shows.

I will pay anyone either $20,000 US Dollars or my equivalent time as a producer in exchange for the name and address of the perpetrators. This information will be more helpful to me, than just getting my gear back. Over 150k dollars of gear was stolen including my main show computer containing the entire show for This Binary Universe. This is priceless to me, as is my Hartman Neuron and Dave Smith Poly-Evolver…”

– Brian Transeau, a.k.a. BT

BT continues with a partial list of the equipment stolen from his studio, and proposes a non-profit community subscription service where individuals can “thumbprint” their gear to help track future stolen goods. Read more here.

Link via matrixsytnth.

ninbento

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Ninbento is a modification of the classic Nintendo Entertainment System that acts as a music visualization system. Using a custom-built circuit and a practice known as “circuit bending,” the modified NES will “listen” to music and generate chaotic and colorful displays to the beat.

Video by apleasantnoise. Thanks to PAgent of PAgent’s Progress for another great find.

Part of getbent.

Music: a Mathematical Offering

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A good friend of mine recently sent me a link to “Music: a Mathematical Offering” by Dave Benson. I’ve only briefly skimmed the text. However, I can already assure you this free online book is full of useful information. It does veer into the technical, as it is packed with equations that may seem a bit alien to some. Don’t let this dissuade you, as there is plenty of knowledge for people of all backgrounds.

The PDF is 524 pages long, making printing a not-so-viable option. For those who wish to read a hard copy, you can purchase the book from Amazon.

Here is a list of chapters in the online version:

1. Waves and harmonics
2. Fourier theory
3. A mathematician’s guide to the orchestra
4. Consonance and dissonance
5. Scales and temperaments: the fivefold way
6. More scales and temperaments
7. Digital music
8. Synthesis
9. Symmetry in music

I would also like to point out that my synthesizer of choice, Csound, is covered.

Home Brewed Convolution

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The fifth Csound Blog entry is up.

“According to wikipedia, convolution is ‘a mathematical operator which takes two functions f and g and produces a third function that in a sense represents the amount of overlap between f and a reversed and translated version of g.’ However, this explanation tells us little about convolution as applied to audio…”

Topics covered:

  • Convolution
  • Impulse Response
  • Reverb
  • Filter

More at The Csound Blog. For more information about Csound, please visit cSounds.com.