Thursday 27 th September. Periods Music Technology A2

A2 exam written question revision ‘The development of music technology’ Must answer 1 question (choice of 2) 16 marks available (8% of A2) Include 16 different points Organise ideas in date order. After planning, answer can be bullet points or prose

A2 exam written question revision ‘The development of music technology’ Topics: Synthesisers Drum machines Samplers Audio effects and audio processing - EQ MIDI Recording media (tape / digital etc). Consumer media (Vinyl & MP3 etc) Multi-track recording (Digital and Analogue) Computer based recording – Cubase / Logic etc Electric Guitars and Amplification Internet Mixers Digital Synthesis / FM / Additive / Wavetable / Sample based

Samplers & Sampling… What do you know?

Samplers & Sampling. Sampling is basically recording a sound. This recorded sound is called a sample and it is stored (RAM / disk etc). Samplers makes sounds by playing back samples. The pitch of the sample is determined by the speed it is played back – to play a sample 1 octave higher you would double the playback speed. Samplers are played via a keyboard or sequencer.

Mellotron The first sampler Each note played a 12 second tape strip of a pre-recorded sound. Like a violin. Very complicated - have to change tape strips to change sounds. Unique sounding (sometimes unreliable) – Analogue – pitch fluctuates (not unlike a human playing an instrument).

Mellotron ch?v=eR6D1ZH2CMk&feature =related atch?v=ypAKsbvKr2s ch?v=c_VGa5TInBc

Digital samplers After the Mellotron – Samplers were digital. Digital samplers recorded sounds and saved them digitally (onto floppy disk / internal memory). The quality of the sound was dependent on…….(its going to get a bit technical!)

Digital sampling – Sample Rate. 1The ‘sample rate’. This is basically how often a ‘sample’ or an audio snapshot / recording is taken of the sound that is to be sampled. ‘CD quality’ has a sample rate of 44.1 Khz which means a sample is taken of the original music times a second. Human ears in very good condition can hear roughly 20Hz to 20Khz. Cubase can record with a sample rate of up to 192Khz. Rule of thumb (or Nyquist–Shannon sampling theorem!) is that you need to sample at twice the highest frequency of the sound. Ie if you wanted to accurately sample a violin which has a frequency response of about 200Hz (lowest note) to 3Khz (highest note) you would sample at 6Khz – twice 3Khz. Sampling at a too low a sample rate causes ‘aliasing’. This means you will hear errors (harmonics / overtones).

Digital Sampling – Bit Depth. 2The audio ‘bit depth’. This is basically the quality of the ‘sample’ or audio snapshot / recording. ‘CD quality’ has a bit depth of 16 bits which means every time a sample is taken (44100 times a second) it is recorded at 16 bits. Early digital samplers were 8 bit. Today studio digital recordings (as on Cubase) are usually done at 24 or 32 bit depth. The higher the bit depth (and sample rate) the higher the data size of the sample sound. Like a ‘high quality’ 320 Kbits/s MP3 takes more space on your ipod than a lower 128 Kbits/s MP3 (this is the sample rate). Play around with the Bit Crusher FX in Cubase which allows you to change the bit depth on a sound.

Digital Sampling. Sample Rate.

Digital Samplers bit Synclavier 1 followed by the more widely used Synclavier 2 in Synclaivier 2 cost about $75,000 in U U

Digital Samplers bit Fairlight CMI sampler (from Australia). £18,000. Mark 2 model in 1982 featured a graphical sequencer called Page R (the origins of sequencers like Cubase). ure=player_embedded#! ure=player_embedded#!

Digital Samplers Development 1988 Akai S bit Stereo sampler. First to use ‘time stretch’. £2000 Developments of samplers since early 80’s: Technology has become a lot cheaper. Original samplers were at least $8,000 for the cheapest model (1982 E-mu Emulator as used by ABC in early 80’s). Samplers used to be out of reach of the average musician. More and less expensive memory. Original samplers had 64/129K RAM – less than 1 second of CD quality sound!). Better sound quality because of: Greater Bit depth (form 8 to 16 bits) And greater sample rates (from 22/32Khz to 44.1Khz CD quality up to 96Khz and beyond)

Software Samplers As synths became VST’s (Virtual Studio Technology) in late 90’s – so did samplers. All the features of hardware samplers but as PCs and Macs became more powerful so did VST’s making hardware samplers obsolete. Steinberg Halion.

Using a Sampler Start and End Points The start and end of the audio WAV when played back on the sampler. Keyboard range (Zones / span) The range of notes a sample can be played on. Different samples can span a keyboard. Looping While playing back a sample – when the loop end point is reached the playback jumps to the loop start point. Ie you could loop a string sample so when it gets to the end it jumps back to the start to make a continuous sound. Changing the sounds (Filters / Envelopes). Just like a synthesiser – the sample can be treated like a wave (VCO) and flitered and also an envelope (ADSR) can shape the sound.

Practical Create a multi sample of a ‘real’ instrument like guitar / violin etc. Record 1 note per octave for at least 5 octaves. Import the samples into the Cubase Short Circuit VST sampler. Create a short musical riff / piece.

Homework You are advised to keep your answer to a maximum of 200 words. You may write in continuous prose, bullet points or use a table to communicate your answer. Try to make 20 valid points. There is 16 marks for this question. The digital sampler has transformed the sonic palette available to musicians and producers by allowing any sound to be incorporated into a recording with accurate control. Describe what a sampler is and how sampling technology has developed from the 1980s to the present day. You should refer to technical specifications of sampling equipment in your answer.

Further study – sampling ‘ethics’ Is it right to use someone else's music in your music? Should you need permission before using a sample? Should the artist you sample be compensated and if so for how much? (from 2 mins in)