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digital culture

Pitch Shifting Pop Songs….

Both digital and analog pitch shifting have been used for years by musicians to alter the sound of original musical material. Be it Ross Bagdasarian’s recordings of “The Chipmunks” , DJs using pitch shifting on a turntable to speed up or slow down a record in order to make it sync up with another record, or someone composing on a computer using digital pitch shifting software, the technique is widely used across musical genres. One recent application of pitch shifting… Read More »Pitch Shifting Pop Songs….

Does anyone play the laptop in your school?

The topic of composing and performing with a laptop will be a theme running through this blog I’m sure for a long time. Over at newmusicbox Marc Weidenbaum recently wrote an interesting article tracing the history of musciains using the laptop, focusing on some recent composers/performers making use of it in their own work. After getting a lot of feedback he wrote a short follow up with information that gives a fascinating insight into the possibilties that laptops allow musicians.… Read More »Does anyone play the laptop in your school?

Playing the Laptop

Does anyone have any students playing the laptop in school music ensembles? It would be interesting to find out how many programs include the use of the laptop as instrument. With more and more musicians such as Ikue Mori using the laptop as their primary instrument it only makes sense to start thinking about how to include it in our music programs. Just as any other instrument, performing the laptop live, requires skills and knowledge that can be developed over… Read More »Playing the Laptop

Breaking it down with the BBC….

Having trouble holding back the excitement of students wanting to remix their latest composition project with world news? Have no fear, the BBC is here to save the day! Even the UK Penguin book publising company is appropriating remix culture. The UK is not the only country holding remix contests. The CC Mixter based in the US is taking full advantage of creative commons licensing and has already held successful contests and continues to encourage people to remix the available… Read More »Breaking it down with the BBC….

X Boxes, And Playstations and gameboys oh my!

Forget students asking you to play the latest movie theme music, soon you are going to get requests to play video game theme songs at your next concert. How do you feel about that? You can get a taste of what it might be like when the Detroit symphony orchestra plays its “Dear Friends: Music from Final Fantasy” concerts this summer. Has anyone had their students create video game music? If so was it done with/for electronic instruments or computer?… Read More »X Boxes, And Playstations and gameboys oh my!