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I have a favour to ask of you: I have the germ of an idea which I am developing for a forthcoming report and I want try it on you. So please let me know your thoughts.
Apart from the persistent pressure of free, two of the recurring trends that look set to shape the future of digital music are:
The Cloud
Social
First a few thoughts on the cloud….
The cloud is of course is already with us, but largely as a collection of disparate connected music experiences (e.g. Pandora, Spotify, Comes With Music) rather than as something more all-encompassing. I’m skeptical of the truly ubiquitous experience happening anytime soon. Indeed, the practical limitations on ubiquitous connectivity mean that connectivity will in fact fall short of ubiquity for some time (more on that from my colleague Ian Fogg later this year). But it is clear that over the next few years more of the dots will be joined. And sometimes the dots will be joined by innovative workarounds, such as Spotify’s ‘offline’ streaming solution.
And a few thoughts on social…
Readers of my will know that I’m a stronger believer in the near term potential of social in music experiences than I am of the cloud. In order to effectively compete against free music products need to create new, unique music experiences and social interactivity is a key means of achieving this. If you put a $0.99 iTunes download against a $0.50 Amazon download against a BitTorrent $0.00 download the BitTorrent download will always win. Future music products need to do more. Formally layering social functionality into the experience is key here, both to add a connected element but also for discovery. With so much noise online, trusted taste makers (or ‘curators’ as Nettwerk Music’s Tony McBride calls them) are key. And who do we trust most for recommendations? People we know and connect with.
My thesis is that these two dynamics not only don’t have to be, dare I say it, disconnected, but that they should be inextricably linked. Their paths should be moulded together.
The likes of Last.FM (Audio Scrobbler) and Apple (Genius) have started to demonstrated the power of ‘Crowd Sourcing’ in the music discovery journey. Spotify and YouTube and many others are showing the way for cloud based music experiences.
The time has come to be the crowd in the cloud.
Social tools and media are of course already inherently connected and inherently cloud based, whether it be Facebook, Twitter or MySpace. Â When woven into the fabric of a digital music offering they bring that experience to life. Â In a connected music experience that exists across multiple devices and multiple platforms, social connectivity is more important than ever. Social connectivity turns a bored 10 minutes waiting for a train into a connected a fun engaged interaction with a friend, sharing playlists on MySpace. It transforms looking for something new to listen to on your iPhone into a social discovery journey.
This idea’s still taking shape, so I’d love to hear your thoughts.  I’ll post further on the concept as it evolves.
Every year at about this time, Ottawa University Professor Michael Geist comes out touting the as evidence of a thriving Canadian market for digital music sales. Every year, he compares the U.S. numbers to Canada and proudly points to our growing digital music market compared to our southern neighbours:
However, if you read the fine print of these articles, every year Professor Geist has to sheepishly admit that while the growth rate is indeed greater in Canada than the U.S., the total market (per capita) is much lower in Canada. So much lower, in fact, that even after four consecutive years of faster growth, the Canadian digital music market still significantly lags the U.S.
The truth is that each successive year that Michael Geist touts Canada’s stronger growth rate compared to the U.S. only serves to highlight how far behind we truly are.
But if we are to use growth rate as the leading measure for a market’s viability, here are some of my 2010 predictions, based on reported growth rates:
– this is the first sign of the inevitable end of digital data storage
– glad I never got rid of my landline
- I knew my index cards investments would pay off some day
– magic broomsticks are the new iPad!
Joking aside, unless you look at an incredibly specific indicator like Professor Geist (growth in sales of digital music in Canada compared to growth in sales of digital music in the U.S.) the reality of these Nielsen numbers is that the Canadian music market continues to be in peril. For the 10th straight year, the Canadian music sales declined over the previous years. I’m not sure if Professor Geist read the , but it leads off with the following two “2009 Canadian Year-End Factoids:”
“Total Album sales declined 2.2% compared to 2008, continuing a trend of declining music sales in Canada.
Increased digital growth in 2009 did not offset the decline in physical sales.”
As usual, Professor Geist ends his article by attempting to tie whatever incredibly specific measurement metric he’s chosen out of the Nielsen report to Canadian copyright law. Growth rates of digital sales as compared to one other country aside, the only logical conclusion that can be drawn from these reports is that something must be done in Canada to reverse these consistently declining figures. Combined with the , the continued decade-long decline in music sales in Canada only highlights the urgent need for reform.
Wherever you live, you can enjoy the DIY and open hardware inventions coming out of Texas. Or, as the famous song goes: “That’s right, you’re not from Texas / Texas wants you anyway.”
Austin, Texas may be associated with the strum of guitars. But it’s also populated by some of our favorite electronic music hardware inventors on the planet, led by the likes of , , , and more. They’ve taken the idea of a “Handmade Music” and come up with the best formula for building a community around DIY hardware I’ve seen yet:
1. Get beginners – even if they’ve never soldered before – making noises with a beginning kit workshop.
2. Do an advanced workshop that pushes the envelope with new hardware.
3. Turn that noise into a performance/party: i.e., “After all the kits were built, we plugged in to the PA and partied until the amp overheated.”
4. Provide your specs and software freely.
5. Make a kit available for people to buy.
Notice that it’s possible to make “free hardware” (open sourcing part or all of the code, publishing specs and circuits) and still sell a product. And it’s possible to act locally (workshops in Austin), and sell globally (sharing documentation online, and shipping kits everywhere else).
And notice that it’s possible to make events beginner-friendly. In fact, this isn’t just to teach experienced musicians how to solder. I find that many people who are too shy to make music via traditional means find there’s a freedom to a glitchy, blippy electronic thing that makes noise. After all, through the ages music was never intended to be exclusively the domain of professional specialists.
Here’s the latest on their activities – and a chance to meet the hardware that has come out of their series.
For more, stay glued to .
Boys and girls of Austin make electronics, as mad sonic inventors Eric Archer (left) and John-Michael Reed aka Dr. Bleep (right) look on. Photo by Thomas Fang; courtesy Dr. Bleep.
First, let’s meet the devices:
Meet the Beasties
Thingamagoop 2
Kawaii, indeed. Photo courtesy Bleep Labs.
Bleep Labs’ Thingamagoop seems as much electronic creature as electronic instrument; its sounds seem like the vocalizations of an alien and, yes, it’s darned cute. The new Thingamagoop 2 is more usable (easier-to-access battery), sounds better, and has more features. But it’s also more open in every way. CV in and out lets it interface with analog gear. A programmer jack lets you reprogram it with your Arduino, if you so choose (the Arduino isn’t required, but it does let you reprogram the sounds on your Thingamagoop). And now the sonic effects — sample and hold, arpeggios, noise, and bit crush — all use open-sourced code. That makes what was already an ingenious soundmaker more open to hacking by advanced users.
The Thingamagoop 2 debuted to the world at Austin’s Handmade Music. Now, perhaps we need some hack sessions to get people working on reprogramming this and other sonic oddities.
I expect to get one of these soon, so expect a hands-on.
Thingamagoop 2 is now reprogrammable with an Arduino, for those so inclined. Just want to make noises and adore its lovable cuteness? No Arduino needed. Photo courtesy Bleep Labs.
Nebulophone
The Nebulophone is coming the world as a kit, but Handmade Music Austin attendees got it first. Photo () .
Nebulophone is a coming kit that builds on the Arduino platform to create a playable, DIY Stylophone-style instrument. , the instrument features “adjustable waveforms, a light controlled analog filter, LFO, and arpeggiator that can be clocked over IR.” Yes, you read that last bit right: it’s all part of the new wireless, infrared sync revolution these guys are leading.
has code, schematics, instructions – so you can actually make your own – plus sound and advance info on the coming kit. I expect a video and more on the kit soon.
SimSam
The SimSam is a noisy, glitchtastic product.
It’s also the subject of a beginners’ workshop, a chance to get people working with electronics for the very first time.
And its cost – a tiny $8 in parts.
It’s also a brilliant use of the ATTINY85, an ultra-compact, 8-pin AVR chip. (AVR chips also live at the heart of the Arduino platform.)
And the SimSam debuted at – you guessed it – a workshop at Handmade Music Austin #4.
Tons of info and everything you need to build your own:
There are actually some details that could use improving, so have a look and see if you can do an updated version.
Autonomous Bassline Generator + Andromeda Space Rocker + MIDI-IR Sync
The …
…can sync up with drum modules like this by Eric Archer:
…and sync together via infrared, wirelessly, connecting to each other or slaving to a MIDI clock signal generated by Wooster Audio’s MIDI-IR.
Image courtesy .
Together, you get the Andromeda Space Rockers: a whole little galaxy of wirelessly-synced sonic gadgets. And all of the above are available as kits, so you can sooth your soul by assembling them yourself.
The creators have debuted and jammed with these gadgets through Handmade Music, and presented workshops on the technologies and concepts that underly their creation.
Arduino, Sound Libraries, and Resources
I asked Dr. Bleep himself (John-Mike) about what resources might be useful for working with the Arduino platform (and similar architectures) and sound. The main secret is, use Pulse Width Modulation to accomplish sounds with a minimum of code:
Here are a few of the pages I used when designing the code for it:
is a fantastic source for “Oh man why didn’t i do that/ this guy is incredible!” projects.
I’m also not the first to mate the stylophone with arduino
The two biggest/ earliest arduino synths were :
http://ww
One difference with the Nebulophone is that it is very low part count. No multipexers or DACs. Just PWM out to an two opamp analog filter. This does limit the number of keys and controls but makes for a tiny, simple pcb.
Handmade Music Austin, in Videos
How do these events go down? Here’s a look at some of the sonic mayhem.
Episode 1:
Episode 2:
Episode 3:
Handmade #4 lacks a video, but we’ll watch for #5 when it happens.
The next Handmade Music Austin is on February 28. Details aren’t up yet, but I’m told you can expect an advanced workshop on building a digital delay by Nathan/, plus a simple, light-controlled noisemaker for beginners. Stay tuned to:
What if a competition didn’t just encourage entrants to try to make a better product? What if it encouraged friendly rivalry between makers to produce entries that were also shared across the community?
That’s the idea behind Digitópia’s upcoming series of competitions, now entering its third year. Digitópia itself is based in Porto, Portugal, at the Casa da Musica. But even if Portugal isn’t exactly in your neighborhood, entrants and onlookers alike can benefit from shared, open sourced contributions.
In fact, even the prizes itself are open projects. The simple, anthropomorphic-looking controller above is a free project. It’s dead-simple, a combination of an IKEA salad bowl, a potentiometer, and ultrasonic distance sensors. But as a result, it’s also inexpensive, simple to use (particularly with the addition of Digitópia’s custom-developed software), and a flexible starting point for further work. (Actually, handling multiple ultrasonics is a bit tricky, too, relative to things like infrared, so that’s a particularly nice addition.)
First up: Max and Pd patchers, your pride is on the line.
Think your Max/MSP or Pure Data multimedia patch is the most original around? Prove it. An international competition will find the best patches, and all of them (whether made in Max or Pd) will be released under a free software license. A panel will judge the results, led by Pedro Rebelo, composer, digital artist and Director of Education at the School of Music and Sonic Arts, Queen’s University Belfast. New deadline: February 14. (That’s right, polish off your best patch, send it into battle, and then take your pumped-up sense of masculinity / femininity out for a fantastic Valentine’s Day dinner.)
There are other competitions, too. The third-annual Musical Miniatures Competition is looking for musical works or “gestures” of 15 seconds or less. (If you’ve ignored other calls for works, this one should leave you no excuse.) The sounds will be licensed under a Creative Commons license for , adding to that communal repository of sounds. Bram de Jong, legendary developer and freesound.org guru, will judge the results. Deadline: May 28.
Produce the best sound or the best patch, and you get the controller above and accompanying software. But the for third competition, you get the futuristic controller of your dreams. You submit the idea, and Digitópia builds the results. The entrants are judged on “innovation, originality, feasibility and inclusive potential.” (Yes, it needs to be feasible in order for them to build it — no electronic music equivalents of .)
Oh, yes, and the Dreams Competition has me as the judge. Deadline: April 3. Keep a dream journal.
The beauty of all of this is that these are contests that give back. We’ll have sounds, patches, inventions, and hardware documentation for the prize and the entrants; stay tuned as that documentation becomes available.
Speaking of getting something out of this for yourself… don’t have any dream ideas? No good at Max and Pd patching? For an absurdly-cheap €15 for three whole days of seminars, Digitópia will teach you patching skills in these two tools. Jeez, for that price, you could afford a flight to beautiful Portugal and still come out ahead. No details on the new seminars for spring up yet, but I’ll put up a notice when they are. (I’m also teaching a seminar at Digitópia the first week of June.)
One of the free (as in beer and freedom) included patches for the Digitópia controller.
AP - Silicon Storage Inc., a maker of flash memory cards used in digital cameras and MP3 players, said Wednesday that it has agreed to be acquired by Microchip Technology Inc. for $273 million in cash.
This music is uncopyrighted. That means you may play, use, re-use, sample, remix and mash up the music at your own discretion. Simply credit the original author as Songsworth when you do so. For the rationale behind uncopyright, see . For information, please send mail to .
If you want to pay for the music, please credit microloans to third-world entrepreneurs at . If you want, drop a mention of whom you’ve credited in the comments. Thanks!
From a previous hackday at InterAccess; photo () .
. Toronto’s InterAccess has been a hub of terrific DIY activity in sound and other fields, otherwise known as a General Gravity Well of Awesomeness, and they’re now doing their own Handmade Music, kicking off this month.
Full call below, but as with other events, there is an open call for work (and some nice thoughts on why now is a wonderful time for DIY).
Even if you’re not in Toronto, it’s nice to read their take on why this stuff matters. I’m gratified they’ve found this inspiring. I’ve certainly been inspired by … well, all of you!
Making an arduinome housing. Photo ()
.
Friday, February 19th, 10PM
InterAccess Electronic Media Arts Centre
9 Ossington Ave.
Organized by Stephen McLeod, Andrew Lovett-Barron, and Alex Snukal.
InterAccess is hosting a party where DIY/handmade/experimental music performers and makers get together and show off their stuff. Haven’t made anything yet? Doesn’t matter, just come out and see what people are up to. We already have some confirmed performers but we want MORE!
We want your circuit bent speak ‘n spell!
We want your home made theremin!
We want your gigantic modular!
We want your trash can drum kit!
We want your insane Max/MSP (or PD) patch!
We want your monome!
If you’ve built something and you make music with it, we want to hear it! Doesn’t work? Bring it anyways! The night starts out with a show and tell, and aside from this initial event we will be holding regular workshops and get-togethers, that anyone regardless of skill level are welcome to attend and share ideas. In fact, we want to make Interaccess a space where people doing interesting things with electronic music can regularly gather, learn, and perform.
To participate, please email Alex Snukal at alex.snukal at interaccess dot org.
Great Time to Make Electronic Music
There has never been a better time to make electronic music, and here’s a few of the reasons why:
Monome (http://monome.org/about) adopted an open hardware/software approach and this has led to a creative and prolific DIY community, committed to finding new and interesting ways of interacting/performing/experimenting with the device. Users are encouraged to make it their own, either through writing/modifying their own software or building their own ‘version’ through a kit, or even sourcing the parts themselves and making something completely new.
In fact, many intrepid DIYers have build monome clones (called Arduinomes) using the Arduino! If you haven’t heard of the Arduino, it’s an amazing open source piece of electronics that lets you connect sensors and control things from your computer. Like the swiss army knife of the DIY electronic world, Arduinos have been involved in countless projects and we can teach you all about them.
This all leads directly to the software that is run on many a monome or Arduino: Over the last decade, Max/MSP and Pure data, both created by Miller Puckette, have been adopted by the international music and multimedia community as programming languages of choice for innovative musical and visual composition. As visual node based programming environments, they differ from the more familiar text based languages by having their roots in electronic musical synthesis using virtual patch cables to route messages to objects which stand in for synthesis modules, a style of creation more in line with Wendy Carlos than Alan Turing. With relatively recent addition of Jitter for Max/MSP and Gem for PureData, these techniques and tools are making there way into the visual realm as well, rounding themselves off as key tools for the modern musician, visualist, and multi-media artist.
And of course, we have been heavily inspired by the excellent Handmade Music events in New York and elsewhere!
Here’s an amazing guy who makes all his own strange electronic instruments:
Some videos of the monome in action.
tehn:
making the noise:
More details soon, and we’ll definitely be sharing the best projects from Handmade Music worldwide.
PC World - Swollen with thousands of save games, MP3s, videos, and full-game installs to counteract nettlesome DVD-drive noise, my Xbox 360 officially feels like a walk-in closet trying to squeeze into a shoe box.
This music is uncopyrighted. That means you may play, use, re-use, sample, remix and mash up the music at your own discretion. Simply credit the original author as Songsworth when you do so. For the rationale behind uncopyright, see . For information, please send mail to .
If you want to pay for the music, please credit microloans to third-world entrepreneurs at . If you want, drop a mention of whom you’ve credited in the comments. Thanks!
