Listening Response

I interpret this grouping of listening tracks for the week to have a concise and singular theme: the limitations of music.  In the (very entertaining) words of one of the videos, "With the right combination of sine waves, you can make any sound because all songs are made up of wiggles on top of wiggles" (The Synthesis of Synthesis- The Telharmonium, YouTube).  This is to say that, any sound can be fabricated.  Although, as the video explains, this concept came around before digitally synthesized music, we are now able to digitally fabricate any frequency, and thereby, can digitally can make any sound.

Okay, so we have established that we can create any sound at all.  This brings us to an interesting conundrum: how do we use this ability?  Well, as I see it, we really only have two options.  First, we can use a combination of the sine waves to replicate a musical object (such as a note from a grand piano).  The other option, is to go against "traditional" music and intentionally make sounds that could not be made using a classical instrument.  We see this concept explored in these videos, particularly in "D. Buxtehude - BuxWV 155 - Toccata d-moll / D minor" and "James Tenney - Critical Band (1988)."  The Buxtehude track seems closer, in many ways, to more traditional instrumental tones, while the Tenney is more distant from sound objects which stem "naturally" from instruments.


Listening tracks for the week: