Introduction to Computer Music | Hacker News Reader

Introduction to Computer Music

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280 pointshecanjog84 comments

Oh man, I get that as an author you have to choose a path to introduce the new learner to...but it bums me out to see that the material completely avoids tracking as one of the preeminent ways to make music on computers.

Instead it goes down the midi path, which of course ultimately is the dominant commercial technology today. But I've always thought that the complexity and expense of a good midi setup is more of a prosumer-type thing.

Tracking gets you quick entry from chiptunes through extraordinarily expressive sampling to VSTs and even into midi at the edges, and there's trackers for pretty much every kind of computer that can make music.

You can very cheap/free/easily explore the main musical concepts presented here from synthesis to digital audio.

Bonus, most classical tracker files are a kind of "open source" music in that you can see all the note data, the techniques the composers used, and have access to all of their instruments. You get to "see" both composition and performance details down to the note.

I really wish that the academic computer arts educators would catch on to these core pieces of the demoscene -- which is now UNESCO recognized by now six countries as intangible cultural heritage for all of humanity -- and were developed to both challenge and wow the audience and make production by literally penniless children possible.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but a tracker is a software to compose music ? This books is about making sounds, so lower level

Look at the table of contents.

I did it and even started to read before commenting. The table of contents is acoustics, studio gears, midi, synthesis, digital audio, history and some appendix. Even if midi and potentially gears are side topics, it is focused on sound creation not composition.

Okay, I see what you are saying and your perspective on it. It's possible I'm approaching the material from a different point of view that's not really aligned with my experience and would like to see some treatment of authoring and mixing software tools, maybe in the Digital Audio section.

The Synthesis chapter is actually very nicely done.

I'm trying to understand this topic more, so I'm curious what you mean by the word tracking. I searched around, and wanted to check if my understanding is roughly correct:

Is tracking when the frequency data of the instrument, and the frequency+tempo changes in the music track are stored? And does midi just say "guitar" or "piano" and leave it up to the software to decide what those instruments sound like? So tracking would always reproduce the same sound, while midi can vary, even if it's making the same tones?

For e.g. an acoustic guitar and an electric guitar might both be producing a note at a particular base frequency (e.g. C2) but the overtones and amplitudes of those overtones would be completely different, giving each instrument their particular sound. So does tracking record that overtone distribution for each instrument, to ensure an acoustic guitar sounds like an acoustic guitar (that the music composer wanted)?

This is the source that I was reading - https://scalibq.wordpress.com/2017/03/29/trackers-vs-midi/

If not, I'd really appreciate any other reading material to understand what you mean by tracking, thanks!

No mention of Daphne Oram [1] in the history of electronic music. :(

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daphne_Oram

Thanks, did not know about her, will check out her book !

Birds of Parallax from 9:45 onwards is my favorite. They had this on repeat in an electronic music history exhibition I attended in a London museum some ... counting... 12 years ago.

https://youtu.be/lNTZh0jHOvs?t=585

The whole of BBC/radiophonic workshop are not there, maybe it's a bit US centered..

She wrote a "treatise" on electronic music called An Individual Note of Music, Sound and Electronics. From the back cover:

"[...] a fascinating glimpse into the creative mind behind the Oramics machine. In this engaging account of the possibilities of electronic sound, Oram touches on acoustics, mathematics, cybernetics and esoteric thought, but always returns to the human, urging us to 'see whether we can break open watertight compartments and glance anew' at the world around us."

http://www.anomie-publishing.com/coming-soon-daphne-oram-an-...

If it makes you feel better, when I taught the history of electronic music I introduced students to Daphne Oram.

Daphne Oram didn’t use computers. Check the title of the book.

Neither did Stockhausen, Schaffer, Les Paul or the Tape Music Lab.

Just slimmed some chapters, but this looks like a great resource! If someone wants to dive more deeply into digital synthesis, I can recommend "The Theory and Technique of Electronic Music" by Miller Puckette (creator of Max and Pure Data): https://msp.ucsd.edu/techniques/latest/book.pdf. All examples are actually Pure Data patches that you can try out and experiment with.

My favorite is OneLoneCoder's videos where he just writes his own synthesizer:

https://youtu.be/tgamhuQnOkM

Alternatively there is Curtis Roads' "The Computer Music Tutorial" [0]

[0] https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262044912/the-computer-music-tu...

The second edition is almost a complete rewrite - much more up to date, but loses some of the core nerdiness of the original.

It's worth mentioning that "computer music" in the original sense was more about generative compositions and experiments with synthesis and DSP, all controlled and generated by hand-written software.

DAWs are much more emulations of a traditional recording studio that happen to run on a computer. So although a computer is involved, they're not "computer music" in the traditional sense.

The difference is that you can do far more with languages like Supercollider. Max, PD, and Csound, especially when controlled with custom code.

But they're much harder to work with. Unlike DAWs and VSTs, they're not optimised for commercial production values. This makes them more experimental and more of a niche interest.

There isn't a lot of notable pure computer music around outside of academia. The biggest success was probably the THX Deep Note. BT made some albums with (mostly) Csound. Autechre used Max quite heavily. Holly Herndon is another name.

So commercially, DAWs are everywhere, but there's no huge commercial computer music fan scene in its own right.

Another fine text on this subject I can recommend (at a somewhat higher level, and not provided for free) is The Computer Music Tutorial:

https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262044912/the-computer-music-tu...

I suggest having some kind of sequencer and synthesizers (one subtractive, one FM) available to play with while reading. Free VSTs in the free Reaper DAW are a fine starting point.

Reaper can be downloaded without paying anything for it. But in a wink-wink strategy, continued use of it after a certain period of time is supposed to be accompanied by paying for a license. This is not enforced. You can call this free if you wish, but it's all a bit wobbly.

Also, if you want to play with synthesis, then VCV Rack, which is truly free (but also comes in a for-cost version with a few more features) is likely the right place to start, or its even free-er cousin/fork Cardinal (which can even be run in your browser)

https://cardinal.kx.studio/ https://vcvrack.com/

"Computer Music" is a very broad term (no surprises here) so, like many here, I can point out topics that are not covered. In particular, computer music (aka algorithmic) composition [1], or very recent AI techniques like the Google seq2seq example at [2], or the (unpublished, but probably a form of generative adversarial networks) techniques used by SunoAI and Udio.

[1]. https://ccrma.stanford.edu/~blackrse/algorithm.html

[2]. https://arxiv.org/pdf/2301.11325

"Computer Music" is also a fairly conventional academic musical genre exploring elements of electro-acoustic, acousmatic, musique concrete, synthesis, algorithmic and serial composition techniques.

I’m interested in the subject but not really a fan of the presentation. Is there an ePUB version or similar that I’m not seeing?

Indeed, or a PDF. When one study these topics is way easier to do so via PDFs for example: you bookmark the page and continue tomorrow. If it’s HTML, you need to bookmark too, but this is a hassle since bookmarking creates an entry in your browser bookmarks (that you need to clean up later) and if the html page is too long and has no anchors, good luck remembering what part you read last (not to mention that one can read a pdf offline and the pdf can be archived easily). Also knowing how many pages there are to read and how many you have read so far is very helpful (in contrast, reading a website is rather tiring since you don’t know how far are you or how much is left)

Any way to compose compelling electronic music without having to spend time learning a commercial app like Ableton?

Learning the app is not the difficult part. It is honing your style within the toolset you're comfortable with. Every DAW has its pain points and learning curve. Spend a few hours a week with each and see which one works for you, is my advice. Same as any other tool, you can't create effectively until you've become comfortable with it.

Literally hundreds or even thousands of ways, physical instrument such as sequencer/sampler, other DAWs. It’s not about learning a commercial app it’s about understanding principles of music production irrelevant of your platform. Just pick one and go: your ears won’t know any difference

You'll have to spend time learning whatever tool you are going to employ. If commercial is the issue... Have a look at SuperCollider. It has a learning curve, new programming language and all that. But the flexibility and actual software architecture is pretty unmatched in its own nieche IMO.

I haven't heard anything nice from SuperCollider

Me either. Links or no downvotes, bruhs.

There are open source trackers like Famitracker, and there are kinda-sorta-half-decent open source DAWs now like Ardour and LMMS.

Eurorack?

But it won’t save you time.

Or money.

except if it's VCVRack (for money)

Might as well use Ableton.

puredata or supercollider - although I would honestly recommend Max/MSP over either (but it is commercial). Ableton is great and most DAWs in general are useful and quite similar so the skills are transferable, but they do lend themselves to specific orthodox kinds of composition, dance music and sound collage basically.

https://vcvrack.com/ and https://www.youtube.com/c/omricohen-music

So many to choose from (in alphabetical order)...

- Bytebeat: https://dollchan.net/bytebeat/ (https://greggman.com/downloads/examples/html5bytebeat/html5b... !Warning loud!)

- Cardinal: https://cardinal.kx.studio/live

- Glicol: https://glicol.org

- Kabelsalat: https://kabel.salat.dev

- NoiseCraft: https://noisecraft.app

- Strudel: https://strudel.cc (https://github.com/terryds/awesome-strudel)

- Tidal Cycles: https://tidalcycles.org

You're really going to dump a total newbie into simulated rack synths, computer music languages, and whatnot? In order to "save time" over learning a DAW?

I'm sympathetic to some of what you're plugging. Really. I love VCVRack. But have mercy!

I am one of those newbies and I spent way too much of my morning going through all of these. :D

I love Ableton though. You can google any random thing about it and get an answer somewhere because it's so widely used. Dunno what OP has against it. It's not hard to come by Ableton Live Lite license for free. I think just buying their iphone app gives you access to Lite license.

That stuff is kind of cool, but it's definitely not a shortcut to making an ordinary song!

I haven't used Ableton for 5 years or so. I got addicted to GB and then Logic (an easy step from GB). But I should try it again. I mean Ableton is what Grimes uses. She's my (musical) like role model. (Only musical tho.)

I have been seeing a few DJ with livestreams composing with Strudel. It's a live web repl programming based approach. I don't think it necessarily scales to professional use, but it's a reasonable intro to the core concepts.

I've gone through the tutorial and it was honestly the most fun I've had on the web in a while.

https://strudel.cc/workshop/getting-started/

Hey thanks I hadn't heard of this.

You're welcome. I should expand on my "professional use" comment as i think it may be overly critical. Strudel is being used professionally by some artists. What I meant by the comment is the expertise you get in Strudel as a tool is not directly transferrable to the tools that most of the other electronic music artists use professionally. All of the fundamental concepts and skills map over but how things are directly done is very different in Strudel (and its cousins - the history of Strudel is fascinating too) from other electronic music tools used by professional artists.

It's like asking whether you can do serious photography without Photoshop/Lightroom or create games without Unreal/Unity. The answer is you can, but do you really want to? Your most important goal is to use a tool to get the job done. The tool is a method to get there, not something you want to fight with.

It's more like when kids start taking music lessons. Most parents aren't going to spend more than $100-200 on an instrument, in case the kid decides they want to quit. But the entrypoint for virtually any instrument that you could call "playable" is usually north of $500 (which also competes against a massive supply of used instruments from people that spent $500+ and then quit).

There's nothing wrong with playing around with Reaper, Garageband, BandLab, or any of the more entry level "instruments" in this analogy. Preferable even, if you don't want to blow hundreds of bucks on a program.

You can get perfectly playable electric guitars in the $100 to $200 price range. It might need some setup first but you can learn to do that yourself from online videos. Modern mass production means popular instruments can be excellent value for money.

Sure, but keep in mind that's not how people who have never picked up an instrument think. It takes a level of expertise to get there. The point is that cheap is fine for beginners, while the more expensive stuff is worth it for serious practitioners.

I'm sure it seems that way to you, but for people who never touched an electric guitar before that's going to be torture. You need an instrument that you really want to pick up and play, that stays in tune, etc. It doesn't need to be $1500, but at $150 they better have an uncle who's a guitar tech.

I have an old Gibson Marauder that rapidly gets out of tune. So far no shop has been able to do anything about that. It would probably go for $400 or more retail, to a beginner who doesn't notice (or thinks the problem is his/her fault). But it's no fun to play. Chords sound bad. And that kind of thing is not unusual.

>You need an instrument that you really want to pick up and play, that stays in tune, etc. It doesn't need to be $1500, but at $150 they better have an uncle who's a guitar tech.

If you really want to play you will play regardless of the instrument you have. Like many, I started with cheap instruments, so I figured out how to fix them or at least make them better. I was 12 and wanted to play guitar, my parents were not willing to spend money on it and just found some handme downs from the relatives, and I made it work because I wanted to play guitar. Ended up teaching myself lutherie, made some money, made some instruments. These days it is easier than ever to maintain your own instrument with the internet to answer all your questions, I had to learn to repair and maintain my guitar by working backwards from books on construction since that is all my library had.

>So far no shop has been able to do anything about that.

It is an issue with the bridge, the nut, and or the tuners, on a guitar of that age it is a fair chance it is a combination of all three. I am guessing you are bringing the instrument to normal guitar shops that primarily do sales and lack anyone even remotely competent when it comes to repair.

Thanks. I think that's all valuable context for a beginner thinking about using a very low-priced guitar.

I have been playing for 50 years at this point. I'm currently playing something similar to this (0) bought at GC for $329 and while the knobs and jack could stand to be replaced (especially if you are performing) it plays and sounds great. You do not need to spend more than $500 to get a solid electric guitar these days. You can definitely spend a lot more for a top tier brand like Fender, Gibson, PRS, Suhr, etc... but there is a lot of good value between $250 - $500.

[0]https://www.guitarcenter.com/Gretsch-Guitars/G5210-P90-Elect...

That price range will suit most players and many of these contemporary lower end guitars even have decent pickups with a sort of jack of all trades compromise, massive improvement over the low end pickups of the past. The next notch up in quality mostly is improved hardware and pickups tailored more to a style/sound, instruments for the performer who plays a lot and these instruments are generally a good value for those sorts. Above that it is questionable but there are some amazing instruments that justify their price, spending $2k on a guitar is not that expensive in the grand scheme if it is the right guitar for you and is the one which will be with you for life. We have a great range of instruments to pick from these days.

Ok but I think we're talking $400 not $150. And there are lemons in every price range, which a beginner can't really detect. Correct me if I'm wrong.

$150 guitars (from the reputable brands) tend to use about the same quality of hardware as the $400 guitars, they just use plywood and synthetic fingerboards and uncool woods which are generally uncool for stupid reasons. Add in a cheap paint job, a thousand fewer turns of copper on the pickup coils maybe made up for with a cheaper stronger magnet and you are getting into the $150 range. Setup and playing wise they tend to be about the same as the $400 guitars.

There are lemons in every price range which no one can detect, it is the nature of wood.

I appreciate this perspective. To oversimplify, you're challenging total beginners to self-teach guitar repair at a level beyond what normal guitar shops offer. Your attitude toward playing seems like my attitude toward my profession, which I'm actually good at.

But here's my perspective on guitar. I'm closer to a perpetual beginner than to a good player. I partly blame the Marauder, because the chords just never sound sweet. It's a bummer, not a joy, to play it.

I have access to YouTube and I've tried to fix my Marauder. Two shops have tried, although one guy admitted he was working from YouTube. (I'm certain it's fixable. It's two pieces of wood with a bridge and a nut on them. The neck is straight enough to be very playable.) But I have a job and a family and I'm not luthier material. I finally gave up and bought an old Fender for too much money. $800 or something. I play it regularly. It stays in tune. I feel good when I play it.

I confess I have some brand-name vulnerability to Fender. "Classic" whatever whatever. Some child inside me doesn't want an Ibanez, he wants a Tele. I'm the kind of guy who would buy that yellowy "antique white" color if it didn't always seem to cost a bit extra. So yes probably I could get a better guitar for the same money if I knew the less famous brands.

Plus anyway the metalheads (or somebody) have run up the prices on Ibanez guitars.

Developing repair skills beyond those offered by most guitar shops is not a high bar considering most shops don't offer repair and just have a "tech" whose training stops at intonation and truss rod adjustment, the stuff required for basic setup. Personally, I think every guitarist should learn setup even if they plan on paying someone to do it, it is not difficult or time consuming to learn and if you can tune a guitar you can do a setup. I did not challenge anyone and to suggest I did is a misrepresentation, not an oversimplification.

>Your attitude toward playing seems like my attitude toward my profession, which I'm actually good at.

It is the attitude required to get good .

You're arguing with yourself. Anybody can hit "parent" a few times and see exactly what you wrote up-thread.

> If you really want to play you will play regardless of the instrument you have.

That's just you, not for any other musician who aspire to improve their technique and isn't so poor that a better instrument is completely out of reach.

I was playing piano on a budget Yamaha digital piano, and as soon as I could afford it, I upgraded it. I upgraded to an upright again. I knew my progress will be hampered by the lack of dynamics and proper key actions. The sound just isn't expressive.

Setup is a huge factor. I got a $300 parts "Telecaster" on Craigslist and took it to Bill's Music (https://www.billsmusic.com/) for their premium setup and it definitely took it to the next level in terms of the electronics, frets (especially worn and / or protruding), intonation, etc... So if you have a guitar you want to love that isn't quite there, consider getting a pro setup by a shop you trust.

Reaper is not an "entry level instrument". It is a low cost, but full featured DAW. Garageband and BandLab are beginner DAWs, though for many they might work just fine for a long time or even for ever, depending on someone's goals and aspirations.

Didn't mean to say imply it wasn't. I'd say Logic is also priced like an entry level tool, yet fully featured.

Look up DJ Dave and using Strudel to make music, its fun!

Honorable mention: FruityLoops. I remember it from high school, 2006, we've had a hand-me-down 486 with maybe 32mb RAM? The boys made some great loops, I brought a guitar, we ran a freakin live hip hop show, standing ovations, FL delivered.

If you bought FL back then, you should still have a license for the latest FL Studio! They offer lifetime updates, which is a pretty good offer if you like the software. (I use Bitwig which doesn't, but I find it worth the tradeoff.)

As opposed to what? Spending time learning any of the alternative tools out there? Everything you do is going to have a learning curve, so you might as well start learning the tool that does what you want.

If you don't want to use a computer, you could write and perform exclusively using hardware. Like a modular synthesizer, or a standalone synth, or an Elektron box (Digitakt, Digitone, etc).

If you want to make "normal" electronic music (and never tried before), use GarageBand on an iPad. It's easier to learn than Ableton et al. because GarageBand has reasonable settings built in. I.e. it will make sounds right away, without endless screwing around. (You might even try GarageBand on a phone, if the screen is large enough.)

If you want to make "experimental" music then ... you'll have to experiment. Most of the recommendations in these comments are aimed at experimental music.

Most things labeled "computer music" belong to a very specific retro experimental music aesthetic, literally dating back to the era when you could barely make music on a computer at all. Much of this music was heavily influenced by academic workers. That may be exactly what you're looking for! On the other hand if you're not quite sure what I'm talking about, then be aware that "computer music" is not the only, or even the sanest, way to make music on your computer.

Agreed! If you have an Apple device GarageBand is the best way to get started.

Once you start getting into many tracks and advanced routing it seems like the choice (for me at least) is Logic Pro or Ableton Live. And I find Ableton much more fun to use when I want to jam, whereas Logic feels more like programming which is also great. FL Studio is also lots of fun. Try various options and see what fits best with what you are trying to do.

I use Logic but I should try Ableton again. It's been years.

Learning a bit of ableton is the least hard part of making compelling electronic music. Bitwig is fine as well. There is such a deluge of people eager to teach you via youtube or udemy etc.

Sure, but what will work for you will depend on what you consider "compelling electronic music," it is a big and diverse field and each have different tools which suit them. Without having some idea about your interests and direction in electronic music, you will just get a massive list of random applications which may or may not work for your goals.

Ableton Live is very intuitive and there is a lite version that is bundled with some interfaces (https://www.ableton.com/en/products/live-lite/features/?pk_v...). It has been years so I don't remember which interface / version I started with but I quickly fell in love and upgraded to the full version. The time I have spent learning it has been fun and worthwhile, so maybe give it a try.

Try LMMS, Pure Data, VCV Rack, or SunVox - all powerful free/open-source alternatives that can produce professional-quality electronic music without the Ableton learning curve or cost.

I love that people share historical pioneers in electronic music, but I'd also want to add some artists of the last decade who really pushed new directions and visions. The PC Music collective/label has been one of my favorite bunch of artists. AG Cook, Danny L Harle, Finn Keane (FKA EasyFun), and all of their tangential collaborators outside the label have been making such awesome computer music.

Let's not forget the contributions of Bernie Hutchins (Electronotes):

https://archive.org/details/electronotes-meh-ebgpcc-torrent

https://www.timstinchcombe.co.uk/synth/Electronotes_EN_index...

The full set is very rare--but what a treasure trove of high quality material.

Its a good read, provides a good introduction - but imho, loopops incomplete guide to electronic music is a much better investment of time and energy ..

http://patreon.com/loopop

.. very definitely worth the effort to get it downloaded for offline reading, also.

Loopop's guide looks interesting, but to unlock the book I had to join (for free) the Patreon channel. Then it immediately tells me that to unlock the book I have to become a paid member.

It turns out that the free tier only gets you notifications when new content is published; to read that content, you have to pay.

I wouldn't mind paying, but dislike the bait and switch approach.

His patreon is really explicit about what you get for what tiers. I get that the patreon ui is pretty confusing, but that’s not his fault

> but that’s not his fault

He chooses to utilize Patreon for his business, so it really is, at least partially.

My condolences, you are annoying.

Come on, you can join for one month, download the up to date version and leave again. Not too much asked for such a ressource.

Yes, it’s definitely worth it, in my opinion. Loopops book is easily one of the most powerful collections of knowledge of electronic music production out there.

I’ve been making electronic music since the 80’s and still find the regular updates from loopop titillating and inspiring.

I judge technical explanations of audio gear by their description of balanced signals. A common error is to focus on the positive and negative signals having opposite polarity, which is entirely irrelevant for canceling out interference (it may improve headroom, but what is actually important for eliminating common mode noise is to have identical impedance with respect to ground).

I would say this text fails this test, which gives me pause. The description is: "The two conductors carry the same signal, but with reverse polarity (meaning that one conductor carries a signal that is the mirror image of the other). If external noise and interference enters the cable, it will probably affect both conductors equally."

Quickly read thorough it, is indeed a nice introductory read. Recommending, may be suitable for 10th-12th graders also.

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