Tuesday, April 01, 2008

Music composing system

I've purchased/built a little semi-pro music composing system, a Musical Fidelity X80 Aviator system. It's pretty advanced, almost all it does is done in hardware, and makes almost pro-studio sound, and it's a Real-Time system (meaning no delays in signals).
The OS is Linux, and all the software is open source, and free. The amazing thing is that it does not have any screen, just the box, the speakers, and a keyboard. The whole composing process and interface is done with acoustic cues about what you're doing. It takes some learning, obviously, but when it becomes intuitive, it's great.
I've hard that Moby has been using the predecessor system, the X79, when he was on the road.


Update April 2: this was an april fools joke. There used to be an iMac on top of the hi-fi amp, and the keyboard got left behind. I thought they looked like they belonged together.
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And now for something completely different:
"In 1998 [on April first], a newsletter titled New Mexicans for Science and Reason carried an article that the state of Alabama had voted to change the value of pi from 3.14159 to the "Biblical value" of 3.0."

TidBITS may change its format radically to cater to the short-attention-span-generation.

16 comments:

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Did you notice the date today?

Unknown said...

hah! nice keyboard :)

-~D~-

RC said...

I would rid of the keyboard and just use toggle switches.

Anonymous said...

Damn, now I'm wishing this was a real device. Although I suppose this kinda stuff is close enough:

http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1798595

http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1775408

Note: College Humor takes you to a myspace copycat page as an April Fool's prank. After a few seconds it'll take you to the main page. Once it does that, click the links above again, or just wait until April 2nd.

Anonymous said...

I hear that Cubase have just bought the patent for this device, but have improved the user interface a bit by introducing motion sensing to it.
Apparently, you can control the tempo and instrumentation simply by waving your hands about. The more frantically you jump around and point, the faster the composition available. They've renamed the system "Conductor v1.0"

Anonymous said...

Sounds super cool!

But what are those comments above talking about it not being real ... don't say.

Monsieur Beep! said...

What do I have my computer for?

I've purchased a small Internet Radio a few days ago, it works on its own, ie no compy's necessary, only WLAN and Broadband Flat.

And now I can listen to ALL my favourite worldwide radio stations, like it used to be with SW, only that it now comes in CD quality.

And my palm's good for a quick check of the weather and email, and even doing a bank transfer.

My desktop system is getting rusty....

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

I tried Conductor in a beta, but I'm in no shape to be waving my arms around, I almost got a heart attack.

Alex said...

So I zoomed into the box to check that it was a Music Fidelity whatsit. But your keyboard is an Aviator, so I was very suspicious.

Are you just telling us you stuck an amp in front of your keyboard.

Oh, Pascal, why is there a Fish on your back today?

Your little cast dancer reminds me of my attempt a making a Lego Degas style statues. Unfortunately they were built in the old LDD software, and cannot be rendered properly.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Alex, you're right, except I didn't arrange it. There used to be an iMac on top of the amp, which I removed. And then I noticed that it looked the keyboard and amp looks like they belong together.
I mentioned to Laurie I would pretend to visitors that it was a screen-less music computer, and he said that I should put that up on my blog today. Viola.

Monsieur Beep! said...

Nothing goes unnoticed - they're watching us, all of them: FBI, CIA, BND, Stasi (still alive????).

And the real villains just laugh...

Violine.

Alex said...

Doh. I feel silly for not catching that little stringed instrument myself...

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht frist and lsat ltteer is at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we do not raed ervey lteter by it slef but the wrod as a wlohe. ceehiro.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Now you lost me. "stringed instrument"?

Alex said...

You said "Viola" as in violet, pansy or small bowed string instrument. I think you were after "Voila", the French for "There you are".

Monsieur Beep, ever the wag, retorted with "violine", which had me guessing, then I re-read it as violin.

Cello.

Anonymous said...

In 1996 the Taco Bell Corporation announced that it had bought the Liberty Bell and was renaming it the Taco Liberty Bell. Hundreds of outraged citizens called the National Historic Park in Philadelphia where the bell was housed to express their anger. Their nerves were only calmed when Taco Bell revealed, a few hours later, that it was all a practical joke. The best line of the day came when White House press secretary Mike McCurry was asked about the sale. Thinking on his feet, he responded that the Lincoln Memorial had also been sold. It would now be known as the Ford Lincoln Mercury Memorial.

Monsieur Beep! said...

Dedicated to Alex:-

I'm a wag! Indeed: the dictionary says "Someone who talks in in a clever and amusing way".

I was making fun of Eo's "Viola", thats true, I should have said "Violin",though. I only added the German "e", an orchestra manoeuvre.

A dieux. )))

...................*wagging.