EMUSIC-L Digest Volume 50, Issue 12 This issue's topics: MAX (5 messages) Vangelis/De Wending interview (2 messages) Your EMUSIC-L Digest moderator is Joe McMahon . You may subscribe to EMUSIC-L by sending mail to listserv@american.edu with the line "SUB EMUSIC-L your name" as the text. The EMUSIC-L archive is a service of SunSite (sunsite.unc.edu) at the University of North Carolina. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1993 15:58:08 -0500 From: SHRINER@BUTLERU.BITNET Subject: MAX MAX 2.5.1 showed up at my studio today.Between MAX and C compiler, I feel like I'm moving into a whole new musical reality......... Any words of wisdom or warnings before I leave? ____________________________________________________________________ charles___shriner@butler.edu Composition & Sound Design Studio or__ccps@mindvox.phantom.com Indpls., IN VOX:317.254.0739 FAX:317.283.9930 ATT Woodruff ____________________________________________________________________ ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1993 18:14:19 CST From: Arne Claassen ISE Subject: Max and Master Tracks I'm trying to figure out a good set-up for my mac. I definetely plan to get Opcode's MAX, but I'm not too impressed with Vision from the bragsheet i got. Master Tracks Pro on the other hand looks, appealing, but I don't believe it supports OMS. Can Max and Master Tracks peacefully co-exist, i.e. both use the MIDI ports and do their jobs? Or am i dependent on Opcode software for this kind of co-existance. I tried several places, locally and mail-order and after they couldn't even tell me the difference between EZVision and Vision i gave up on that line of help. By the way, has anyone had experience with both Master Tracks Pro and Vision, to tell me, if one is actually better, or if Passport Systems just has more convincing ads? Thanks, -AFC ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1993 07:44:38 +0000 From: Nick Rothwell Subject: Re: MAX >Any words of wisdom or warnings before I leave? (i) Wait for the less buggy 2.5.2; (ii) Join the MAX mailing list; (iii) buy more RAM. Nick Rothwell | cassiel@cassiel.demon.co.uk CASSIEL Contemporary Music/Dance | cassiel@cix.compulink.co.uk ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1993 07:44:47 +0000 From: Nick Rothwell Subject: Re: Max and Master Tracks If you're getting MAX, you'll get OMS (Opcode MIDI System). Since Vision uses this as well, that's a great point in its favour. I believe MTPro uses MIDI Manager (as does Performer, which I use), and the MM-OMS interfacing, while it works, is less than ideal for various reasons. I consider this issue sufficiently important that today I'd buy Vision rather than what might be a better sequencer. Another point: Passport have pulled out of the music market. MTPro might currently be unsupported. Nick Rothwell | cassiel@cassiel.demon.co.uk CASSIEL Contemporary Music/Dance | cassiel@cix.compulink.co.uk ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1993 07:47:20 +0000 From: Nick Rothwell Subject: MAX mailing list To those who've asked (and anyone else, for that matter): the mailing list for MAX is at edinburgh, max@dcs.ed.ac.uk. You sign onto the list by mailing MajorDomo@dcs.ed.ac.uk with the message body "subscribe max-edinburgh " - that puts you onto the edinburgh branch of the list (there are others). The address "max" sends messages to all of the list. Nick Rothwell | cassiel@cassiel.demon.co.uk CASSIEL Contemporary Music/Dance | cassiel@cix.compulink.co.uk ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 29 Mar 1993 18:22:58 +0000 From: Nick Rothwell Subject: Vangelis/De Wending interview Well, seeing as it's the big man's birthday today, I thought I'd forward part of this interview which popped into my mailbox this morning. Some interesting comments here. (This is quite an old interview, by the way - maybe ten years - but more recent interviews I've read carry the same sentiments.) >VANGELIS: The biggest problem is makers of synthesizers aren't > musicians. The instruments are approached incorrectly. > Alright, there's an enormous library of information, but > you can't play the instruments, they hinder the spontane- > ous creativity. You buy a synthesizer and six months > later, it's out of fashion. Then, a new one will > appear which won't resemble the previous one at all. One > should be working in the direction of a simpler, more > human model. I don't want to lose time by reading > every manual. What's the point of having a violin sound > when you can't express yourself with it (no dynamics, > vibrato, etc). They can implement all these things, but > they prefer making instruments for the amateurs, the masses. > When the CS-80 was released, I was euphoric; at last > an instrument that responded, one with which you could > communicate. Since then, no real instrument has been > released over the world. The computer, instead of helping > us, enforces it's way of thinking on me, and that's very > dangerous. That's why I haven't bought such a machine ... >QUESTION: That's probably the reason for you being surrounded > by dozens of synthesizers and about the same amount of > foot switches. What are they for? >VANGELIS: They help me with my way of playing. They help me > with my expression, that's what it's all about. Sometimes > one is told electronic music is cold, but it's the musi- > cians making that music whom are cold... They look a lot > like typists, they type their music on a type machine and > that's for one a way of working which doesn't create much > happiness/pleasure. If you would have entered the stage > with a tape recorder a few years ago, it would have > caused a outrage. These days, everyone uses a computer on > stage and nobody even cares, I find this immoral. I can't > understand why people except such things. A concert is a > concert, if not, you buy the record. The musician would > be better off sitting in the public ... After a concert, > they always come looking for my hidden tape recorder, but > you can be sure, they won't find one. Anyway, I almost > never know what I will be playing, at least if it's a solo > performance. I want to enjoy the concert as least as much > as the audience... My personal perspective on this one is that I know exactly what Vangelis means, but I disagree with some of the more detailed criticisms. I view computers just as tools (musical ones, potentially). It's how they're used that's important. Instruments are now made "for amateurs, for the masses." Computers? Well, no, because they're soft, and it's the software that's important. Most music software is now made "for amateurs, for the masses" in the same sense: tape recorder style sequencers, sending patch changes to select preprogrammed library sounds. The positive view, in my opinion, is that the computer is a general enough tool, and (thankfully) MIDI SysEx implementations are just about versatile enough, that we can build our own control surfaces. This is what I'm doing at the moment, and I would like last week's live performance to be the last one where I ever use a conventional sequencer. I leave you with one of his closing comments: > I can release 50 > albums a year, but when you depend on a record company, > this sadly isn't possible. Frightening... Nick Rothwell | cassiel@cassiel.demon.co.uk CASSIEL Contemporary Music/Dance | cassiel@cix.compulink.co.uk ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 29 Mar 1993 19:12:00 EST From: rg8 Subject: Re: Vangelis/De Wending interview Vangelis sez: > >> I can release 50 >> albums a year, but when you depend on a record company, >> this sadly isn't possible. > >Frightening... That's one scary birthday thought, Nick... Bob Gibson rg8@umail.umd.edu ------------------------------ End of the EMUSIC-L Digest ******************************