Granular Synthesis

As we push the outer boundaries of our technical and creative tool kit, we will find granular synthesis.   The methods of granular synthesis have changed over the years (first requiring razors, audio tape, splicing tape, and lots of time).   Now we can use computers to complete tasks that may have taken days and weeks in the past in only a few seconds.

To producing granular sounds, one must be able to cut a sound into tiny pieces then put thousands of these tiny pieces back together.   Think of a single sound as a concrete brick,  the grains of sand that make up the same volume as the brick can move in ways that the brick cannot.  You can poor a bucket of sand much like a fluid.  It can flow down a slope, it can be directed as it falls or flows much like water flowing out of a faucet can be directed by your hand.

Please listen to these example of granular synthesis being used in music and sound art:

Analog tape based granular synthesis by Karlheinz Stockhausen.
Computer based granular synthesis by Barry Truax.

For the lab today, you will create a work of music/sound art by recording or finding a few sounds from man, machine and nature, then manipulating them granularly until you have found the internal beauty of the sounds themselves.   Then produce a non-rhythmic (no drums or other synths) composition using these sounds.

Submit the work, your thoughts on the above pieces and answer some questions via the lab report here.

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