Getting Started With Electronic Music:
​An Open Course in Music Technology

Robert Willey
ATMI 2019 Conference

Background​

• Music Industry class
  • Teachers Guide
  • Textbook
• Music Production book
  • 11 collaborators
  • 73 instructional videos
• History of Rock and Roll
  • Playlists
• Interviews
• Music productions
• Ukulele singalongs
• Apps for playing internet radio
• Conlon Nancarrow
• Scott Joplin
• Other conference presentations

​

Class Setup

• Canvas site overview
• Canvas course archive
• Software
  • Audacity 
    • Instructions on how to add mp3 capabilities by
      adding the LameLib library
  • Sequencing
    • Logic Pro
    • Pro Tools First - free
    • Studio One Prime - free
  • Noteflight
  • Shotcut​
• Specifications Grading system, token request form
• Vocabulary
• Teacher's models of completed projects
• Version 1 of this guide, from Spring 2017 class

​

Class Materials

Module I (5 weeks) Digital audio sound manipulation: acoustics, digital audio, sampling, pioneers of electroacoustic music, improvisation, and Audacity software. Project: Musique Concrète Étude

• Specifications
  • Example of a finished project
  • What is an étude?
• Pretest
• Musique concrète
  • The Liberation of Sound - Edgard Varèse (origin of the definition of music as "organized sound")
• Student source sounds​​
• Acoustics
  • Dan Russell’s Acoustics and Vibration Animations
  • The Doppler Effect and Sonic Booms
• Lab 1: Record your sound source and upload it to freesound.org
  • freesound.org
• Lab 2: Create a Weebly portfolio and incorporate your sound source
• Left-right-center panning
• Audacity hacks
  • How to add labels in Audacity
  • Files and folders
• SoundCloud
  • How to upload
  • Custom artwork
• How to take a screenshot
• Creative Commons
• Review of laws related to sampling
• Sonic Visualiser is designed to help study recorded music

Module II (5 weeks) MIDI arranging and sequencing: MIDI controllers, GM, expression, automation, orchestration, drum parts, pioneers of synthesizer performance, and Logic software. Project: MIDI Arrangement

• Specifications
• Expression: Clara Rockmore, Theremin virtuoso
  • Spotify playlist
  • YouTube video: Saint Saens, El Cisne
  • Demonstration on how to play the theremin
• What does a synthesizer do?
  • Keith Emerson at Moogfest
  •  Walter Carlos, Moog synthesizer
• The first synthesizers
  • Introduction to pipe organ
  • The Telharmonium
• What’s an oscillator?
  • 50 Hz sawtooth wave
  • 220 Hz square wave
• What is a low frequency oscillator?
  • 20 Hz to 20 kHz
  • Vibrato
• What is MIDI?
• Pop quiz
• Lab 1: Sequencing
  • Noteflight score for “Stand By Me”
• Lab 2: Add expression to a melody
  • "On Top of Old Smokey" melody
• Lab 3 MIDI editing [ Logic session ] 
• Subtractive synthesis
  • Dynamic spectra
  • Changing the cutoff frequency
  • ADSR
    • attack
    • decay
    • sustain
    • release
• Lab 4: Chameleon [ Logic session ] 
  • Herbie Hancock: Watermelon Man [ video ]
• ​Compression
• Lab 5: Mixing
• Feedback form for students to make comments on each other’s work​​

Module III (3 weeks) Music notation: arranging, lead sheet notation, MIDI files, interoperability, and Noteflight software. Project: Notated Score

• Specifications
• Noteflight
  • ​Getting started with the note editor
  • How to make a lead sheet
  • How to divide words in Noteflight
  • Moving from Noteflight to Logic
• Lab: "Amazing Grace" [ score ]
  

Module IV (3 weeks) Music video: music for video, video for music, composing shots, soundtracks, editing, and iMovie/Shotcut software. Project: Music Video

• Specifications

• Reading: Video Direction as an Application of the Study of Music
• ​Free footage
• Lab 1: ​Video Editing Exercise
  • ​Shotcut guide
  • How finished sequence might look
• Lab 2: Special effects
  • Source material
  • How finished sequence might look​
• Repeat pretest

​

Results

• Portfolios
• Tyler Kuntz:
  • Musique concrète
  • MIDI arrangement
  • Score notation
  • Music video

Concert

• Planetarium concert​

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©2019 Robert Willey
Email: rkwilley@bsu.edu
Feel free this material to use for non-profit educational purposes.