My concert at 2pi Festival this time (Nov 25, 2006) has been misunderstood by many people, even those who saw it live. Some said there were human voice samples involved, some even thought it was the air-strike siren sample (I did use such a siren during the final jam session). I think I’ll make a few clarifications here.

Usually Wang Changcun 王长存 and I would poke each other about what you gonna play before such a concert, though no one would disclose. Seeing I played with the laptop lid closed, he said resentfully afterward: “This is hardcore, man.”

I planned my gig in a way that I hope would bring something different to the festival. No typical 2pi-style loud volume, not even a single piece of sample, no human voice, no concrete sounds, no noise. I also tried to avoid rhythm. There was only pitched melody.

Basically it’s a customized instrument I made from scratch. The idea was to play the controller with my hands without looking at the screen of my laptop. The computer program is but the engine or circuit board as seen in traditional electronic instruments: you don’t play those but let them stay there. I even went as far as closing the lid of my laptop. (held it with a pack of cigarettes so that it doesn’t go into sleep mode)

Actually I’ve been thinking about performing like this for a couple of years, which I think would be helpful to self-immune from the pointless debate on either the lack of “visual element in computer music performance” or “body gesture”. In fact, maybe we can once again go back to the very essence of music by shunning these irrelevant discussions. Maybe.

Here is the basic structure of the piece/instrument I finally came up with the last two days before the performance.

The interface I used was Behringer BCF2000 controller. Behringer has always been a big knock-off brand which would certainly embarrass German. It specializes in ripping off the design of all kinds of musical instruments such as mixer or monitor speaker made by the American brand Mackie, and has them outsourced to the factories in China in order to sell at low price. However, BCF2000 is an exceptionally original design. One big selling-point is its unique motorized 8-channel faders.

In this piece I made, Behringer BCF2000 was not just a “controller” used to control the parameters but the instrument that I “played”. This is made possible by its 100mm long-distance faders and the sufficient spaces between the 8 tracks which allow independence of fingers and the precision of their movements. What’s more, the stickiness of the variable resistance is just about right, unlike Evolution UC-33 or Roland MCR-8, which are way too sticky to “play” fast-changing variables. The 16-channel (a number that beats everybody) Peavy PC-1600 could be the ideal controller had it has more spaces between the faders and longer sliding distance.

Also, the motorization feature enables the faders to be restored to their original positions automatically when shifting between pages. This virtually multiplies the number of faders and knobs. As a playing interface, it can be used to control enough number of parameters.

Below is the core tone generation part of my Max/MSP patch. The patch first calculates the frequencies of a just intonation scale as the global variables to feed the whole program. Due to the use of just intonation, the tune sounded a little off-key to the well-tempered ears, which added special flavour to it. This trick has been used by the likes of Terry Riley, La Monte Young, Robert Rich and Jon Hassell for dozens of years.

The main body of the patch was a simple 8-voice synthesizer, with 3 wave generators each voice (that’s 24 altogether). There were two sine waves with adjustable value of detune in-between, which added some richness to the sound. Also at work was a little bit of adjustable square wave in order to make the voice stands out when soloing. All these were written according to the basic rules of synthesizer design.

I also set some widely-adjustable portamento/glide. When used appropriately, it would extend the sound far beyond the limitation of musical notes. There was also a glide button at the lower-right corner of the controller, so that my fingers can add glide effect whenever I want during the glide-free 8-voice passages, resulting in a twisted, psychedelic note-bending sound. Besides, there were also panning control for each voice and reverb control for the main sound-out.

And the rest is the patch connecting the controller and the synthesizer, which can be recycled for future use as a subpatch module.

So you see, I don’t need to look at the screen when playing such an instrument, in fact I can even play it with my eyes closed. Of course, the above is just the instrument itself, content-wise it’s another story. All melodies were improvised manually.

The structure of this piece/instrument is a prototype of what will become a very complex live instrument. In the future I’ll be working on the organic algorithmic composing feature which is capable of generating complex melodies. The playing will still be done on the control interface only, with screen closed.

I was glad to have met my pisces new media friend Shen Ligong 沈立功 a few minutes before the performance. After jerking around for a bit I suddenly came up with the idea of inviting him to collaborate with me. I asked him to do anything he wants, regardless of medium. Be it modern dance or performance art, whatever. Art must be dangerous to be interesting. So we started without knowing what’s in each other’s mind. And there you had: Ligong the wicked pisces opened his voice and had a wicked time in the wicked just intonation pond I built.

[Photos: Wang Changcun, Wang Ke 王可. All photos were published on 潜艇日志 SUB LOG first.]

China-based users can download it from here for better speed. (thanks Hitlike for mirroring).

Recorded by Lin Zhiying.

Download the recording (MP3 format, 18.3 MB).

China-based users can download it from here for better speed. (thanks Hitlike for mirroring).

Recorded by Lin Zhiying.

Download the recording (MP3 format, 34.5 MB).

China-based users can download it from here for better speed. (thanks Hitlike for mirroring).

Recorded by Lin Zhiying.

Download the recording (MP3 format, 87.2 MB, 1 hour 3 mins and 31 seconds).

China-based users can download it from here for better speed. (thanks Hitlike for mirroring).

This set is a bit different:

• Part 1 (00:00 - 18:19), by Zhong Minjie
• Part 2 (18:20 - 48:44), by Zhong Minjie & Lin Zhiying
• Part 3 (48:45 - 1:03:31), by Lin Zhiying

Download the recording (MP3 format, 13.32 MB, 9 mins 42 seconds)

China-based users can download it from here for better speed. (thanks Hitlike for mirroring).

Download the video (MOV format, 6.2 MB, 1 min 15 seconds).

China-based users can download it from here for better speed. (thanks Hitlike for mirroring).

Don’t frown on the poor quality, it was taken with a digital camera.

Download the recording (part 1, part 2) (MP3 format, 12.7 & 11.7 MB, 9 mins 15 seconds, 8 mins 31 seconds)

China-based users can download it from here (part 1) and here (part 2) for better speed. (thanks Hitlike for mirroring).

Download the recording (MP3 format, 16.8 MB, 12 mins 13 seconds)

China-based users can download it from here for better speed. (thanks Hitlike for mirroring).