Saturday, December 04, 2010

Transcendence

George-from-Canada sent along this link, 'cos he's kewl like that:

A fascinating cross between score and histogram and a bit easier to follow than a 3-D spectrum display (though you should see one sometime. The three axii are time, frequency and amplitude: it's hypnotic).

Best comment I noticed was near the top: "Bach was an alien!" Intriguing but not possible -- any species that would fail to keep him nearby isn't clever enough for even sublight-speed space travel.

13 comments:

  1. Thanks so much for posting this! I love the T&F, and to see it in this format is great. I'll use it to try to convey to others the mathematical, as well as musical, beauty of the piece.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wow ... now thousands will see this. I just thought it was so neat ... actually the word was going to be cool ... as I'd never seen music done that way.

    Glad you liked it, Roberta.

    Regards.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Sequencer piano roll. If you spend enough time working with it, you can play it just like sheet music. J. S. is awesome!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Roberta,

    Bach was da bomb. When warming up I'd do scales get bored and do that
    It was so delightfully gothic in scale on a decent Hammond.

    Reminds me of the early (ca1978) computer music though more sophisticated. One program used a notation like that as the screens of the time didn't do graphics but you could position multiple symbols in character cells.

    Jim,
    That site is grand, I haad a blast creating various beats and patterns.

    Eck!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Douglas Adams suggests in one of his Dirk Gently books that Bach's Brandenburg Concertos are actually the music from the beginning of the universe, brought to him by time travelers so it would be preserved. The characters even mention that it's too much for one person to write in one lifetime. That always made me smile.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Wonderful. Gives a whole new
    perspective on the piece.
    Anon, Don

    ReplyDelete
  7. Have you perhaps been leaving your Ipod on and playing this through the earbuds while Tam's alone in the house??

    ReplyDelete
  8. It doesn't, but my high school yearbook should have said of I, "Most likely to disrupt workplace productivity." ;)

    Jim

    ReplyDelete
  9. I have a sudden desire to re-read Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid...

    ReplyDelete
  10. You know Hofstadter was a (more or less) local boy when he wrote that? And at the most unlikely of places, really. Underappreciated there.

    ReplyDelete

Comment moderation is enabled. Your comment will not be visible until approved. Arguing or use of insulting or derogatory language will result in your comment going unpublished: no name-calling. Comments I deem excessively partisan will not be published.