In 2000 NASA’s scientists displayed at the Library of Congress in Washington images they had chosen among hundreds thousands taken by the Landsat satellites. Some of the most stunning images I have ever seen.
To see more of them : http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/ecology/30-most-incredible…
Mayn River, Siberia, Russia [large size]
Lena River, Russia [large size]
Herebelow is the programme of the festival Les Digitales that takes place at la Chaux-de-Fonds on August 30th.
LES DIGITALES DE LA CHAUX-DE-FONDS
Samedi 30 août 2008
Festival itinérant de musiques électroniques, les Digitales feront halte pour la 3ème année consecutive au kiosque à musique du Parc des Crêtets. C’est au coeur de la ville, allongé sur un transat, que vous pourrez savourer de tous vos sens une programmation à la fois éclectique et pointue, entre concerts électroniques, performances et installation surpenantes, rafraichissements et petite restauration.
Concerts au Parc des Crêtets (15h00-22h00)
(entrée libre)
Exposition sous le kiosque à musique : Emeline & Silvio - travail photographique
After à Bikini-Test (22h00-04h00)
(CHF 10.-)
Projections : VJ Ikar
I started working on a max/msp patch that’d do what the Boss Loop Station pedals do: layering loops in real-time. I don’t have much experience with max so it was a good project to get better skills. Version 5 of max has really brought some great improvements, like the dynamic documentation and help. Max has become much more intuitive. I also like the new presentation mode which allows to design much cleaner interfaces.
So I started juggle with loadbang, record~, buffer~ objects. Actually timing is a bit tricky… But today I found an AudioUnit plug-in which seems to do what I want: SooperLooper. The good point is that I can run SooperLooper directly into Ableton Live as a plug-in. I’m gonna test it first and then I might be using it instead of developing my very own patch. Anyway I’m still interested in doing my own interface so I’ll definitely go back to max soon.
I thought it’d be a good following to the post about Rotators; John Cage performing his brilliant “Water Walk” composition on NBC in 1960.
From johncage.info:
“The materials required are all related to water. Some examples: Bath tub, toy fish, grand piano, pressure cooker where steam is being released, ice cubes and an electric mixer to crush them, rubber duck, goose whistle, 5 radios, etc.
The score consists of a list of properties, a floorplan showing the the placements of instruments and objects, thrre pages with a timeline (one minute each) with descriptions and pictographic notations of occurence of events and a list of notes “regarding some of the actions to be made in the order of occurence” (from score). Timings are not accurate: “Start watch and then time actions as closely as possible to their appearance in the score” (from score).”
Well, I don’t really see how a grand piano can be related to water, but that’s fine with me.
And I can’t resist posting this video of Frank Zappa showing Steve Allen how to play bicycle. It was in 1963, Zappa was 22 years old. Search “Frank Zappa bicycle” on YouTube for seeing the whole show.
john cage music performance videoFollowing my post about Dekotora, I thought I’d talk about japanese artist Ujino Muneteru who could have been a Dekotora driver from an aesthetics standpoint.
Since 2004, he’s been building instruments called “Rotators” which are a well crafted mix of sundry household appliances. When I discovered “Rotators” I was amazed how carefully assembled they were. It wouldn’t make sound yet it’d be still beautiful pieces of art. But it’s actually designed for making sounds. Muneteru controls “Rotators” through a kind of mixer which turns on/off the instruments. Beat patterns are made by sticking small cubes on vinyl discs and using custom turntables.
The Love Arms Series is nice too.
Website: http://the-rotators.com
There’s an interesting interview of Muneteru on pingmag.jp.
“I set up everything on the table and control everything from the Rotatorhead, so it ends up looking like a cooking show on TV. As for the instruments, the permanent members of the Rotators are: the blender, for its heavy, low frequency sounds - like a punchy kick drum; the drill, set up too for its snappy, tight snare drum sound; and the hair dryer, which is always involved with my performances because it resembles a fuzzy bass but sometimes takes the role of vocals. Then, I control the Rotatorhead and program it to play in a variety of ways.”
More videos on http://www.youtube.com/rotators
art DIY electronic music video
