Why is a synth so "alien?"

X-Trade · Post by **X-Trade** » Wed Jun 25, 2008 2:01 pm

well, before I was 'in' music, I never thought it was alien.. more I thought it was necesary, I felt music usually sounded empty without keyboards.
but then maybe thats why I took up playing the keyboards?

JonSolo · Post by **JonSolo** » Wed Jun 25, 2008 7:36 pm

I think we are getting off topic a bit. This thread is not arguing whether or not people feel this way about synths. They do. We are discussing WHY they feel this way in general. If this does not apply to synthesizers (not keyboards, not pianos) where you live, then great. But many of us who play mostly synths in public do see their reaction in this manner.

Again, and this may sound like splitting hairs...most people do not view pianos and keyboards such as the organ or even a Rhodes as alien. This thread is about why the general public views Moogs, Arps, Prophets (or the current Dave Smith stuff), Korg's Radias and other multi-knobbed things as alien.

Additionally some have noted that the all-in-one instrument such as arrangers tend not to be viewed as a musical instrument. Kind of like "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" is really not butter. But unsalted butter is still butter. Arrangers and synths ARE musical instruments. People will ask "do you play keyboards, guitars, or drums? Oh do you play saxophone? Is that a trumpet or flugelhorn?" They will never ask, "Oh, do you play the synth?" That is too foreign for the general Western audience.

This may not apply where you live, but I live in South Carolina and while it is a far cry from Deliverance here, it is also a far cry from Jarre-country.

Solo

X-Trade · Post by **X-Trade** » Wed Jun 25, 2008 8:32 pm

JonSolo wrote: Additionally some have noted that the all-in-one instrument such as arrangers tend not to be viewed as a musical instrument. Kind of like "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" is really not butter. But unsalted butter is still butter. Arrangers and synths ARE musical instruments. People will ask "do you play keyboards, guitars, or drums? Oh do you play saxophone? Is that a trumpet or flugelhorn?" They will never ask, "Oh, do you play the synth?" That is too foreign for the general Western audience.

actually, maybe thats it. The synth doesn't so appear 'alien' as it appears to come under keyboards (come on, it does really, typically you use a keyboard to control it, right?).
They don't recognise what you're doing because they can't, not without a general understanding of how a synthesizer actually works.
For those in the know its easy to misunderstand those who don't.

Or maybe its the point that the general public aren't audiophiles? no-one is ever going to notice a beautifully crafted synth sound on stage, generally because its too loud for those who care (because they're at the front), and those at the back won't be interested. similarly the majority of the general public, they don't care about the actual sounds in the record either because all their interested in is fitting the most number of tracks into their mobile device (MP3's). Similarly I know way too many people who are interested only in what music they can find that is faster, bassier, louder.. all quantifiable measurements, whereas things like timbre, harmony, and all the things which more naturally stem from skill and from more appropriately synth programming, are subjective so no-one can justify paying them any attention (mainly refering to timbre here).

JonSolo · Post by **JonSolo** » Wed Jun 25, 2008 9:54 pm

no-one is ever going to notice a beautifully crafted synth sound on stage

Now you are feeling me! That is true. YET...they WILL notice the guitar sound or the sax sound or whatever. It is not that they need to be audiophiles to get it.

They don't recognise what you're doing because they can't, not without a general understanding of how a synthesizer actually works

I might agree with this on one level, but I have no clue WHY a sax works the way it does. Does that mean I cannot appreciate it's sound? Of course not.

I think what this REALLY gets into is the "new-ness" of a synth in the world of music as well as the fact that the methodology of sound is not conventional (something is not struck, rubbed, plucked, blown, etc....gee that make conventional instruments sound pornographic

).

Jon

sKitsOo88 · Post by **sKitsOo88** » Sat Jun 28, 2008 6:06 pm

You guys are right about people not knowing the difference from a piano and a synth. Im fine with that, becasue people that dont know about them will wonder how our "un-ordinary" sounds are created. Until they actually take the time to realize they are two totally different instruments designed for completely different genres of music.

Fatalmasterpiece · Post by **Fatalmasterpiece** » Sat Jun 28, 2008 8:24 pm

I have to admit... I may be one of the people you guys hate.

I sometimes refer to my keyboard as my piano, but mostly because I use it to reproduce classical sounds. I think live music is better than arraigned or sampled and I despise things like Fruity Loops. I do all my recordings in real time and don't even know how to run a sampler or arp on my korg. hehe

RVNOak · Post by **RVNOak** » Sat Jun 28, 2008 10:57 pm

Fatalmasterpiece wrote:I have to admit... I may be one of the people you guys hate.

I do all my recordings in real time and don't even know how to run a sampler or arp on my korg. hehe

Why would anyone hate you for that??

...and yes, I despise Fruity Loops too!!

JonSolo · Post by **JonSolo** » Sun Jun 29, 2008 1:55 am

No hate at all.

I prefer to drop all of my tracks in real time. There are times that I call on tools to help convey the ideas in my head, but I am old fashioned about recording.

From reading through the posts and even viewing my own posts I think we have zig-zagged across a great plain of ideals with regard to general acceptance of keyboardists. Yet I cannot escape the topic as posted: why is a synth so alien? As a keyboardist and even a pianist I am VERY accepted into the realm of general public acceptance as the piano being my instrument. As a synthesist, in the western world, it is not quite that simple.

The long and short of this five page discussion comes down to these questions (in my humble opinion):

Will the general public ever view Korg in the same light as a Stradivarius? Do they look at a synth in the same light as a violin? Is it EQUAL in it's status as a musical instrument?

I think some do have the view as many of us here. But even in my immediate family, some have commented that synths are "copycat" instruments (i.e. not the real thing). On the light side...I have had some walk in and comment that my Triton Extreme is "a beautiful instrument". Unfortunately, the two folks that come to mind are both synthesists.

Jon

P.S. This thread is really a whole lotta fun.

Fatalmasterpiece · Post by **Fatalmasterpiece** » Sun Jun 29, 2008 5:29 pm

I think it is the same as digital art to acrylic paint. There are many great digital artists out there, but will one ever be recognized to the level of Da Vinci?

Then again, you must realize, the world is so different than it was in the time of the classical painters and musicians. At those times, not everyone had access to music. A simple poor man could not just pick up a piano and practice every day to become Beethoven. So, when you did have those rare specimens pop up, they were iconic. In todays world, one only has to turn on YouTube to see hundred of thousands of skilled artists and musicians amongst a swarm of information at our finger tips.

I think the old ways have a sense of mystery and awe connected to them, while modern methods, being so familiar and in our face everyday, become normalized and generic. How often does one see a virtuoso playing the violin compared to a masterfully made synth effect? Many skilled people of the latter saturate our modern information world. I mean, when you really look at a commercial on television, you may realize that whoever made the graphics that woosh around and make it look so beautiful was truly a master of digital arts, but is forgotten because thier medium is so familiar and commercialized into a non-expressive form.

Personally, what I hate is having the oh so often had conversation where someone finds out you are a musicians and says, Me too! Which results in them wanting to show you the 20, 3 minute long, stock Fruity Loop beats they mixed together for their electronic project, yet they fail to own a single workstation or even something with keys which they know how to play.

Synthoid · Post by **Synthoid** » Sun Jun 29, 2008 7:04 pm

Fatalmasterpiece wrote:Personally, what I hate is having the oh so often had conversation where someone finds out you are a musicians and says, Me too! Which results in them wanting to show you the 20, 3 minute long, stock Fruity Loop beats they mixed together for their electronic project, yet they fail to own a single workstation or even something with keys which they know how to play.

And it's probably a pirated copy of Fruity Loops at that!

JonSolo · Post by **JonSolo** » Sun Jun 29, 2008 8:03 pm

Well now this is an interesting angle.

I know I absolutely HATE when I read that someone has "produced beats" for sale. That person has "produced" nothing, because I was educated as a producer and the two have nothing in common. They may have engineered a backing track, but they have produced nothing.

So I see your point Fatalmasterpiece. The question is now: can the computer alone BE a musical instrument in the hands of a musician without the use of anything but keyboard and mouse?

Gee, why do I feel like my soul is being exposed? As a musician I want to have the prejudice and say: NO! You cannot view the computer as a musical instrument because it was designed with a million other functions in mind.

But as a visionary I want to say: YES! After all it IS an instrument (tool) that makes music.

Hmmm. We truly live in a unique time for artistic history.

Jon Solo

RVNOak · Post by **RVNOak** » Mon Jun 30, 2008 12:22 am

What's alien to me is when someone asks if I can make them some beats and they will pay me $50 for each beat. Of course, they would take those "beats" and put them in their pirated Fruity Loops.

It's not that the synth is really alien, it's the people who are too lazy to try and understand it as a musical tool.

Lazy Aliens...

...lazy... ... ...

... ... ...aliens...

RiotNrrd · Post by **RiotNrrd** » Mon Jun 30, 2008 2:18 am

As a musician I want to have the prejudice and say: NO! You cannot view the computer as a musical instrument because it was designed with a million other functions in mind.

No... I would disagree with this prejudice. By the same logic you can't view the computer as an accounting tool, or a video tool, or a communication tool, or... etc., either, because it's still got all these other functions not related to... well... anything you might care to mention.

I want to say: YES! After all it IS an instrument (tool) that makes music.

Which is the way to think about it. After all, you can pound a nail with a clarinet, too, and it doesn't make it any less a musical instrument (clear up till you pound too hard, but that's taking the analogy too seriously).

Certainly computers can be used as musical instruments. They can produce really quite amazing music. They can also be used to produce really crummy and uninspired music. But so can a piano, after all. Because at the core the instrument doesn't really make the music, the musician does. And the music made will be only as good as the musician making it is, regardless of whether the sound is being produced by a vibrating string or an integrated circuit.

What computers do well is make doing the basic technical stuff easy. So producing clear trumpet sounds, or on-the-money violin plucks, or resonant cello, or whatever, is MUCH easier on a synth than doing it with the real instruments. Play sloppy? Doesn't matter, a little quantizing will fix that. And so on. Some musicians complain that this ability to do certain things easily that once were difficult wrecks music. Takes all the skill out of it, or some such nonsense. In my opinion: No, it doesn't. Instead, it just raises the bar. Since most real-world instruments require a decent amount of technical mastery that synth players can, to some extent, avoid, then frankly, I'm going to hold the synth players to a higher musical standard. Now it's not enough that someones "violin" playing is always pitched to perfection - sure, that used to take years and years of practice, but that's now the easy part. No longer counts. Now they have to blow me away with something REALLY good. Something that the machine by itself CAN'T do.

RVNOak · Post by **RVNOak** » Mon Jun 30, 2008 3:13 am

That fact that someone operating a synth has to know a little about all the instruments makes the electronic musician more a musician. There was a discussion about this on another forum and someone was asking how he could make piano sounds more real. Everyone was recommending different keyboards. Wrong answer. First, you had to understand that the keyboard plays static samples. Meaning, if you hit a not on the piano, it will sound much fuller and richer as the strings around the hammered string vibrates a bit. Take this knowledge to your synth or keyboard and how do you make is sound more full of life? It could be reverb or delay or any number of effects. Changing the the envelopes or pitching that note or a combination of all of these or even layering two or three piano sounds together with a slight difference in pitch. The point is, the keyboard musician has to work to make that sound sound good. It's musicianship. A beginner cellist or violinist has to get to know their instrument, as RiotNrrd pointed out. So also does the keyboard player, to some degree, and we have to do it to a hell of a lot more instruments. Even when we make new sounds from scratch that aren't traditional, we have to have an understanding of an instrument that is closest to it and we have to understand how sounds works. That makes us true musicians!!!

JonSolo · Post by **JonSolo** » Mon Jun 30, 2008 3:37 am

I agree with all thoughts on all accounts from both of you.

What I am wondering however is will this alienate the synth (software or hardware) even more?

For example I enjoy and have used Reason extensively in some of my work. Yet someone who saw me working with it asked "is this painting by numbers for music?" What makes that statement interesting is that they were keenly aware of my capabilities and skills as a musician. It might have been their first kneejerk reaction to seeing me work with it, but I am wondering how many people feel that way toward modern day electronic musicians.

Further, are the REAL musicians being lumped in with the "paint by numbers" bunch as a result of the alien-ness of these developments?

It seems to me that while WE know that we can create wonderful music (I know many of you here create some really nice pieces and I have been complimented as well) therefore we are playing our "instruments" even if it is software...many others think of us as button pushers.

Jon