CHAPTER 1. A HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

By the early 1980s, designers of electronic instruments were in a similar dilemma to that of wind instrument makers in the nineteenth century. Musicians were demanding more flexibility and refinement than the existing technology allowed. Until circuitry shrank significantly, the advantages of both the electronic organ and the new "synthesizer" could not be combined in one unit.

The electronic organ was "polyphonic"; that is, it could play many notes at once, but it offered very little variation in tone color. The synthesizer, expressly designed for creating new sounds, was "monophonic" -- capable of playing only one note (or sound) at a time.

The early synthesizer was not a "fixed" package. Manufacturers offered an assortment of separate oscillators and sound processors. The buyer decided on which units and how many of them would comprise the synthesizer.

Each unit had several controls for modifying a particular aspect of a sound. A plethora of jacks and patch cords were provided so the composer could connect the oscillators and processors together in a variety of ways.

Since all the components of a synthesizer were dedicated to one sound at a time, the keyboard could not be wired so as to play many sounds at once. Instead, the keys introduced a series of resistors that could change the value of one or more sound parameters by known steps. They also "triggered" the envelope generators that governed the curves of volume and filtering.

The inherent drift of the circuitry and the need to make myriad critical adjustments to each sound rendered live performances problematical at best. As a result, composers committed their compositions to tape.

As electronic sounds became more popular, builders provided instruments that combined features of the organ and synthesizer. For ensemble work there were "glorified organs" -- polyphonic instruments with a few added controls to adjust tone quality. For solo work performers used true synthesizers fitted with complex switching arrangements instead of patch cords.

Tonal richness could be expanded by connecting several synthesizers to a master keyboard and setting each one to a desired tone color or "timbre." Nevertheless, the circuits introduced many tracking anomalies such that one had to retune the synthesizer depending on which section of the keyboard was being played.

The microprocessor and electronic memory changed all that. The present-day synthesizer (often abbreviated "synth") contains a lot of "firmware" -- fixed programs that determine the synthesizer's features. It permits a synth to have both a polyphonic keyboard and a large number of "programmable" voices.

The term "programmable" means that the characteristics of a voice can be changed and those changes can be stored in the instrument's memory. Many parameters of a voice will respond to variations in a performer's touch.

There are two basic methods by which electronic instruments produce sound. The first employs a set of internal algorithms that generate the pitches and the processes that shape their tonal colors. The second method employs digitally recorded "samples" of instrumental and other acoustical sounds.

Although both methods produce musically interesting sounds, it is usually easy to tell which sounds are fashioned from electronic building blocks and which are from acoustical ones.

Digital synthesis not only eliminated the tuning anomalies inherent in older synths, but allowed a choice of tunings other than the standard Equal Temperament used in most Western music.

In addition, this technology made it possible to incorporate a protocol by which data for recording and playing music can travel among the instruments, sound processors and computers within a network. Called "MIDI" -- Musical Instrument Digital Interface -- it comprises a set of messages that represent keyboard activity, voice selection, and some of the commands that change tonal characteristics.

MIDI can also perform such studio-oriented tasks as controlling audio mixers, reverberation units, and recording equipment. MIDI data can be converted into SMPTE, (pronounced "simpty"), the protocol used in video work.

From the outset, the computer offered tantalizing possibilities. In theory, a composer could construct an infinite variety of instruments, dynamic levels, and textures. Until the advent of plentiful, inexpensive memory this research remained a province of well-funded university laboratories. Now, however, many store-bought computers include a "sound card" and music-production software. This basic music studio comprises at least one MIDI-based synthesizer, a digital recorder and player, and a sound mixer. Software is available that can synchronize MIDI data with the data that constitutes sounds from an outside source.

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