Studies in MASS
“Below up where is room to grow”
The contents of
this sample CD were created over the better part of a year, where I went from
not really knowing anything about modular synthesis to having a better idea of
exactly what it is that I didn’t know about modular synthesis. I wanted to
document the result, but I arrived at the idea of a sample CD only after most
of the material was already prepared. Since then I have heard real sample CDs,
so maybe the term is deceptive.
The CD consists of
the following.
1)
.cda recordings of
three long evolving patches, readable on any CD player.
2)
.wav samples of
all 150 patches. On some occasions I have recorded several different settings
of the same patch, or muted a delay module to provide a drier recording. As a
result, there are some 175 samples.
3)
All MASS source
files used to generate the above samples (*.msl), located within the folder
“Studies in MASS” and grouped thematically by subfolder, excluding the CD audio
patches.
4)
Archives of all
patches assembled in the course of development. Most of the 150 patches above
have been drawn from this morass. I’ve included the archive as a warning for
anyone who is thinking of using an alphanumeric system of classification for,
well, anything at all.
5)
A .zip of the MASS
application itself. Installation and pottering about is free, however in order
to save modifications the software should be registered at www.9barrecordings.co.uk/. Support
shareware – support Stewart!
All .wav samples
are monophonic 44.1kHz/16-bit resolution, and recorded directly to hard disk
from within the MASS environment. Aside from normalization and fade/loop-point
editing done on Sound Forge, there has been no postproduction – everything is
straight out of MASS. In some cases artifacts or aliasing persisted on a few
samples, but I considered the sounds interesting enough to warrant inclusion.
Development was done on a PC (MASS is PC-only), using a Korg Oasys PCI card and
Mackie HR824 monitors – therefore, all sounds are THX-approved!
All sound files
and source patches are copyleft under EFF Open Audio License.
All material on this CD is also considered trackware – if you use it in a track,
do be kind enough and send me a copy.
Despite my limited
experience, it seems to me that MASS has some very nice features. One is the
oscillator design, which goes from 0.001Hz to 22050Hz continuously (with the
break in significant digits occuring between 4.999 and 5.0). Thus a simple
mouseclick turns an LFO into a tone-generating oscillator or vice versa – no
need to mess around with exchanging modules.
Another is that
every aspect of a module’s output can be controlled by another module’s output.
While an oscillator has a single output, all aspects contributing to that
output – frequency, slide (ie, portamento), wave form, amplitude, phase, hard
sync – can be modulated by any other signal from any other module, including
the osc itself. Long amplitude and/or frequency modulation chains are thus
possible. Also, through the use of splitter, splicer and amplifier modules, any
number and variety of feedback circuits, subroutines and parallel processes can
be generated.
Hardly any of the
assemblies use envelopes. I found them annoying to work with – always opening
and closing. This may seem odd, but not if every sound file on this disc was
created with a mouse and not a keyboard (MASS doesn’t require a MIDI
connection, although the MIDI implementation is quite easy). Well, now I’ve got
it out of my system, so my next project should involve patches designed to be
played from a controller.
The majority of
assemblies in the archives were built around consonances of 60Hz, however, I’ve
attempted to retune much of the final group of 150 assemblies and the resulting
samples to 55Hz, in order to remain consistent with the A3 = 440Hz paradigm.
Sometimes I’ve had to keep patches at the original fundamental simply because
they don’t sound as good any other way. Other patches, like percussive or
sample-and-hold- driven sounds, obviously will not have a fundamental tone per
se, and still others will have upper and lower tones as suggested
“boundaries” for the sound generated (eg, patches that make heavy use of
frequency portamento, or patches where the cutoff frequency is the principal
determinant of tone, as opposed to a tone generated by an oscillator). The
accompanying MASS Catalogue gives, where possible, the frequency employed by
each patch, as well as the length of each sample, and whether loop points have
been set.
Since these
patches weren’t necessarily designed to be components of a larger compositional
architecture, there aren’t as many “single sound” examples as one might expect
from a sample CD. Nor did I have any interest in emulating other synths,
although I’m certain this would have been a good exercise (some patches, like
“303 Generator”, just wound up this way). Nor was there much interest in
emulating actual instruments or objects. I did get a lot of pleasure out of
mimicking metallophones, but the technique’s discovery seemed about as
accidental as anything else.
What I did find
intriguing in the design process was the chance to create evolving patches, and
these constitute the majority – soundscapes that can stand on their own and
develop over the course of seconds, even minutes. Also, on several occasions I have recorded several settings of a
patch, eg removal of end-of-chain delay module to produce a dry sound perhaps
more appropriate for future production work. Spawn of Sinclair, for instance,
is a handy illustration of the development process – only the final build
exists as a source file.
Within the .msl
files themselves, I have made an attempt to describe the functions of modules,
particularly the oscillators’. For those of you who would strenuously contest
usage of such terms as “metamodulator”, I invite you to set me right. I have
also attempted to give the inheritance of each patch within the “Notes” view,
so if you continue developing patches, send them back to me with an updated
inheritance, including instructions, if any, on how to play them. Before
attempting to play and/or record from MASS, note that I used a 533MHz 640Mb RAM
PC, and that in several cases the processor was quite maxed, so I had to use a
much faster machine for recording.
Cheers
Misha Lepetić
New York, July
2002