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(This part was last updated: April 24, 2000. Newest additions near bottom. The open letter is continued in Part Five, which was begun in July 2002. )
Here is Part Four of the Open Letter, containing collected feedback with all of you site surfers. Some of you have suggested it ought be split into "Rant & Raves", and other similar (alliterative?) ruminations, but this would lose for me the temporal continuity. I may eventually go for such methods in reorganizing this admittedly chaotic collection of thoughts. The necessary "spare time" (wazzat?) that would take has been but a dream the past two years. Well enough to get the whole website rebuilt and greatly expanded. Thanx to many of you who wrote with compliments.
For now, let's continue to use a more calendar-based approach. All the comments prior to August 1996 will be found in Part One. And those added up through November 1997 will be in Part Two, and through January 1999 in Part Three. This will continue as a fourth part. I'll put in the current list of Gold Leaf Awards (for those who located the SOB 2000 album's single Moog sound) as before, to the top of the newest open letter. Other added-on new material goes near/at the end, so read from the top down for the original written order.
Please note, as
before, that for the latest information on upcoming release, look to
the Recent
News
page, not here. Sometimes the two will overlap, but we will try to
place the appropriate items in the appropriate
locations!
Open
Letter 3 was last added to so long ago, it's difficult to try to get
the idea rolling again. Let me go through the enormous stack of
printed message from you collected over the past year. I'll jump
around to the most interesting questions, and get back to others when
I can. Over this past year I've been surprised to read that several
of you actually expect me to publish the answer on that mild puzzle
of the single Moog sound in S-OB
2000. Goodness
griefness, why ruin it henceforth for anyone else who might enjoy the
not unintelligent challenge? I can't come up with a "sound of the
month" puzzle, you know. So while I do appreciate that it's
frustrating to wish to know a "secret" sans effort, and have many
such that I carry around with me in hopes of discovering the answer
some day, your request seems out of place and not sporting.
There have been others who did
find the correct answer, the first of these having been mentioned in
the earlier Open
Letters. I'll be adding some
newer winners here below as I find their names again. Congratulations
to all of you who looked, just for making the effort. (One of you
recently made the suggestion that it might be the tuned noise in the
new "Jesu, Joy of." Sorry, but that would be too nearly an exact
match, as the digital tuned noise is essentially the same sound as I
used to get on the old Moog. The real answer is much more
idiomatically "Moog-y, a much fairer challenge;!")To those who found
the not so difficult note and wrote me here, we extend to you the
Gold Leaf Award of being published here, for the whole world to see
you're both perceptive and intelligent, and didn't give up until
you'd figured it out (another one adorns the bottom of this letter,
in fact). Good lessons to be learned here, don't you think?!
It
was odd to receive a bit of worn-out praise for the standard 12-tone
tuning this year. It really can't help but to come across as wasted
effort, like the expression, "kicking a dead horse". Of course the
standard scale is not bad. It was a pretty good compromise when it
evolved more for pragmatic reasons than any special qualities it had.
It added nearly nothing to the sounds of music, though it was less
offensive than some of the other choices that could have been made at
the time.
It took many years to evolve,
too, so how bad could it be? And SO WHAT?! The need for the
compromise is way past being a convincing argument these days. The
new technologies easily
handle just about any scheme one might want to try out, at very
little cost or effort. It just takes a bit of knowledge to know what
looks like a reasonable plan to try, and some work and time to get it
operating. If the equipment doesn't care, doesn't require arbitrary
limitations as the E.T. scale certainly imposes, why should we? Why
be stuck in a well worn rut?
You can explore two other
worlds: the nearly perfectly tuned worlds of just intervals, and
variations and clever temperaments that measure themselves against
the just intervals, or any arbitrary alternative system one can
imagine, including scales better suited to unusual timbres and
sounds, which don't happen to work well with the just intervals. Very
eclectic possibilities here, and like sampling the cuisine's from
around the world, the best that every civilization has to offer, and
it seems to me the height of laziness or narrow-mindedness to avoid
these deliberately. Where is the curiosity? Life is filled with so
many new horizons to explore -- so why remain for your whole life at
home?! I just don't get it.
Yes, if you find many of the
explorations come up short, that's the way it's always been. You have
to search in 100 places to find one or two worth keeping. Is this so
bad? Isn't it worth it? Isn't this a neat way to expand your musical
ideas, and possibly come up with truly original footsteps uniquely
your own? It doesn't have to be all or nothing, you can continue to
use the 12-tone E.T. too, but of course. Room for many options. Okay,
this is directed mainly to the composers among you who read this, but
like any convincing "pep-talk", it's deeply felt, and a fun one to
trumpet out about. The new world of alternate ways of tuning is
simply one of those ideas whose time has come. Give it a try (the
water's fine, come on in)!
It
was very thoughtful of many of you to send pieces of software,
images, poems, url's for files to download. Most of the time I can
open images in jpeg or gif or PICT format easily. I have no PC Wintel
machines here, so if the file you wish to send is a ". EXE" or
".XYZ", I probably won't be able to open it. Just tell me what it
was, that'll be fine. I don't have time to visit many website,
especially large, detailed sites (like this
one, my gosh -- how hypocritical to complain! ;^), and seldom browse
for the hell of it. More often I go grab what I need, some file a
collaborator has posted just for me, or some OS updates or to search
for specialized information, like tech or science stuff. So don't be
disappointed that I will probably not be able to go look through all
your treasures now up on the web. It IS wonderful, though, isn't it,
to be able to indulge in such democratic, international sharing of
info and a bit of ourselves, too?!
It
is rather frustrating to receive the same oft-repeated message,
asking when will such and such a recording be available again, like
S-OB,
W-TS,
or Tron,
most often. I have really tried, especially the last three years,
both to answer those questions, and (more important) to push to get
the remasterings and new albums out there. Rarely is such a question
not already answered on the pages of this site. Check the
Discography
page and its related pages
linked from there, and check the News
page or the Old
News page. The answers such
as I know them are laid bare for anyone to read. (P.S. How many other
composers do you know of who make the effort to be web-helpful?
:^)
Recognize that the originating
artist of most music recordings sits near the bottom of the
"pecking-order." We have very little to say about the quality of
pressings and printings, the availability of our CD's in stores and
on websites, and the ads that show up or lack of same. It frustrates
me how little my very loud and logically argued suggestions or
complaints become reflected by reality. I already know there are
problems. I know that web stores are sometimes careless about your
orders, and you may have to call them a couple of times when they do
not get a CD you ordered promptly sent to you, most annoying. We've
added several suggestions (on the discography page) about
buying
music on the web. Take a
look.
I'm but one solitary composer
who tries to wear many hats, and falls always behind the stack of
things to be done. One hat I have not the time for is "librarian." If
you have research you need to do, for a project, a dissertation, a
term paper, whatever, please do go and do it the best you can. I
can't answer the many requests to evaluate projects you may have, a
musical or tech query. Sadly, I might be both unqualified and very
wrong if I sent you my opinions. If some idea really won't let you
alone, the best way to exorcise the itch is to follow it up,
investigate and do your best to test the concept, like a prototype or
sketch. You'll find out more by the actual "doing" if it's a good
idea. The best advice is almost always: Go For It!" Life frequently
does that to me, just like most of you. As Arthur C. Clarke has said
(to paraphrase) ideas are in no short supply -- it's the actual
labor, the following through, that in the end determines which ones
are worthwhile, which are not. Give yourself the benefit of the doubt
and give it a try!
A
similar frustration comes about in managing files to download on the
web. I've have more than my share of wasted days trying to get some
individual item to download to everyone who might want to go get it
from the Resources page on our site. Over the past few years we've
learned some of the pitfalls, and have gotten better about supporting
PC users as well as the Mac, which we are far
more familiar with. Sometimes just the attempt to upload a simple
file breaks it. Dunno why. Other times a file that has been fine for
several months suddenly won't download for someone. I think there are
temporal bugs and glitches that can sabotage the occasional attempt,
but not always, and not democratically to everyone.
My more web/net savvy friends
have often tried to help on this, and I have learned a lot from them.
Gradually I hope the software and standards we all have will become
more aware of other "ways to do the same thing", and allow easier
interchange of formats and content. But why would a Stuffit file
sometimes work, and other times come up with a broken icon, when it's
being run on a Mac, just as I've used to stuff and upload the file?
No idea. It's usually worse with DOS platforms, and in between for
Wintel machines. After you've written and I've taken a couple of
evenings to attempt to fix what I often can't detect while taking all
reasonable steps to recode and rebuild and upload, and still it will
not work for you, please just chalk it up as another bit of Net Chaos
in Action (Chaos
at work and play to make the Universe a Better Universe, for All
Mankind, on Earth as it is on Venus, in sickness and in health, ah
nuts...! ;-)
The
new release of the Switched-On
Boxed Set has caused a few
more adventurous souls to ask if any versions of these masters in
surround sound will be made available. The terse answer is "yes". But
there are a few important things to bear in mind, and were the main
reason we went ahead with so many months of work to produce the new
definitive set in regular stereo first. Let me quote here two
paragraphs that go into this topic better, from the DiscNotes
page:
"Eventually (perhaps soon, now that the standards seem to be in place) surround sound on DVD will be a popular medium for home music delivery. The good news is that the third and fourth disks of the Bach collection (S-OB II and the Brandys) are now preserved in superb 20-bit surround master transfers (20-bit audio's cool), from which the ultra-stereo two track CD versions on the new boxed set were made. So those will lend themselves neatly to 5.1 or whatever versions quite nicely. Switched-On Bach I was mastered in two track stereo, but a couple of years later got the early quad treatment, too. We made careful new mixes at CBS's bequest. But that mastering was released in their phony-quad system: SQ, if only for a couple of years in the early '70's. We will evaluate if that mix lives up to our usual standards, and also how greatly it may differ from the original we're all used to.
"The Well-Tempered Synthesizer was never mastered to anything but two channels. Evenso, we have the original multitrack tapes, so it might be reasonable to do new surround mixes, which would allow ALL the Switched-On Boxed Set music to become surround-ready, if you'd permit the fact that the first two will not be exactly the same in balances on every line and part to the originals (this is why the Boxed Set MUST be made available first as the best possible version of the original masters, for historical reasons. Other versions can then follow, as interest demands.)"
You may smile when I tell you I
wanted to release everything in surround sound originally, but was
forced to respect realities of the slowness of technological progress
of some kinds, and that there are many good reasons to work towards
both regular stereo as well as surround releases. I hate it myself
when I find I have to purchase double or triple inventory of favorite
films or CD's, and would never freely impose that cheap trick on
those who collect my music. Things are not always so straightforward.
As the ability to make the home listening experience approach closely
to what we hear in the studio, you must expect that our current
formats are slowly obsoleted by newer, eventually better methods.
CD's took a while to reach their
now excellent quality. Compare any LP, cassette or early 8-track
copies you can find of my CBS released albums, with ESD's recent CD
remasterings. Can any honest, undogmatic individual reasonably claim
that the old versions sound better than the new? I do wish we could
have had such quality available back in the 70's, when it was
frustrating to hear what the LP or bulk dupe copies finally released
sounded like. We spent weeks to do the best we could, and that was
that. There was no way to put out recordings with depth and subtlety
intact on a format that most people could play, not without losing a
good 25-35% of the master's quality. Now we lose next to nothing (if
you know what you're doing).
The CD is a marvelous medium,
but what's next? No, I'm afraid the silliness over 24-bit audio is
mainly hyperbole. I'll go into the reasons at another time. More
misleading (reasons later) is the completely idiotic plans to
"update" to 96 kHz sampling, or the even more whacko value just
double that, of 192 kHz! What a waste of bits! (If you really want to
double the rate, what about 2
x 44.1 = 88.2 kHz? The
artifacts of going from 96 to 44.1 for CD release is
much
worse than simply recording in 44.1 at the outset. Mastering at 88.2,
on the other hand, would make ever more sense.) These are exactly the
issues no one is talking about. The BS gets escalated to try to
coerce us all into buying what will make no
audible improvement of any kind,
save junque-science fantasy. How about some double-blind A/B proof
(not rigged a priori demos), and spare the sales pitch!
Want a wiser plan? Let's put the
generous space on DVD's where it'll make the greatest audible impact:
multichannels. Not an original suggestion that, but it's still the
truth. 3, 4, 5, 6 or even 8 channels would make an immediate
impression of MUCH
better sound, even with the same speaker quality and everything else.
I'm not guessing about this, I've made the comparisons over and over
for 40 years, and will easily stake my reputation on this. I can't
wait to put out most of my catalog and newer music on a multichannel
medium. We'll get back to this again frequently in the next couple of
years. It'll be cutting edge stuff shortly, little surprise. Stay
tuned!
The
covers on the first several CBS albums were done with little or no
input from Rachel Elkind or me. At least we were pleased to learn
that the very professional team (then very popular among the
cognates) of Horn & Griner would be doing the work. So the gaffes
with the first cover (no patch cords, no output cable, etc.) were
matters we grimaced about, too. I think by now I can safely say I
outgrimaced the best of you -- honk, honk!
I have no idea whose Moog III
portable synth was used on those covers. We were told it was rented.
CBS did purchase such a unit, so it also may have been theirs. That
one was used only one time I know of, for the making of the decent
Andy Kazdin/Tom Shepard LP: "Everything
You Ever Wanted to Hear on the Moog
(but were afraid to ask)", although there may have been one or two
others. I had nothing to do with these projects, although I used to
enjoy chatting with Andy, who often was at work in the CBS studios
when I was there for final masterings. That Moog was likely sold off
later, so some of you may have indeed found photos of the same one.
Be aware, though, that Bob used to place very similar Dymo labels on
most of the units from that period, so looks can be deceiving, as
many looked nearly identical. I never used this synth, and it was in
no way involved with the sounds on any of my albums.
In the mid-80's one summer I
happened to be attending the lovely rooftop wedding of Ivan Berger
and Roberta Thumin. Among the guests I chatted with a woman who told
me she had been the source of the cute white Persian cat that
appeared on the cover. He was a gentle soul, very suited to the
rigors of posing for the many hours it had taken (don't try it with
most Siamese...) She had been at the shooting, something I sighed to
learn about so many years later -- wish I could have been, too. It
was a smile just the same. By then the old dear had passed into the
happy sunning
grounds, but his image will
live on.
Many,
many of you have written to say you were touched to read about some
of the critters with whom I've shared my loft, including the pains of
saying goodbye. Please know I understand, the empathy works both
ways. And thank you for taking the time to write me about this. It
may be fashionable in America to scoff at everything tender and
close, like the friendships we have with our pets. This is usually
only a mask for deeper emotions that are easier denied than
acknowledged. To all our lost friends, we'll never forget you. We may
have given you a home, food, clean box/paper, health care, and a warm
place to sleep, but you gave us your entire life and trust, and we're
grateful.
Some
of you appear to be true Coronaphiles, and have written with lively
tales of your own experiences chasing this most staggeringly
beautiful and dramatic of nature's spectacles. Thanx for sharing your
thoughts and enthusiasm with me about this site's Solar
Eclipse page.
I've been asked recently
about prints
of eclipse images. Right now
I have simply no way to provide hardcopy of these challenging images.
I do appreciate that many of you would love to have such prints -- I
would myself, to tell the truth! I have at best a few 8" x10" color
prints of each corona, while the best images are stored in the
computers. With the advent of such technology as the photo quality
inkjet printers by such companies as Epson, I've been staggered by
the ease, cost, and high quality of prints one can make at home (if
only they didn't fade). So eventually when I get past other
time-sensitive matters, I'll consider making prints both for myself
and for sale, if there is still sufficient interest. I may also
consider the frequent suggestion to assemble a book with photo
quality prints and expanded texts describing the chase of each
eclipse, how the images were made, for each full page
reproduction.
Right now that's a hazy
plan/idea I would need assistance to pull off. I apologize to those
who have written expecting that it was a "given" that I could provide
prints of any of the coronae depicted on this site. Were that were
true (why can't you make me a print? You compose music, that's nearly
the same thing!). If and when the situation changes, as if some
publisher showed an interest and ability to assist, I'll let you
know. As I get older the one common "enemy", as many of you know, is
"time." When I think about writing a book, making prints, remastering
of an album, or even adding new pages to my Open
Letters, or anything else
added to this site: it's the same thought: how much time will it
take? I can't spare the time I'd like in making custom prints now. To
charge enough to make it remotely worthwhile would cost you more than
I think would be fair. A stalemate. Stay tuned if any way "past the
impasse" can be worked out.
For the moment, my cordial
thanks for your interest and requests. These images have taken a
LOT
of time and effort to do (it's not as easy as it may look), and I'm
glad others see the results as justification of the means to get
there. I wish it were a straightforward thing to describe, "recipe
style", how to make such images. But, as explained on
the eclipse page, this is
far from honest. Nevertheless, in answer to the pleas of two good
eclipse-chasing friends, I wrote a couple of e-mails that lay out the
kind of tasks and approach needed. Perhaps I'll edit them into shape
to add to the site. But then please don't complain how "open-ended"
and unalgorithmic it will probably seem to be!
Yes,
it is true there was a 7" LP included with the By
Request album on its initial
release. We had little at all to do with that, although Rachel did
provide some of the graphics elements for them, and I helped by
making a few copies of the masters for them. It was really nothing
much to speak of, just the usual way a record company might promote
other albums by an artist, to tie them together better in the mind of
the purchasers.
There were six of our earlier
albums represented on the 7" sampler: two short selections from
By Request
itself, one each from
S-OB
(an excerpt) and
S-OB
II, one short work from
W-TS,
our score to CO,
and another excerpt from SS
(please check the discography page if these abbreviations are
unfamiliar to you). Mini photos of the LP covers and their catalog
numbers were included, so if any selection caught a listener's fancy,
they could find the whole thing. The same sampler was also handed out
at a few trade shows. It's a fine promotional idea, but not something
historically of any real importance. If I did omit mention of it on
the site so far, that's the only reason why.
Isn't
this something? I've gotten two letter from folks who just wanted to
thank me for retitling "Clockwork Black" sans any mention of the
word, "Mass". They both say it really would have been insensitive to
include it, from their point of view and from their family and
friends. Thank you for saying so. I've said it before, but I
certainly have no desire to offend any of you, and remain very much
neutral on all such topics, perhaps just a stubborn old Yankee
agnostic, so sue me.
Anyway, high moral standards
don't require establishments, a certainty in belief or dogma. Just
being an empathetic humanist ought be sufficient. I've recently read
that one listener misunderstood parts of Tales
of Heaven and Hell as
suggesting I harbor religious hang-ups. Sounds to me like a case of
what's called: "projection." (That ink blot isn't either an orchid;
it's the Devil! ;^) C'mon, this road works both ways -- please don't
try to offend me,
now! No reason to offend anyone gratuitously, if you can avoid doing
same. Remember the High Lama in the classic Capra film, "Lost
Horizon", suggesting the simplest Golden Rule of all: "be kind." I
had good reason in the case of that title to believe this might be
such a case, and simply changed it.
Yeay!
I've gotten the first several message about mapping, projections, and
making. The
Mapping page was added early
this year (1999), with a good starting collection, and more to come.
Neat change of pace from music and audio and physics and eclipses and
pets, to get these letters. I've read the suggestions a few of you
made on criteria on new projections with great interest. Yas, I think
some of these ideas are fascinating, indeed. It all makes me want to
get back to that, which I have planned now for a few years. Glad to
discover many of you share in the love of maps and how they are made.
Thanx for writing!
I
see that others of you either share in my earlier desperation about
older audio tape instabilities, and also in finding ways to make them
playable again. The ideas on silica gel for storage are warmly
acknowledged, like going to a garden shop of a department store to
find some dried gel, which works well as a desiccant when NOT mixed
with potting soil! Clever, thank you.
I
receive overly flattering comments occasionally, like one from a
teacher recently, this time quoting a bright student's question. My
Yankee Skepticism forces me to duck queries and immodest comments of
this kind as patently silly. With considerable discomfort I'll try to
reply thoughtfully to a youngster who intended no harm. The question
was something like, "what does it feel like to have made such an
impact in music?" My first reaction was instant and automatic:
"HA!
Right. Sure." To be completely candid, this is fantasy or PR. It's
but human nature to smile at the occasional compliment -- I don't
mind sincere applause any more than the next person. On rare
occasions I've been asked to appear on stage or in front of mike or
camera, and quite enjoying making a fool of myself, why not?
But I have no illusions that
most of what passes as "greatness" or "genius" is ephemeral. If after
several decades go by there is a tad of shadow left that you helped
to put there, it ought certainly be enough. An avid reader, I know
what the real great people have done, the contributions made.
Compared to them, my stuff is mostly chicken feed, a lonesome artist
scratching away in the desert, irrelevant to the world in general,
and most of the world of music. So what? If I were "famous", would
that make me a good person? It's near madness to wish to be "a star",
instantly recognized on every street corner, a proof of vanity or
unresolved egocentricity. Do your best because to do less makes what
you do worth less. Search for answers because you are curious to
learn the truth. It's fun to figure things out. It's also fun to hear
(or see) something you've made that comes out kind of well. That's
why if you're human you try to do it even better the next time!
It's showoff fun to let others
experience carefully
chosen snippets of what
you've been doing that came out well (like Ravel, I hide my "work
sheets" and all "trail of blood" mistakes and false starts), and
watch them enjoy it, too! It's a real hoot to try to work a few minor
ideas together and have it sometimes all fall in place in the heat of
inspiration, almost as if that right-hemisphere mode steered you into
things you never knew could
exist. This is why teaching yourself how to do creative work is so
human, so rewarding, for it's own sake, as many of you know. If you
get a bit of applause along the way, smile, acknowledge the giants on
whose shoulders you stand, take in the brief experience while it
happens and in retrospect. Cool. Now get back to work!
Even at its best, this still
ought not be the only thing that makes you tick, any more than doing
anything you spend a lot of your life working on to be better than
average will hence define who
you are. Think about that. It should be but one part of your whole.
Yet these are wonderful, challenging targets, and we all ought work
to develop one or two of them in our lives if we can, if we are
lucky. The effort is still worth making, even when we may fall short.
A great sadness fills me when I read the news and magazines and
discover how few young people have been taught/encouraged to pursue
activities for excellence's sake, who will stick with such challenges
long enough to gather some expertise. Consider how the Big Bucks have
harmed The Olympic Games since the mid-80's, when it went "showbiz!"
Honest goals of achievement fit our human nature, hand in glove. We
were NOT born greedy, to be "the best known person in the world", the
richest, or the "best-looking." Our goals ought go deeper than that
(even when we're not
ugly... ;^)
It seems that there have never
been more tools available to make the path simpler and less tedious
than ever before. But what the tools more often are used
for
is plain old vanity and greed, well, DOH!. Our sophisticated means
are so often wasted on the laziest cliches, led not by an inner
vision or idea, but by what's fast and easy and obvious. I'm
embarrassed to be a part of it. A large chunk of the professional
musical world lowers it's standards ever and ever downwards to reach
the widest possible, lowest common denominator audience. It has sadly
succeeded, while becoming sterile and devoid of all art and artistry
-- a grand nihilism, all so a few more dollars can be made (let's put
the "C" back on Rap). Just don't forget the "Law of Strawberry Jam",
which states: "the
wider a culture is spread, the thinner it gets."
On the other hand, if any few of
my works have helped a few young people to avoid these vanities, and
to try to do their best to carry on the next inevitable steps after
those of my generation are long gone, then THAT
would justify it all for me. Otherwise, I think the values I have
always tried to instill in my music, especially in the
electroacoustic arts I'm most often associated with, have been
largely ignored or forgotten. Damn. Music has seldom been at such a
low, groveling level, often perverted by the likes of quantized drum
machines, one of the most destructive influences of our era, teaching
a generation that stiff, mechanical, unfelt streams of notes is
"unbad." (Turn the crank some more, pa, we're on a roll tonight!) It
hurts to remember the efforts we had to go through to insert some
human performance value and "feel" into our earliest albums,
essential lessons now forgotten. This certainly proves how minuscule
is any effect I might have had.
Nevertheless, thank those of you
who share in an appreciation of the mere act of trying to do
something very well. I've always been obsessive about my work,
worrying every damned molecule into oblivion, while trying to remain
true to our human spirit and compassion, romanticism and, dare I say
it, sentimentality? Don't forget drama, even if only of the "mello"
persuasion. Those things drove and do drive me. Sure, we hope the
current media will preserve our recordings for some years to come,
that our efforts will not be too soon forgotten. It's always a matter
of luck if what you try to do "makes it" or not (we need luck, but of
course can't take credit for luck when it happens). Let's see what
the luck of time decides in the long run, before getting too excited
here and now, okay?
One final thought: most people
stuck being real artists automatically are preoccupied not with
anything that they have done in the past, but what they're working on
now. It's always been that way, and perhaps it's a good thing. Moves
us forward, even if art itself does not actually move, actually
progress (is Bartok a "better" composer than Bach in having been born
later? Or Stravinsky compared with Mozart? Ridiculous questions!).
It's been one of the follies of the 20th century that so many of us
have been told "important art must progress," like the medical
sciences, say, that older ideas are obsoleted by the newer. Bunch of
"BS-de-Jour", don't you beleive it. But as individuals we do move
forward and learn and grow and alas, sometimes forget, too. It's been
rather fun doing so many remasterings for ESD, as it forced me to
look back where I'd never have done so on my own. Not too painful,
most of it. But I can't wait to get moving ahead with some new music
soon, you know?
I guess somewhere in this
messy stream of thought lies what I'd try to reply to your students
who even care about this stuff. I seldom think on such topics. I'm
sorry I don't have the time go make it clearer and briefer, and cut
to the bone of the matter. But perhaps you can read this and distill
some kind of reasonable reply, with my thanks!
Yes,
I've finally determined that CBS/Sony has indeed deleted
(!) the Peter
and the Wolf parody I
did in the late '80's with Al Yankovic (dunno why, but I still have
trouble calling him "weird", when I just found him to be bright,
witty, and a bit shy, sorry to blow your image, Al, there was nothing
that weird I noticed! ;-). So sorry about that -- not in my control.
It appears to have taken place in early 1999. Heard about it only
from some of you at last (for which, thank you). No need to write us
with this news again.
I can't suggest how to get
copies of it right now. But I'll ask ESD to look into putting a
remastered version out, if that can be arranged. I'm often bamboozled
by the effort it takes to make such straightforward suggestions as
this take place, become reality. Legal problems or people who are
intractable or indifferent or greedy can topple a whole house of
cards. Stay tuned and we'll look into it.
Thanks
to those who love the Living
Page concept as we do. Feel
free to borrow the icon (the small one is on
the index or homepage) and
idea for you own use, and you're welcome!
Thanks
to those who have written to say you enjoy my original compositions,
besides the more famous transcriptions I've become indellibly
associated with. "Different strokes" is cool; even cooler those who
comfortably walk both paths, enjoy both kinds of music, old and new.
Kind of you to let me know you more versatile fans are out there!
The
year 1999 also marks the first time I've gotten letters from a few of
you about Planetaria, another topic with more than a mild passion for
me I made three planetarium projectors when I was a teenager, the
third, which was interrupted by college, had a chance at being pretty
okay, with aluminum construction, twinkling stars, a real dome. Never
completed. I built it in my tolerant parent's basement, with physical
models of the horizon buildings in the neighborhood -- but that's a
long story. Seems a collection of these topics and interests must
naturally overlap for many of you. I've recently received letters
that suggest many of you have also noticed this, sunnuva gun!
Received also the first letters
which are from others of you who also share my outrage over the
credit for music making going to the tool,
not the artist
who uses the tool. Jeepers. That's a fairly recent bit of disturbing
misperception. We encountered it with the earliest Moog, with a great
many persons crediting the synthesizer for the performances on
S-OB.
Hell, even CBS was absurdly and disrespectively "out of it" when they
signed the
machine (yes!),
not us, on that first album. Can you believe it?! (No urban legend,
the same nonsense goes on to this day. An excellent artist I know
tells me would-be students frequently ask her just what kind of
airbrush makes all those cool results in her paintings -- as if one
could "purchase some medium sized skill with an accessory box of
talent, how much...?!")
Seems
reasonable to include here a few predictions I've been making to
anyone foolish enough to bring up this topic with me during the past
year. First, the so-called Y2K
Bug will shortly be proven
to be 99 44/100% hype, a Pseudobug,
if there ever were one ('course
you haven't met my cousin, Ralph).
Let's emulate Jonathan Swift, and herewith make a modest proposal:
all the "experts", and authors of those 3" thick (!) expensive books,
ought be forced to wear large badges which proudly proclaim:
"Y2B a Bug
Like Me ($)" during all of
2000, as they stole from the gullible, preying on their technophobia
and paranoia.
Yes, there will be cases of
certain computers, older mainframes or machines based on 70's
designs, that are no longer able to be used until a work around patch
is installed, perhaps in the BIOS (bright folks have been working on
these bugs and other potential roll-over problems for many months --
thanks, you've all done well!). Guess I ought not assume that just
because I was stubborn enough to stick with the often disparaged
Macintosh
(which has
no problem -- I checked), those who chose Wintel will be so happy. A
large proportion of PC's will need fixing, as, let's face it, their
internal ROMs and clocks were lamely designed (hey, remember those
absurd and sloppy math errors generated by many PC's only a few years
ago? Don't you smell a tad of indifference and contentiousness
here?)
Let's also note the demise of a
favorite weather site so handy to grab fast loading text summaries of
the current weather. This site (cirrus, at the University of
Michigan) stopped just a couple of days ago (around Xmas), since the
computer it used was not Y2k compliant and had to be shut down, as
they have no funds (!) to make it operable again. Too bad, I'll miss
those efficient reports, since now only cluttered, slower html
versions are available on the web... *sigh*. This is a good example
to bring up here of a real world Y2k bug, in contrast to all the
media palaver that has now reached it's hysterical peak. Be grateful
for 1/1/00 just to have them STOP
-- enough, all ready!
Are there really any readers of
this who expect to see planes falling from the sky (as in a recent
episode of "The Simpsons"), and water and power extinguished, no food
available in markets, automobiles inoperable, or phones and cable TV
become nostalgic memories? Won't happen, no way, to be reasonable and
non-hysterical about it. Like the infamous false predictions of blind
"seers" of Jeanne Dixon's ilk, the baloney will be blithely forgotten
in a couple of days, while the faithful remain ever gullible to be
taken-in another day. So it goes.
Corollaries are easy to find:
expect no Judgment
Day or End
of the World of any kind to
occur as the big odometer rolls over. Nor will it happen when the
2000th of AD years reaches an end and third
Millennium's Odyssey begins for real,
on 1/1/2001,
just as Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick told us it would! (For
the mass of Innummerates out there, "Happy Newman Ellium"... remedial
counting lessons to be scheduled shortly... ;-) Speaking of which,
here's something to ask your friends: "When you count your fingers,
do you include the final, 10th digit, or stop after counting the
9th?" and: "Can I pay back a $100 loan from you with $99?"
Stop Press: This P.S. is added on 1/1/00 (wotta cool looking date!): All the above modest predictions have been borne out in reality, and no Y2k disasters of any size have occurred, no sensationalist reports, even on the Hypevision Quasinews Media. (Not one piece of equipment in my loft/studio had any problem at all, for example, including old VCR's and camcorders.) Hope you weren't suckered in.
Let's not waste this check on reality, and cognize that here's proof why genuine skepticism is a VERY good thing to possess in today's world. Go on, doubt at least one improbable thing a day: doomsdayists, conspiracy theorists (how about Conspiracy Science, to match "Creationist Science", that embarrassment to the Kansas Oxymorons et al?), psi and bent spoon practitioners (practition makes perfect?), and all Roswellians at large or small.
Good for you, good for me; skepticism sets us free.
(Pardon that doggerel -- I got carried away there, won't let it happen again...)
BTW-- I don't mean to imply any disrespect for the hardworking teams of you who helped avoid the more specific elements of disaster which would have occurred had we remained completely unprepared around the globe. Your joy of satisfaction ought come in seeing just how successful those intelligent efforts turned out to be.
It's still too early to report no "End of the World" has occurred, either, although many dogmatically blessed groups are warning their misguided flocks that this will assuredly occur this month, so it is written.
Well, it didn't happen by mid-January, and counting. (Don't hold your breath.)
We've
gotten a few questions about the covers of the individual albums that
contained the LP versions of music now collected and optimized on the
Switched-On
Boxed Set. I suppose in a
pedantic way we were not being completely accurate to suggest these
were "originals." Is that "original originals", or just "originals?"
It's just like the dozens of Original Ray's Famous Pizza restaurants
in NYC...! The first SOB pressings didn't even have an artist credit
on the cover, that took over a year (don't forget, they had signed
the M-o-o-g
originally, not us!). It (originally) said: "Performed on the Moog
Synthesizer." From 1969 for the next half-dozen years, due to strong
pressures from others, credit lines were falsified, and I winced over
each bogus pseudonym continued for their
selfish reasons, and for the faked image they insisted would "sell
better." (BS.) We halted the travesty on all new and older albums
(repressings) in the late 70's, over 20 years ago.
The original cover reproductions
were often of mediocre quality, which cried out for improvement when
the boxed set was assembled. I spent days on the first two, tweaking
colors and contrast, eliminating artifacts of too much masking --
ugh! So these are not exactly the original originals (they're closer
to the original, original original slides, however!). The covers for
the third and fourth LP albums are currently clouded in some snarled
legal issues, so we made our own new versions, which captured the
idea and spirit of those you've grown familiar with, but avoided
these issues. "If wishes were horses, beggars..." uh sorry, reality
often intervenes in each desire to be perfect...
Our reconstructions certainly
are decent, and more than adequately conjure up those originals, with
some flair and image panache, I hope. Pardons to those who disagree.
But -- as I pointed out earlier, "as the artist I outrank you..." I'm
quite pleased with the final compromises, the necessary stylized
solutions we came up with, and beg your indulgence to try not to be
too disturbed by such secondary issues. Besides, a detailed history
is too convoluted and ultimately, oxymoronically, irrelevant. It
ought be the music that counts.
And for the music on all the
CD's, as I tried to point out in the notes, we took great pains to
remain completely faithful to the original mixes (the
original,
original originals), even where those were necessarily modified to
fit the restraints of cutting physical grooves of an LP. If any
"compromise" on the music is to be found, it was back then: all the
LP's up until the boxed set were inadequate reflections of the
intended (original original) masters. What you will hear on the new
four CD's IS
what we originally recorded. Any tinkerings
done for the set were only
to make the final reproduction as clean, pure and free of needless
blemishes as could be done without
harm. With the current state
of the art, that's quite wonderful: essentially no audible compromise
I can find. You ought notice these improvements right away, given
good ears and equipment. If not, compare (if you dare) with any LP,
cassette or previous CBS/Sony version CD. I rest my case.
A couple of you have written to
ask about which cover of S-OB
I was the original original:
the sitting/mugging or standing elegantly pose. Isn't it obvious? Why
would we have preferred to make a joke of our hard work? It was the
other way around, as the "joke" CBS first thought they had in
S-OB
began to be taken seriously by a LOT of people. A better cover image
was called for. In the Boxed Set's bigger book the tale of that
initial, thankfully short-lived cover is presented (also on the
enhanced-CD files of Disk IV).
BTW, to jump to a related topic,
yes, the initial batch of By
Request albums sent to the
UK had Rachel's and my tongue in cheek Elgar-parody (Pompous
Circumstances) replaced
by a few tracks borrowed
from The
Well-Tempered Synthesizer.
Later copies in the UK occasionally were the US version, I've been
told. But I found only the abridged versions at the HMV store in
Oxford Street when we were in London to score Kubrick's "The
Shining". That would be very early 1980. It's the first time I
actually SAW (and bought) one of the cowardly pressings, although we
were told it would probably happen that way during the initial
release, but CBS never sent us one. (Of course.)
Speaking of the UK, allow me to
apologize for the way record companies in the States tend to be damn
tardy in supplying music on US releases anywhere else. I have never
had any control of that, as with most things on the business side
(I'm just an artist! ;^). So I find myself constantly surprised and
angry when I learn how poor the distribution is in
all
other countries. (You have no idea how difficult it is these days to
get market penetration of ANY kind in the US, to put things in
perspective!) But I have brought up this topic with ESD, and have
been told that things will get better starting soon (they've
explained how difficult things have gotten across the board). I can
only try my best from this side. Perhaps those gifted with diplomatic
and forceful skills of description and persuasion ought write to the
companies too, the distributors, even complain at a store level.
Insist on getting CD's by artists you enjoy which happen to be near
impossible to find (it's not much better here).
As the Web becomes more an
important part of music purchasing power, this problem will become
bypassed, and the ill-will and contempt by older merchandisers will
be rewarded by their becoming less important, eventually not
important at all. It's the usual way arrogance tends to bring about
its own downfall, don't you think? (Poetic justice.) But that's still
a few years away. I'd
suggest ordering albums like mine online.
Ordering through a store near you will probably be a LOT slower than
having an immediate shipment sent your way via one of the decent
alternative carriers. That's usually what we do, even from NYC, you
know! (Prices are usually better online, too.)
Sunnuvagun...
I've recently gotten a few
letters from fans like you seriously asking me if I think the early
LP albums on CBS were any good. Just my candid opinion: how do I
think they hold up compared to the new remasterings, the new Hi-D
CD's in particular?
The short answer is:
"You must be
joking!" I still can't
believe we all had to be satisfied with that final release technology
(mastering tapes were usually quite decent.) It was always a bitter
disappointment for us, often emotionally so, but what choice was
there? Each time we came to put out a new album, we faced a difficult
struggle, to transfer at least 50-60% of the quality from our master
Dolby tapes onto mere LP or prerecorded tape/cassette. We were never
completely satisfied, even when we'd reach all the technology
could
do, and all the engineers at CBS who helped us had taken their best
shot. The "good ol' daze" was none too good. I've never understood
the lunatic fringe who to this day maintain that this torturous,
ancient roller-coaster ride of tiny mechanical stylus trying to
follow all the minute undulations of vinyl plastic molded grooves was
ever "ideal", and bemoan its demise. I hear there's a big Bridge for
sale...
Since I was a cutting engineer
for some years in the late 60's, I know of what I speak here. We
resorted to many outrageous tricks at times to try to force that
dated methodology to be something less than arthritic. It's testament
to the skill and patience of many who cut records, built the
equipment, that some of them were/are not half bad ("only" 15-25%
bad). Comparing that methodology to a properly designed and aligned
20-bit digital recording system is like shooting ducks in a barrel,
the elaborate mechanical kludge being the loser.
Save your money on eBay, bidding
on and purchasing those old black plastic disks. At least don't
expect quality audio, nor an exact match to the original masters, not
any I've been involved with. If you need to own these for nostalgia,
I won't argue the point. But I can't share your delights that such
old pressings sound "great". Consider having your hearing tested ;^).
Like most mind-over-matter, we can fool ourselves much easier than
most of us realize. Trust the double-blind scientific method, just as
we've done, as a check on perceived reality.
Even more important, our newest
ESD CD's are not just hit-or-miss transfers to digital of the old
mastering tapes used to cut those LP's. I'm not such a fool to spend
difficult months trying to do much better than your usual
remastering. We've taken the time, made the efforts, in a painstaking
attempt to render each master to be as good as it can now be, based
on what now exists. You're not "paying for nothing" when you purchase
one of these remastered editions: a lot went into it, as high-quality
sound is no accident.
We ought repeat an important
distinction here: the source tapes we used are not the "mastering"
copies (read: limited, compressed and EQed) as fed the LP cutting
lathes, but are the first generation master mixes, the moment the
music was "locked down" in a final take. No new mixes have been made:
these are more authentic and genuinely original than you ever heard
before! In the end I do expect, or at least hope, that the more
golden eared among you, using good equipment, will notice and enjoy
the improvements, even the subtler ones. In careful A/B comparisons
it really is quite obvious here.
Early cassettes and prerecorded
tapes made by CBS can sound a bit better than the LP's in certain
(not all) ways. But in order to manufacture these (profitably) in
large quantity, 3-4 extra generations of dubbing were necessary, and
the finals were made at very high speed. This added its own problems
of frequency response and slew limiting, etc., not to mention tape
hiss (yes, even with Dolby B). This is why those pirated "Tron" (and
a few others) CD's sound so lame: they're just dubs of mediocre
cassettes. I have heard a few better sounding cassettes from the
80's, at least better than those earliest years, so they did improve
somewhat. Even LP's got better near their end (cutting copper blanks
helped a lot), albeit with the same surface blemishes and other
measurable distortions notably on the inner grooves.
Don't just trust me on the
matter of audio quality, try comparing for yourself. Be sure to do it
double blind: let someone else pick and play the various versions
while you just listen without any cues. First balance the levels to
be nearly the same, and everything else you can do to get a close
match. Find a decent system to listen on, adjust for a moderately
loud listening level (but not "blasting"), and then you tell me.
Reality. Don't trust your memory, which can be fooled, but play short
snippets of 10 seconds or so, immediately comparing back and forth
the same spot. Try to be attentive, unprejudiced (dogma please wait
outside) and bravely honest. Nu?
Just
an aside here. At times I find myself being pushed into a position of
metaphorically throwing cold water on some cherished urban legend or
another. I wish I could demonstrate proofs to each of you why those
notions are not worth the human time and energy they consume, in
magazines, the media, and web sites. Eventually the acquire a life of
their own, and capture the minds and souls of the unaware. It's such
a shame when there are so many more important things to be done in
life. This is the case with the continuing sincere but misguided
fascination over "Analog vs. Digital." Quite a few of the comments
I've made on this site have tried to expose a few similar over
inflated conceits. When you look really closely, you discover that
unadorned reality is usually the simplest explanation, an example of:
"no bigus dealus"!
(Izzit just my phony Latin above
that reminds me of that wry scene in Monty Python's hilarious:
"The Life of
Brian"? You know the scene
in which Brian tries to tell the crowd to "buzz off", while they
cheerfully proclaim his discarded gourd and accidentally dropped
sandal as "holy relics of Jerusalem?" Hmm... with Roswellians,
Psychic Channelers, and Multi-conspiracyists on the rise, perhaps
reality has finally become the real comedy... or as the Historical
Santa Claus once so aptly put it: "Ho, ho, ho!")
By
the way, I just received a message from a good writer friend who's
journalistic skills often cross paths with the fringe right of
Gullible's
Travels (you
may quote me on that). There's
apparently a slumbering mess of websites which still preach to the
faithful that "digital stresses our nervous systems with it's
subliminal strobing of sound," and other hearsay from the early days
of digital audio. Yes, it was frequently done poorly when only an
infant technology -- have pity, it was just a Baybee! I hoped these
"digititis" phobes had followed the progress made since. No such
luck. Yas, it is true that digitized anything means the information
is broken up into little carefully measured bits, steps. But for
digital audio these little measurements stream along at well past our
sense organ's (ears, eyes, nose, throat, etcetera) response-ranges to
palpate, by a factor of two or more, to double blind repeatable
evidence. Have some modesty, we can't detect every
potential stimulus out there with our mammalian apparatus, which has,
face it, its limits.
But even if this were not the
case, the final Digital-to-Analog conversion passes EVERYTHING
through a low-pass filter, which smooths and integrates the steps
into a continuous
signal (no steps whatsoever
-- none), exactly as analog. In fact, by then the signal IS analog,
that's the whole point. Jeepers, so many pseudo-experts shoot off.
But they don't first take the time to learn the facts behind the
topic of their worries, before exhibiting themselves in full frontal
ignorance. Learn before you speak -- wotta
concept!
Please
note that like most composers of film music, I have essentially no
control over my motion picture scores. That's just the way it is: the
film studios keep control over every aspect of a film they produce. I
guess it makes sense, but it is a big ouch
one has to face in that field. Try to understand that unlike the rest
of my catalog, which I have now had returned to me (and am now in the
process of making really high quality remasterings of them all for
you on ESD), I can't force when or where the filmscore music will be
made available. Like many of you (perhaps a good deal more ;^), I'd
really
like to see all my scores
out on new Hi-D quality CDs! Is that clear? It's not our fault!
We have been trying to do just
that for some months now. But it's difficult to get the studios to
share an interest in doing just that. In a few cases the studios
report back to us that they can't just go ahead, as they have many
other composers who have also been waiting for such a nod, and they
can't favor one of us over any other. Grumble, grumble... It's gonna
be difficult to get legal permission to put out what we all want.
Even more depressing is the discovery that a few dishonest people
have rushed in to profit from delays, and have come up with their own
homemade
pirate versions, which they try to peddle off to
you at ridiculous prices as
something "collectible". The technical term for these claims is, I
believe, b-u-l-l-s-h-i-t. Usually you find them on auction web sites.
Don't be fooled, and don't buy some crummy sounding dub someone made
from an old prerecorded cassette. It's also breaking the law
stealing.
The two albums we are trying to
see reach the light of day currently include two we've mentioned on
our site several times before: Tron
(Disney), and The
Shining (Warner Brothers).
In case it is not already completely clear, please understand
there are NO
genuine soundtrack CD's of either TRON or THE SHINING currently
available from ANY source,
period (ahem.. pardon my purple prose...). That's the simple truth,
and it hurts to have to say it (I know, dammit I know, don't rub it
in). Any copies you stumble upon, no need to ask us about it, such
copies ARE
pirated, lo-fi rip-offs of you who naively buy these bogus disks
(some are pretty clever, literally "sneak-thieves", kabbish?), and
rip-offs of me and all the performers, and all the legal copyright
owners.
If you are growing impatient (as
are we), rather than sending us another message requesting a CD
remastering of "Tron" or "The Shining," why not write to the film
company itself? If they realize there IS an honest demand here, that
many fans would indeed purchase a legitimate new CD release, it can
make it that much easier for us to get the permission to go ahead. I
don't have the current names of executives at Disney or Wrn. Bros.
who might be approached, but a lot of you are much better detectives
than I am, and might figure out a good way to get effective attention
of a proper kind. If you should choose to "poke a spot more likely to
get results," please be serious, brief, and diplomatic. Thank you if
you do try, what's the old line, "to get the mule's attention"...!
Five
More Gold Stars
(well, more gold leafs,
anyhow, and yes, originally they used to be green ;^) make a good way
to close this fourth open letter for the time being. Interesting how
suddenly the number of winners has jumped up in the past few months.
You'll remember we publish these to congratulate the sharp-ears among
you who correctly identify the single Moog note in
Switched-On
Bach 2000.
* The first winner this
time is Greg
Dolhy, whose server is
<bellatlantic.net>. He provides one of the better
analyses I've read as to why his answer "must" be the correct one,
and he's completely correct. See, it's not all that
hard. The rest of you aren't trying hard enough. On the other hand,
he reports he got the same kind of satisfaction as solving a Myst
puzzle, something I sure don't have the patience for... Oh, well,
thanx for the message, and congrats, Greg!
* The second much more
recent winner is Peter
Onion, whose server in
England is <srd.bt.co.uk>. He tells me: "I won't be
too upset if I get it wrong ;-)." Guess we won't disappoint your
preparations for either win or lose, to announce it IS the former.
Hope this will insure (as you suggest it might) your "peace of mind".
Congratulations to you, Peter!
(Peter just sent us a
note of cheery acceptance of the award, thoughtful of him, thanking
the cast, his producer, screenwriter, and parents...
*wink*)
* The third winner is
Richard
DeCosta, who nailed it
exactly, with the comment: "Love that (Moog) sound!" He wishes the
album had more analog synth sounds on it. I think here I'm the one to
"blame". Certain of the newest digital synths are quite capable of
producing the same kind of "fat" sound characatures we obtained from
the early analog machines, and with a lot more control and
reproducability in most cases. But I guess I got completely overdosed
early on with these very simple sounds that formed my exclusive
pallette, and much as I crave spicy, hot foods I would have been
incapable of eating or enjoying when I was younger, my tastes in
sounds have become a lot more layered and complex. Still, point well
taken, and I will try to include such sounds in the next new
projects, as contrast to the richer diet. Might work well together,
that. Yeah, stay tuned for initial result observations... ;^)!
* The fourth one is from
Ned
Wilkinson, who hangs out on
the web via AOL. His submission was particulary fun to read, as he
described note-by-note, in typed sound alikes and homophones, the
exact location for that elusuve Moog note. I wish I could
print it verbatim here without giving away the location, with such
riveting, onomatopoetic, musictech dialog as:
"(in a
medium range)...Dumdiddle dodudohhh, (in a
higher range) Dadidoh diddle doh doh
daaaaahh!", priceless...
Ned, take a bow!
(Note:
onomatopoea edited to mislead the gullible...)
* The fifth award winner is
from Miles
Peters, who lives in
Derbyshire, UK (many winners are British, interesting, no?). He seems
to have picked up on the correct note while visiting a friend in
Germany. They got into a musical discussion, and it led by a logical
train of thought to the sounds on S-OB 2k, and just like that, he
realized what the Moog sound must be. He suggests it just became
obvious. Amen. Just like that. Good going, Miles. And welcome to our
small "club"!
I'll try to mention any and all
of you who find that one puzzle note. But as mentioned above, there's
no
cheating, and we won't
reveal the answer ahead of time (so please, follow a sense of decorum
-- no sweet words and purrs and wagging of tails--don't beg!). That
quite a few of you have now hit it, and none of the submitted
attempts have been in error, suggests it was a valid challenge, not
absurdly hard, but hard enough to provide a genuine listening
challenge. Thanks to you all for taking the time to try our little
aural/musical Sherlocking.
I'm
already aware of most of the ways images of eclipses can be further
"processed" to exaggerate some property or another. So tricks like
duplicating layers in PhotoShop and then multiplying them together
are not particularly interesting, at least to me (bit of the old:
been there, done that). You may not realize that such steps are often
just the equivalent of exaggerated settings in the adjustment
windows, such as Levels
or Curves.
My goal has always been to produce near-naked eye views of eclipses,
and you may safely assume I've tried the various adjustments already
over many weeks, and selected the ones that satisfy this condition
best.
Certainly if you have need for
exaggerated views of some coronal (or other) feature over another
property, you might wish to try "enhancing" such images. Some results
can be interesting, at least at first glance. Others may be more
suitable for study and feature dissection, even though they are very
far from naked eye. The worst type, IMHO, is the overdoing of either
Contrast
or Unsharp
Masking and variations (i.e.
spin versions) of these. These two processing techniques have become
trendy cliches with some image-makers in the past couple of years,
despite the usually ugly results whatever the scene. The harder-to-do
trick is to maintain
balance, an honest natural
quality, a long, smooth grayscale without blocking up highlights or
shadows, and avoiding added artifacts which demonstrate a beginners
glee, but lack of subtlety.
There
have been messages received here which prove some of you have not yet
read the open letters before asking questions which have already been
answered, in many cases several years ago. Boo, hiss. For example,
the music on Kubrick's The
Shining was covered on the
first Open
Letter, near the bottom.
Please look there for what I currently know about that film,
including the music Kubrick chose for the end titles. Several good
books (like the one by M. Ciment I mention in those comments) may
provide answers to your questions on his films.
Also, we have no staff to look
up information and answer your personal queries -- have you come to
the wrong place! I wish we could, but few personal artist sites can
(I know of none). Most sites don't even offer the open letters we
provide to try to help you. Often a number of requests we get for
personal research topics and detailed assistance are amazingly
presumptuous and cheeky. Jeepers, get real! There are good search
engines that can find many answers to your interrogations on the web.
When the web fails to yield any results, you may have to do what we
all do, and check books in a (*gulp*) l-i-b-r-a-r-y.
We will continue to post a lot of varied and up to date information
here as we have for several years now. But we don't pretend to be
all-inclusive, nor to be the only experts in the many fields
represented by our web site.
I thought we had already
explained these realities on the Write
Page that the open letters
are linked from, but it may bear repeating it here. Thank you for
your understanding, with apologies to those who already understood.
On
the boxed
set page you will find a
copy of this message below, just added, by way of reply to several
recent letters. Hope this answers all such questions as clearly as we
know how.
The Boxed Set, For Dummies Some of you have written to say you found the contents list below, or our other explanations on this page, a bit confusing. Also, some web music stores have incomplete or inaccurate listings. If you are simply looking to find any or all of the original 1968 Switched-On Bach, any or all of the 1969 Well-Tempered Synthesizer, or any or all of the other Carlos realizations of Bach and Baroque music, boy, have you've come to the right place. The four CD's of this set contain the COMPLETE COLLECTION of every such Moog realization Wendy released from 1968-1980, and then some, with the most pristene, and faithful to the master tape sound they have ever had, and the complete S-OBackground Story, with many photographs.
So the short answer to all such questions is: "Yes, it's in here!"
Thanks
for reading this continuing growing stream of (loosely) connected
thoughts (chronology seems to play a role, wink nudge) triggered by
you. I'll get back with more feedback and comments when I can. Stay
tuned!
--Wendy Carlos
Wendy
Carlos Open Letter 4
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