Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
In April 2008, Dalbavie and his musical assistant Serge Lemouton decided to
choose another technique: they built a sampler. It is a kind of database of sounds
produced by an instrument. The sounds have been recorded from the old TX 816 at
various pitches and intensities. This solution enabled to re-perform the piece by
means of a kind of photography of the previous sounds. When no sound corre-
sponding to a given pitch exists, the sampler is able to interpolate between existing
files in order to give the illusion that the missing note exists.
22.1.5 What Is to Be Preserved?
As for music from the past centuries, we need to preserve the ability to re-perform
the works, and not simply to preserve the outputs - audio or video recordings -
even if these recordings are clearly part of the objects to be preserved. This implies
a careful analysis of the objects that have to be preserved, including the objects that
are at the core of the digital part of the work: the
process
. The context of these
objects is also to be preserved, from its various dependencies - hardware and soft-
ware - to the knowledge that is needed in order to install it and run it correctly. The
amount of dependencies of the process is immense, from the hardware platform on
which it runs, to the almost uncontrollable amount of libraries used by the multiple
layers of software: from the underlying operating system with its device controllers,
to the libraries included in the course of the software development process. One
quickly understands that the maintenance activity needed in order to be able to re-
perform a work is a never ending activity that should moreover respect a minimum
of authenticity.
Authenticity in this context means that, despite the various migrations, emula-
tions and other transformations that have to be applied to objects, one has also to
maintain the information needed in order to allow future actors to answer the very
important question: “DOES IT SOUND LIKE IT WAS INTENDED TO?”. This is
not the most straightforward task, since any judgment on authenticity in this context
incorporates a certain amount of fuzziness
...
22.2 An Insight into Objects
22.2.1 Complexity
Complexity seems to be inherent to musical creation, at least in the Occidental
approach. This is not the right place to expose a musicological treatise on this impor-
tant question, but on can refer to many examples from the past, from Jean Sebastian
Bach to Mahler, Wagner, Stravinsky
. Moreover, some musicologists have shown
that even in songs from Africa there is a hidden complexity, see for instance in the
CD-ROM by Simha Arom
Pygmées Aka. Peuple et musique
. One can also refer to
Claude Levi-Strauss for an approach of the importance of complexity in cultures
...
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