ELECTRONIC VOICES1

BON IVER (JUSTIN VERNON)

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WOODS, FROM THE BLOOD BANK EP (2009)

Sampled By Kayne on “Lost in the World” (2010)

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KAYNE WEST

ALBUM: MY BEAUTIFUL DARK TWISTED FANTASY (2010)

SONG: LOST IN THE WORLD

Recording voices

Microphone as Instrument

Vocal processing effects (talk box, vocoder, auto-tune)

technical processes feed back into vocal styles

Voice + Technology

Transducers!

Two most common types of microphones:

Dynamic

Condenser

Microphones

dynamic

condenser

versatile and ideal for general-purpose use

relatively sturdy and resilient

better suited to handling high volume levels

Dynamic Microphones

require power from a battery or external power source

tend to be more sensitive and responsive than dynamic mics, but less suited for high volumes

Condenser Microphones

Microphone Polar Patterns

Directional Sensitivity

indicates how sensitive it is to sounds arriving at different angles about its central axis

Considerations for Microphone Placement

inverse-square law: distance vs. intensity

High frequencies are more directional than low frequencies.

Room sound: close mic for less hall sound (reverberation)

Proximity Effect: (Bass boost) on directional mics.

Bass Rolloff: reduces low frequency sensitivity Phase Cancellation: frequencies 180 degrees out of phase will cancel - Constructive-Destructive Interference

High-end condensor microhone with switchable polar patterns (cardiod, figure-8, onmi).

The omnidirectional microphone has a very “flat” (accurate) frequency response.

Neumann U87

Proximity Effect

Most pronounced when using directional mics

closer to the mic, more bass frequencies are transmitted

Shure SM58

microphone as an instrument

Crooning

Crooning: a style from 1920s to 1950s

intimate Associated with Rudy Vallee, Bing Crosby, Mildred Bailey, Perry Como, Annette Hanshaw, & Frank Sinatra

Listen: Bing Crosby, To Learn to Croon (1933)Bing Crosby

Crooning

Crooning: a style from 1920s to 1950s

intimate Associated with Rudy Vallee, Bing Crosby, Mildred Bailey, Perry Como, Annette Hanshaw, & Frank Sinatra

Listen: Mildred Bailey, Lover (1937)Mildred Bailey

Professor at the University of Oxford

composer whose interests deal mainly with the human voice, in particular with the transformation of it and the interpolation by technological means between human voice and natural sounds.

Excerpt from Tongues of Fire (1994)

Transposition (pitch shift) Truncation (cutting) Overlap (mixing) Inversion Speed Change

Trevor Wishart

Listen: Six Litanies for Heliogabalus (2007) Composed by John Zorn

Lead vocalist for Mr. Bungle and Faith No More

Patton's vocals touch on crooning, falsetto, screaming, opera, death growls, rapping, mouth music, beatboxing, and scatting, among other techniques. - Wikipedia

Mike Patton

Vocalist and composer

Has worked with John Cage, Robert Ashley, Morton Feldman, Philip Glass, Larry Austin, Peter Gordon, and Merce Cunningham.

Listen/Watch: Joan La Barbara Performing Christian Marclay's Manga Scroll

Joan La Barbara

How the Voice WorksTo produce a sound, air is pushed up through the vocal cords from the lungs

Power (diaphram/lungs) + Sound Source (pitch from tension in the larynx) + Filter (nasal cavity, tongue position, mouth opening).

The human vocal tract, like a musical instrument, has it’s own natural resonant frequencies, called formants.

The difference between humans and most instruments is that humans can flexibly change the shape of their mouth, which changes the formant. These different formants allow humans to create distinguishable vowels, even if the pitch of the vowel itself is not changing.

How the Voice Works

Tuvan Throat Singing

Listen: Kargyraa (style of throat singing)

Melodies and high frequency tones are produced by isolating partials above the fundamental by changing the resonant shape of the mouth

TALK BOX

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An effects pedal that allows a musician to shape the sound of their instrument much like the vibrations of our vocal cords are shaped by our mouths.

When activated, the sound from the amplifier is directed through the tube into the performer's mouth. The shape of the mouth filters the input signal (synthesizer, guitar, etc) using the vocal cavity, effectively making it sound like the guitar is talking.

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VOCODERS

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“voice” + “encoder”

Developed in 1928 at Bell Labs as a way to encrypt voice communication.

combining the formant qualities of the input (typically speech) with the sonic qualities of the output (usually a synthesizer). The result is “robotic” sounding speech, with the filtering characteristics of the voice, and the timbre of a synthesizer.

Sound is passed through a multi-band filter, with each band then going to an envelope follower, which controls then filters a different sound. The result takes the spectral envelope of one sound, and maps it onto another.

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LAURIE ANDERSON

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Known primarily for her multimedia presentations she has cast herself in roles as varied as visual artist, composer, poet, photographer, filmmaker, instrument builder, vocalist, and instrumentalist.

O Superman launched Anderson’s recording career in 1980, rising to number two on the British pop charts and subsequently appearing on Big Science, the first of her seven albums

LAURIE ANDERSON

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The tape-bow violin is an instrument she created in 1977. It uses recorded magnetic tape in place of the traditional horsehair in the bow, and a magnetic tape head in the bridge.

She also developed the “Talking Stick”--a granular synthesis controller--in the 90s

IMOGEN HEAP

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English singer-songwriter and composer.

known both for her work as part of the musical duo Frou Frou and her solo albums, which she writes, produces, and mixes.

Listen: Hide and Seek (2005)

The song is performed with the sole accompaniment being a keyboard synth transformed by a vocoder

influenced by Paul Lansky

AUTO-TUNE

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audio effect that measures and alters pitch in vocal and instrumental input through use of a phase vocoder.

scale both the frequency and time domains of audio signals by using phase information. The computer algorithm allows for time expansion/compression and pitch shifting

Uses a Fast Fourier Transform to quickly analyze and resynthesize the frequency domain of the voice

“Photoshop for the human voice”

Authenticity Controversies

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ANTARES AUDIO TECHNOLOGIES

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It was originally intended to disguise or correct off-key inaccuracies, allowing vocal tracks to be perfectly tuned despite originally being slightly off-key.

based on technology initially created by Andy Hildebrand, an engineer working for Exxon as a method for interpreting seismic data

CHER

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LISTEN: BELIEVE (1998)

Constantly reinventing herself

“if you set Auto-Tune on its most aggressive setting, so that it corrects the pitch at the exact moment it received the signal, the result is an unsettlingly robotic tone.”

PAUL LANSKY

digital voices and formant synthesis, linear predictive coding

excerpt from “Idle Chatter Junior” (1985)

Radiohead sampled his "Mild und Leise" (1973) in their song “Idioteque” on Kid A (2000)

teaches at Princeton

Cutting/Editing Voice

Listen: William Burroughs - Silver Smoke of Dreams (1960s)

HOLLY HERNDON

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