In December 2010 we plan to release an experimental Optigan® disc called “Musique Concrète,” which will essentially be a collage of 57 sound loops in the tradition of early electronic studio tape music. We’re completely disregarding the Optigan® paradigm of chords and keys, and simply assigning a different abstract sound loop to each chord button and key. We thought that the most interesting approach for this disc would be to invite Optigoners everywhere to submit sound loops of their own making (please, no samples from commercial or copyrighted sources), from which we’ll choose the best for inclusion on the disc. All sounds chosen for inclusion on the disc will fall under a Creative Commons Attribution license. Unused sounds will revert back to their respective creators. We are unable to pay for submissions, but folks whose work appears on the disc will get a special discount off the retail price, and they will be credited on the disc jacket (most likely we will have a graphic depiction of the button/key layout with the artist identified for each).
So get to work! The deadline is Nov. 1st, 2010. You can submit as many loops as you like, the only real rules being that the loops must be exactly 2 seconds long (or we’ll alter them to fit that length) and in mono. Any sort of common file format (wav, mp3, aif, etc) will work. The final disc should have a nice balance of rhythmic, ambient, tonal and non-tonal loops to choose from. Keep in mind that the Optigan’s frequency response tops out at 5kH, and there’s a significant inherent noise floor, so it’s best to avoid subtle/quiet things or sounds that rely heavily on high frequencies. We will not be able to offer any sort of previews of the final sonic results for artist approval.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4ea0sBrw6M http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YlBmx3VulY
Comments 15
February 2, 2010 at 2:06 pm
Most righteous. Deadline?
February 2, 2010 at 2:08 pm
I suppose I should put one in the post…
February 2, 2010 at 3:17 pm
Hey Pea, any particular file format?
February 2, 2010 at 3:19 pm
no, i can work with pretty much anything.
February 2, 2010 at 9:34 pm
Wow – this is a really great idea. BTW – I just got an Optigan® in December and your site has been a fantastic resource – my hat is off to you, good sir!
February 3, 2010 at 8:54 am
fantastic idea Pea! prepare to wade through gallons of audio soup.
February 3, 2010 at 5:01 pm
February 4, 2010 at 3:59 pm
February 5, 2010 at 12:32 pm
Maybe it’s especially interesting to use tones of monophonic (analogue) synthesizers, and organs (like the Solovox, Clavioline, Maestrovox…), since this way they can be used polyphonicly.
February 9, 2010 at 10:26 pm
Really, REALLY excited about this. Expect a bunch of stuff over the coming months!
October 8, 2010 at 4:16 pm
Hey Pea, can I send you my submissions via an online file hosting service like Mediafire? I want to put them in an RAR file.
October 8, 2010 at 6:19 pm
sure, you can get them to me anyway you like!
October 9, 2010 at 11:32 am
Fantastic! I’ll get them to you by this coming Friday!
October 17, 2010 at 10:54 am
And they’re in! Hope you find one to use! Let me understand the concept: every key will have a different loop – as opposed to a typical disc which has rhythm loops on the ‘chord’ buttons and a single melodic tone on the manual?
November 5, 2010 at 7:19 pm
Deadline arrived! When is the disc coming out? Did you get submissions? Looking forward to the Sci-Fi or should i say Sci-Lo disc 🙂