I’m still not sure exactly what my first mock, prototype, or whatever it is will be for my portfolio hand-in. One of my ideas is still the production/musical left-field sample-based hip-hop project. I’ve decided to do a bit of research into the art theory behind sampling and music production. The analogue culture within the recording and the ethics of remixing work, what does it mean to remix-sample work and recontextualise it.
I read this short book about sampling What’s a Sampler? it was rather simple and I knew a lot of it but I decided to start at the very beginning. What is a sampler? I found it did have some interesting ideas, explaining the digital to analogue or vice verse concept. How a sampler records and translates audio into digital and how it allows manipulation. The processing involved in recording, aliasing, and the difficulty within memory.
I also found the bit rate to resolution explanation really useful and I do feel like a lot of the explanations within this were made to be broken. One specific section explained loops and extending sounds, and how to find the middle point of a waveform to create a loop that does clip or sounds unnatural. It also explains how to effectively perform instruments once sampled, and how to create a digital instrument through recording, typically by using root notes.
I think this has given me some ideas on what to do, perhaps create an instrument from the Thames rubbish and digitally sample it? I did have ideas on creating a trash instrument and this might be the outcome of it. Let’s see.
