X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.3 PL11]
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.emusic-l
Date:         Tue, 5 Jan 1993 09:45:36 PST
From:         metlay <metlay@NETCOM.COM>
Subject:      Re: No sight in sounds (fwd)
Comments: To: EMUSIC-L@american.edu
              McMahon" at Jan 5, 93 10:06 am

>
>Michael A Squillace (squillac@student.msu.edu) writes:
>Hey, all:
>
>As a handicapper (the preferred term for we "physically challenged" persons in
>Michigan), one of my first goals is to promote awareness whenever possible.
>Hence, I cannot esist the chance to comment on what it's like to program
>today's synths without sight, since this seems to have stirred a few minds out
>there.

Thanks for an interesting read, Mike. By the way, how do you follow text
like this letter on your computer? Do you have a speech synthesizer? A Braille
encoder of some sort?

>.  One of these days,
>someone will build a synthesizer that includes speech output.  Why we persist
>in creating sounds based on visions and graphs is beyond me -- no one would
>think of creating a painting from sounds (or would they).

We are visually oriented creatures as much or more than we are aurally
oritented. It's how we evolved. We communicate by sound, but we learn
primarily by watching. Trying to build machines like synths that can be
used by the blind short-circuits our normal modes of education.

>Actually, I'm not so sure that the problems I encounter with the D50 are all
>related to my lack of sight.  Be honest, y'all, there's just too many darn
>parameters!  I counted once, and there's about 340 parameters per sound on
>that blinkin' keyboard!!  That's alot to program even if you have eyes.  The
>next stage in technology is going to require not only more control but some
>other means of control.  Endless rows of knobs, levers, buttons, and
>joysticks simply won't cut it.  I'm hoping that, upon such a change, the
>visually-oriented sound creation will suffer a change as well.

This is the sort of statement that crops up here frequently. There are
too many parameters, and not enough controls. I have yet to see anyone make
a constructive suggestion on how to solve this dichotomy; the ones who are
trying for their own solutions are probably hard at work in basements
somewhere and too busy to argue the point here. |-> I certainly don't
know of many people who'd willingly oversimplify all their gear to the point
where it was in 1970.

>Two questions:
>
>     1.  Does anyone know of such "other means of control" in the making or in
>the near future?  Are they as visually-oriented as current technology is?

Not offhand. You ought to talk to Don Buchla about a Braille Thunder.

>     2.  More generally, am I the only one that sees the need to change?  Can
>we continue to program as we do?

I certainly can. I have only a few instruments, and all of them are in my
rig at least partially because I find them easy to program. Or at least
tolerable, he amended, thinking of the U-50. |-P

--
mike metlay                |
atomic city                |
p. o. box 81175            | "'Thppht' spelled backwards is 'thppht'."
pittsburgh pa 15217-0675   |
metlay@netcom.com          |
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU