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MORE →Reflects the personal views, recollections, and perspective of the author, Mike Davis.
This is a personal recollection on the Move fire on May 13, 1985
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Sample-based synthesis is a form of audio synthesis that can be contrasted to either subtractive synthesis or additive synthesis. The principal difference with sample-based synthesis is that the seed waveforms are sampled sounds or instruments instead of fundamental waveforms such as sine and saw waves used in other types of synthesis.[1]
Before digital recording became practical, instruments such as the Welte Lichttonorgel (1930s), phonogene (1950s) and the Mellotron (1960s)[2] used analog optical disks or analog tape to play back sampled sounds.
Early sample-based instruments were the Computer Music Melodian, the Fairlight CMI and the New England Digital Synclavier. These instruments were expensive, up to $250,000[3].
More affordable[peacock prose] sample-based synthesizers available for the masses with the introduction of the Ensoniq Mirage (1984), Roland D-50 (1987) and the Korg M1 (1988), which surfaced in the late eighties.
Sample-based synthesis is featured in sound cards for the multimedia PC, under the names such as wavetable card or wavetable daughterboard.[citation needed] (See Wavetable synthesis § Background)
The principal advantage of sample-based synthesis over other methods of digital synthesis, such as physical modelling synthesis or additive synthesis, is that processing power requirements are much lower. This is because most of the nuances of the sound models are contained in the prerecorded samples rather than calculated in real time.
In contrast to analog synthesizers, the circuitry does not have to be duplicated to allow more voices to be played at once. Therefore, the polyphony of sample-based machines is generally a lot higher. A mitigating factor is, however, that in order to include more detail, multiple samples might need to be played back at once (a trumpet might include a breath noise, a growl, and a looping soundwave used for continuous play). This reduces the polyphony again, as sample-based synthesizers rate their polyphony based on the number of multi-samples that can be played back simultaneously.
A sample-based synthesizer's ability to reproduce the nuances of natural instruments is determined primarily by its library of sampled sounds. In the earlier days of sample-based synthesis, computer memory was expensive and samples had to be as short and as few as possible. This was achieved by looping a part of the sample, and then using a voltage-controlled amplifier and envelope generator combined with key velocity information to control the dynamics of the looped sound. In some cases, key velocity also modulates the attack time of the instrument, leading to a faster attack for loud passages.
As memory became cheaper, it became possible to use multisampling; instead of a single recording of an instrument being played back faster or slower to reproduce other pitches, the original instrument could be sampled at regular intervals to cover regions of several adjacent notes (splits) or for every note. This provides a more natural progression from the lower to the higher registers; lower notes don't sound dull, and higher notes don't sound unnaturally bright. It is also possible to sample the same note at several different levels of intensity, reflecting the fact that both volume and timbre change with playing style. For instance, when sampling a piano, three samples per key can be taken; soft, medium and with force. Every possible volume in between can be made by amplifying and blending the samples.
For sample-based models of instruments like the Rhodes piano, this multisampling is very important. The timbre of the Rhodes changes drastically from left to right on the keyboard, and it varies greatly depending on the force with which the key is struck. The lower registers bark, while the higher range has a more bell-like sound. The bark will be more distinct if the keys are struck with force. For the model to be sufficiently expressive, it is therefore necessary that multisamples be made across both pitch and force of playing.
A more flexible sample-based synthesis design allowing the user to record arbitrary waveforms to form a sound's basic timbre is called a sampler. Early samplers were very expensive, and typically had low sample rates and bit depth, resulting in grainy and aliased sound. By the late 1990s, the huge increases in computer processor speed permitted the widespread development of software synthesizers and software samplers. The vast storage capacity of modern computers was ideally suited to sample-based synthesis, and many samplers have thus migrated to software implementations or been superseded by new software samplers.
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Sample-based synthesis is a form of audio synthesis that can be contrasted to either subtractive synthesis or additive synthesis. The principal difference with sample-based synthesis is that the seed waveforms are sampled sounds or instruments instead of fundamental waveforms such as sine and saw waves used in other types of synthesis.
An electronic piano is a keyboard instrument designed to simulate the timbre of a piano (and sometimes a harpsichord or an organ) using analog circuitry. "Electronic Piano" was also the trade name used for Wurlitzer's popular line of electric pianos, which were produced from the 1950s to the 1980s, although this was not actually what is now commonly known as an electronic piano. Electronic pianos work similarly to analog synthesizers in that they generate their tones through oscillators, whereas electric pianos are mechanical, their sound being electrified by a pickup and then amplified through an internal or external amplifier. The first electronic pianos date from the 1970s and were mostly made in Italy (Davies 2001), although similar models were made concurrently in Japan. An exception is the range of instruments made by RMI in the United States from 1967 to approximately 1980, which was used by Genesis, Yes, Deep Purple, Elton John and Rick Wakeman (Reid 2001). These early electronic pianos (including the RMI) are not velocity sensitive in that, like an organ, they do not vary their volume based on how hard or soft the keys are played. "The major drawback of the RMI was its total lack of touch sensitivity. I found this very restricting, especially since any bum-notes are played at full volume, no matter how lightly you brush against them" (Tony Banks, quoted in Reid 2001). The first electronic grand piano was produced in 1979 and patented in 1981 by Wilton Decker of St. James, NY under the name of PianoNova Co. It contained the first full touch-sensitive (velocity sensitive) keyboard and three full working pedals (Decker 1981). Electronic pianos became less popular in the 1980s when the digital piano and polyphonic synthesizer became available and affordable enough for both professional and home use as an inexpensive, smaller and lighter alternative to an acoustic piano. In modern usage, the term electronic piano sometimes refers to either a digital piano or a stage piano. This is actually a misnomer, as electronic pianos use analog synthesis to generate its sounds while digital pianos normally use digital data sample-based synthesis. In addition, early digital pianos in the mid-1980s were often referred to as a personal electronic piano.
The Wave Blaster was an add-on MIDI-synthesizer for Creative Sound Blaster 16 and Sound Blaster AWE32 family of PC soundcards. It was a sample-based synthesis General MIDI compliant synthesizer. For General MIDI scores, the Wave Blaster's wavetable-engine produced more realistic instrumental music than the SB16's onboard Yamaha-OPL3. The Wave Blaster attached to a SB16 through a 26-pin expansion-header, eliminating the need for extra cabling between the SB16 and the Wave Blaster. The SB16 emulated an MPU-401 UART, giving existing MIDI-software the option to send MIDI-sequences directly to the attached Wave Blaster, instead of driving an external MIDI-device. The Wave Blaster's analog stereo-output fed into a dedicated line-in on the SB16, where the onboard-mixer allowed equalization, mixing, and volume adjustment. The Wave Blaster port was adopted by other sound card manufacturers who produced both daughterboards and soundcards with the expansion-header: Diamond, Ensoniq, Guillemot, Oberheim, Orchid, Roland, TerraTec, Turtle Beach, and Yamaha. The header also appeared on devices such as the Korg NX5R MIDI sound module, the Oberheim MC-1000/MC-2000 keyboards, and the TerraTec Axon AX-100 Guitar-to-MIDI converter. Since 2000, Wave Blaster-capable sound cards for computers are becoming rare. In 2005, Terratec released a new Wave Blaster daughterboard called the Wave XTable with 16mb of on-board sample memory comprising 500 instruments and 10 drum kits. In 2014, a new compatible card called Dreamblaster S1 was produced by the Belgian company Serdaco. In 2015 that same company released a high end card named Dreamblaster X1, comparable to Yamaha and Roland cards. In 2016 DreamBlaster X2 was released, a board with both a Wave Blaster interface and a USB interface.
Yamaha SY77 is a 16 voice multitimbral music workstation first produced by Yamaha Corporation in 1989. The SY77 is a synthesizer whose architecture combines AFM (Advanced Frequency Modulation) synthesis, AWM2 (Advanced Wave Memory 2) for ROM-borne sample-based synthesis, and the combination of these two methods christened Realtime Convolution and Modulation Synthesis (RCM). The same technology was also packaged in a rack-mounted module released simultaneously, the TG77. The SY77 is equipped with a 61-key keyboard with velocity and aftertouch; has a pitch wheel and two modulation wheels (the latter being quite a rare feature among keyboards in general); and has a large backlit LCD, expansion slots, floppy-drive, on-board effects, and a 16,000 note sequencer. Programming is performed through a keypad on the front panel. When the SY77 was released in late 1989, its initial prices were close to $3000 USD/£2000 GBP. In 1991, it was followed by the SY99, a successor that cost ~$4000/£3000 and expanded its capabilities with a 76-key keyboard, the ability to load user-specified samples for AWM, a more advanced effects unit, and other features.
Before the 1921 destruction of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, Black residents had created a remarkable center of business and community life. The district included stores, professional offices, entertainment venues and homes owned by Black citizens. Understanding Greenwood means learning what was built—not only what was burned.
MORE →Brown v. Board of Education in 1954.