Design and Use of Some New Digital Musical Instruments

Abstract

Abstract. This article presents some facts about the use of gesture in computer music, more specifically in home made instruments dedicated to performance on stage. We first give some theoretical and practical ideas to design an instrument, in the following areas: the sound, the gesture and the mapping. Then, we introduce three examples of digital instruments we have created, focusing on their design and their musical use.

2002: The Importance of Parameter Mapping in Electronic Instrument Design

“…The same would be true in the other sense: for the same controller and the same set of parameters, multiple synthesis techniques could be used by just adapting the second mapping layer, the first being held constant. Specifically in this case, the choice of synthesis algorithm is transparent for the user The original two-layered model has recently been expanded to include three mapping layers in two independent performance works by Hunt and Myatt [11], and by Arfib and collaborators [1]. These works support the idea that, by using multi-layered mappings, one can obtain a level of flexibility in the design of instruments and that moreover, these models can indeed accommodate the control of different media, such as sound and video, in a coherent way.…”

Interactivity for Mobile Music-Making

“…Hence in Fendrix we take the input space of the multitouch screen literally and map coordinates to synthesis parameters without relying on analogies to existing musical instruments (see figure 6 (left)). This is akin to musical performance on touchpads like the Lemur or Wacom tablets (Arfib, Couturier, Filatriau and Kessous 2006). One can then go and give meaning to the geometric space.…”