Klarinet Archive - Posting 000166.txt from 2002/06

From: w7wright@-----.net (William Wright)
Subj: Re: [kl] Re: Clarinet sampling
Date: Wed, 5 Jun 2002 16:07:16 -0400

<><> Mark wrote:
after all, a live person can be employed to make the requisite sounds.
Wait - we don't need any piano reductions! That's cheating. We can just
hire an orchestra.

In fact, if we want to carry this to extremes, we can chastise
recordings of every sort. Don't buy a CD or DVD! Buy a ticket
instead!

However, to put this on a more realistic basis:

Sampled music *does* cost jobs. We all know this. We discussed it
when we were talking about Mark Snow and the synthesized woodwinds that
he uses on X-Files and other television shows. I've had similar
thoughts myself while watching a Cirque du Soleil performance on stage,
where the 'orchestra' was 60%-70% sampled music from an electric
keyboard that is played by one musician. Is it 'fair play' when a
solitary performer switches from solo trumpet on the keyboard to massed
strings? Is *any* form of sound effect 'fair play'? Should we allow
cinema sound tracks to 'fake' an explosion, or should we criticize film
because they didn't hire people to truly blow up the Brooklyn Bridge and
rebuild it afterwards?

All of this is no different than the time-honored argument about factory
workers. It is proper to replace hand labor with assembly line
machinery? Compared to the number of factory workers who have lost
their employment to automated equipment, the number of musical jobs that
have been lost is tiny. Should we chastise someone who buys an
injection molded plastic clarinet instead of a hand-made wood
instrument?

The only reasonable answer (imo) is that time does not stand still. In
order to do more than was possible a few years ago, you must develop or
choose new tools. Old instruments and the players thereof will vanish,
just as cobblers have vanished (for the most part). How many
hecklephone players do you know? But perhaps one of them is standing
in front of an electric keyboard right now.

Cheers,
Bill <who plays a 'real' clarinet and has no interest in electric
keyboards, but he wishes to put the issue in perspective>

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