.jpg)
.jpg)
Prtie Trkz
sounding electronic contingency for concert area
Prtie Trkz are an ongoing series of improvised interactions with a computer music system developed in Pure Data. Available for all occasions for the right price.
A more involved commentary:
Prtie Trkz is a set of electronic music pieces of variable duration. They are all created within a specific software environment developed in Pure Data, and related to that used in the other works.
a system and/as a body of work
Whether Prtie Trkz represents a practice, system, a body of work, or some particular pieces (such as those submitted here, appended by roman numerals) remains to be seen. These works were developed along with a sequencer system of a different sort than those created for and used in Unnatural Processes or Unnatural Habitats. In a discussion of these technical aspects, one must separate the construction of these systems from the aesthetic features of these works, despite
the fact that they are deeply linked. In particular the abrasive surface of the Prtie Trkz works is based on an aesthetic decision largely separable from the sequencers used to create the pieces.
improvisational approach
In Prtie Trkz, I aim to quickly construct varying sequences of textural material with a very audible degree of physical presence. Once textures are running, I can then engage with this material improvisationally. I found the fact that I could interact with the running and unfolding sequences in various ways, but with incompletely predictable results, time to party then.
future developments, problems, and rewards
Although these sequencers are unpredictable and create unreasonable demands on someone wanting to use them live, they are a lot of fun to play. They also possess the advantage they output notes in whole number ratios, rather than midi values as the other sequencer do, and can be calibrated to do this based on any numerically-entered fundamental value, so they are quite flexible as far as temperament goes.
The Prtie Trkz pieces apply these sequencers in a rather brutal parody of popular styles, albeit using just intonation to do so. Combined with polyphonic synthesizer, and various gates and filters, the result is a quasi-random, partially improvised, overly-compressed mess in which very short melodic fragments are layered in three instances of the sequencer-synthesizer system. No real attempt is made, nor attention paid to musical form, and in general the overall sound quality favours the dirtier the better, while letting the "pretty bits" through. This approach has given me the freedom to really play with my developing equipment and test its capabilities in a highly subjective context, largely free of constraints of taste save my own momentary and fleeting sense of "quality".
