Bach on multiple Voyagers

PHC · Post by **PHC** » Sat Aug 22, 2009 12:11 pm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gwig-fJ1 ... re=related

from 7:27

also I recommend watching the series How Music Works

There are a few episodes: Melody, Rythm, Harmony, Bass

Great thing to learn about music basics, not only for newbies

Portamental · Post by **Portamental** » Sat Aug 22, 2009 2:54 pm

Thanks, nice, fun to see all those moogs with one handed players

Now from there... a search with "Bach" and "moog" brings many interesting results... real moogs and others synths. After watching a number of these, if this is not a testimony on how gorgeous the sound of a real moog is in comparison of just about anything else, I don't know what is.

Edit : those with the monosynth with the red edges sound particularly awful. So does the one of Denise Hewith

The Analog Organist · Post by **The Analog Organist** » Wed Aug 26, 2009 8:41 am

Moog synthesizers are the most appropriate for performing Bach's music due to their strength and clarity of tone.

From the time of the classical era (Mozart, Haydn) until now, music has essentially consisted of a prominent melody supported by a background accompaniment. Previous to this, in Baroque times (Bach, Handel), music consisted of counterpoint in which all the voices of a piece of music were equal in importance and independence. So, in a four voice organ fugue, each of the voices are simultaneously important throughout the entire piece and maintain their individuality. Each part could be isolated, played alone, and found to possess a high standard of musicality, to the point of being a worthy theme itself. Obviously, that could not be said of the accompaniment to a melody in modern music, in which many notes are held or repeated over and over, with very little melodic or rhythmic quality or variety. Examples of this would include simply holding a chord on an organ for a long period of time while some one plays a solo, or playing arpeggios on a piano over and over while some one sings. If you were to isolate and examine each of the "voices" in such accompaniments, you would find that they were very crude and redundant, very poor on the scale of musical quality. Baroque music, generally, was just the opposite, in that each voice maintained a high standard of musicality throughout the piece.

Whether or not Bach would have been interested in synthesizers, it's clear that the Moog sound is the very best for Baroque music. The reason is, Moog's clarity of tone which allows the independent voices in contrapuntal music to be heard with clarity and distinctness. That's the whole key to Baroque music - clarity. In my opinion, digital instruments definitely fail this test. Any degree of thinness or muddiness of tone would bury the inner voices in a Baroque piece and make it sound more like modern music.

One of the reasons the "Switched On Bach" project was so successful was due to the fact that the Moog sound served the style of Bach's music almost perfectly, almost as well as a pipe organ or a harpsichord. Simply defined: strength and clarity of tone, which are the Moog sound in two words.

Electrong · Post by **Electrong** » Wed Aug 26, 2009 9:40 am

No power cords or instrument cables?!?

Bryan T · Post by **Bryan T** » Wed Aug 26, 2009 12:44 pm

Electrong wrote:No power cords or instrument cables?!?

Those also aren't clones of the same person - there is a bit of studio trickery involved here.

Elhardt · Post by **Elhardt** » Sat Aug 29, 2009 8:51 pm

The Analog Organist wrote:Moog synthesizers are the most appropriate for performing Bach's music due to their strength and clarity of tone.

Whether or not Bach would have been interested in synthesizers, it's clear that the Moog sound is the very best for Baroque music. The reason is, Moog's clarity of tone which allows the independent voices in contrapuntal music to be heard with clarity and distinctness. That's the whole key to Baroque music - clarity. In my opinion, digital instruments definitely fail this test. Any degree of thinness or muddiness of tone would bury the inner voices in a Baroque piece and make it sound more like modern music.

One of the reasons the "Switched On Bach" project was so successful was due to the fact that the Moog sound served the style of Bach's music almost perfectly, almost as well as a pipe organ or a harpsichord. Simply defined: strength and clarity of tone, which are the Moog sound in two words.

Gee whiz, so much of this is backwards, and the constant use of the term "Moog Sound" as opposed to synthesizer sound is pushing the Moog dogma to new extremes. Wendy Carlos talked about how the Moog sound was too thick and could cause things to become muddy or too heavy. There's nothing special about the Moog sound when doing Bach, it's about what timbres the musician creates for certain parts that matters, in addition to stereo placement, reverb, and production techniques. Those are what gave Switched On Bach its clarity. Not that a Moog was used over another brand (not that there was much else to choose from).

And then to bring up the pipe organ when talking about clarity doesn't make sense. There can hardly be an instrument that covers up all those inner voice lines like a pipe organ with the long muddy reverb of a cathedral.

And I've come closer to imitating W. Carlos' style in my Bach and Scarlatti demos I did on an Alesis Andromeda than anybody has in the last 40 years. No problem with clarity with that synth as long as I do things correctly. No problem with the clarity in W. Carlos' SOB 2000 which uses a digital synth. Only problem there is the rigid and sterile sound of the digital synth itself.

-Elhardt

The Analog Organist · Post by **The Analog Organist** » Sun Aug 30, 2009 4:41 am

I would strongly disagree with the critical comments about the pipe organ. It is the king of instruments, by far the preferred instrument of Bach, and the most immense and beautiful sound that a human being has ever produced. All the great classical composers have admired and written for it. A pipe organ makes a Moog synthesizer - or any other type - sound like a kazoo by comparison. To refer to its reverberating sound as "muddy" is just ridiculous, especially considering the abundant use of reverb by synthesists - including Carlos.

Turn off your amplifiers and sequencers and listen to a recital of Baroque organ music. Feel the 32' pedal reeds shake the ground, and the brilliant mixtures shimmer like a chorus of triangles. And notice how every inner voice can be followed, even in an elaborate fugue. That's the sound that the most advanced technology can only dream of immitating. Sorry, but this is one instrument that has withstood the test of time, and it didn't need the help of an electronic instruments web site review.

Just Me · Post by **Just Me** » Sun Aug 30, 2009 9:21 am

One of our local churches has recently installed a new (huge) pipe organ. Also a small 6 rank practice organ in another room. If you are a keyboardplayer, you can play the organ any weekday morning before 10am just by asking. There is NOTHING like playing such an instrument in the electric/electronic world. I just have a hard time getting used to the delay from keystrike to sound. MIDI delay has nothing on that! But throbing the building with the 32' and the resurection trumpets and flutes cutting through as clear as glass while Tibias lay a melody of their own is incredable. You should hear Karn Evil 9 1st part 1 on a pipe organ!

The Analog Organist · Post by **The Analog Organist** » Sun Aug 30, 2009 3:50 pm

Well said. As a part of their musical training, I think every synthesist should experience a pipe organ - not a digital imitation or a Hammond - but the real thing. Nothing in the electronic field could compare, because the pipe organ is an acoustic instrument. Let them play a D minor chord on the manuals with principals, reeds, mixtures, and couplers, and the root and fifth played in the pedal section. Sustain that mammoth chord for a minute, listen to the layers and layers of tones and timbres that compose it, and then release the chord and listen to true reverb. No muddiness; just magnificent depth.

I judge all my work with synthesizers, and the instruments as well, according to how closely it all compares with my experience playing church organs. For me, a good synthesizer is one whose quality of tone somewhat approaches that of an organ. In fact, that's why I prefer analog synthesizers in general, and Moogs or DSI's in particular. And that's why I would recommend Moog or DSI for Baroque music.

In order to reproduce the sound of a moderately-sized pipe organ on synthesizer, it would require perhaps forty independent sets of oscillators, filters, LFO's, and envelope generators. That would take care of the manuals. The same would have to go in to the pedals. Not surprisingly, the effort to electronically imitate the pipe organ sound has failed, so that sampling is now being used instead. Which is to say, the synthesizer couldn't do it; the sound is just too complex. When I hear an organ patch/preset on a modern electronic keyboard, I always think, "Now there's an organ sound from someone who's probalbly never played a pipe organ." It's not even close, because it couldn't be close. At best, electronic imitations can only remind you of the original instrument. There's just nothing like a real pipe organ.

So, let me repeat myself. The pipe organ has extraordinary clarity, and there is no reverb so utterly lacking in muddiness as the REAL reverb found in a church.

jgirv · Post by **jgirv** » Sun Aug 30, 2009 8:30 pm

...another, perhaps less polarizing view...

i have contributed to this forum infrequently, but read it every day. I enjoy the various viewpoints, and am often impressed by the musicality of many of the posters, both those experienced, and those just starting out.

Consider:

A beautiful synth, well played, and appropriately recorded, is a pretty wonderful sound. If you have the ears to combine it well, in any style of music, you can create high art. Of course, it doesn't come easily, or often.

I'm also a pipe organist, with a passion for electronics. The beauty, and the clarity of an organ depends on many, many factors, just as the great sound of synths depends on much.

Combine a great space (church/cathdral/hall), a hand-built organ by a fine maker, and the appropriate selection of registers (pipe types), AND some really excellent playing, and you have the potential for incredible music making. Including Bach. And it's really fun.

Combine a great space (electronically), a well-designed synth (I do love the Moogs, but others are also terrific), and appropriate programming, AND some great playing, and you have the potential for some incredible music. Including Bach. ...and it's fun.

I have had the pleasure of using both the pipe organ and my Moog LP at church... a great sound, indeed. --- anyway, keep the interesting music coming, no matter what you use. - jgirv

mayidunk · Post by **mayidunk** » Mon Aug 31, 2009 12:09 am

Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D Minor as played by E. Power Biggs on the Flentrop Organ at Harvard University, Busch Hall. If you have access to this recording, give it a listen.

Very nice!

Portamental · Post by **Portamental** » Mon Aug 31, 2009 2:45 am

or this one, my favorite.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pY08e_t ... re=related

Sound is only average (youtube). Anyway, the pipe organ is an instrument that can not be recorded to the greatness it is capable of... it has to be FELT.