Oramics

Musical Mirror

philosophical and poetic thoughts on music

Oramics

contribute by Daphne Oram on SERENDIPITY

September 1968 No.6 Price 2/6

The Magazine of the Institute of Contemporary Arts

Oramics is a method of converting graphic information into sound - it does not use sine, square, or sawtooth generators and so does not come into category Electronic Music, nor does it use manipulated natural sounds ad in Musique Concrete.

Perhaps you could call it Computer Music, but this term usually refers to music

wholly or partially composed by a digital computer, which, itself, directly operates the sine, square and sawtooth generetors of a classical electronic studio, or produces a manuscript score to be played later by instrumentalists.

So I've thought it best just to call my invention Oramics.

Oramics uses some digital programming, but it is really dependent on analogue techniques.

Recently, composers in America, too, have been investigating analogue timbre tecniques - they have been using vastly expensive computers, such as the I8M 7094,

to supply digital information, which is then converted to analogue ...

and thence directly into sound. '20,000 three digit numbers a second can describe not only any music that has ever been played but any music that ever could be played, if only we are able to choose the right numbers!

writes Dr. J.R. Pierce. But what a task supplying 20,000 three digit numbers for every second!

And alas, the expense! On the other hand how much more interesting and rewarding

than just using a digital computer to operate those oh-so-dull timbres - the sine, square, white noise and sawtooth generators with their filters,

shapers and modulators - that seems such a waste of a computer.

So, for Oramics, I have built equipment of the computer type (yet relatively inexpensive) which enables the composer to programme the timbre,

volume and vibrato directly by analogue information, and the pitch by both digital and analogue (digital for discrete steps, analogue for glissandi).

I have discarded the normal punched tape, or punched paper, input because, to my mind, the composer's best friend is his rubber - if he cannot erase how can he refashion;

how can he learn this new language if he cannot experiment empirically?

Have you ever tried going back and altering just one parameter in yards of punched tape or in stacks of punched cards?!

Oramics, therefore, allows the composer to programme graphically - using special ink which can easily be erased and altered in a moment.

The graphical notation is simple, direct, and enables the composer to draw in,

freehand fashion, nuances and subtleties which make the music more alive and less clinical than Electronic Music.

Oramics will therefore only attract the composer who feels he has the patience to specify by analogue exactly what he wants - and that's hard work!

For those uho would rather get the computer to do it all for them, there is always the random number table and the digital computer - they can then sit back and have music by the mile!