Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/LMJ_a_01005 byguest on 01 October 2021 32 ABSTRACT LEONARDO MUSICJOURNAL, Vol. 7,pp. 32–35,2017 works for new media that utilize the MIDI transcriptions transcriptions MIDI the utilize that media new for works sequent uses of Nancarrow’s transcribed scores, focusing on sub- the of examinationup-to-date an provides article this pamphlets.Further, formoutsidelished disparateof gallery pub- in appear Nancarrow’sto yet have details such scores; Trimpin’ssurrounding of details transcoding practical and 2011 interview [1]), this article aims to focus on the technical overviews of Trimpin’s career (exemplified by SashaLeitman’s scores. process and challenges he faced in transcoding Nancarrow’s technical the providespreviouslyintounpublishedinsights TrimpinTrimpincomposer (1951–). hereand builder ment poser Conlon Nancarrow (1912–1997) by sound artist, instru one such potentially vulnerable of body works: that of com- of applications further and preservation transcoding, the on focuses article This artworks. threaten disasters natural and humanconflict andage, with brittlegrowsandyellows paper degrades, film fade, Pigments transitory: inherently stored are created and are artworks which upon media The andinstallations. performances andtwoextended scores, includingtraditionalperformances ofanumberexampleusesthetranscodedNancarrow overview concludeswithan Thearticle extension, analysisandpreservation. thataffords toaformat composed uponavulnerablemediaformat and Nancarrow, works andonthesignificanceofactporting focusesonthecollaborationbetweenTrimpinthis conversion,thearticle Inadditiontopresentingthetechnologyutilizedin the MIDIformat. Studies forPlayerPianofromtheiroriginalhand-punchedrollsinto and inventorTrimpin composerConlonNancarrow’s converted focusesontheprocessbywhich,in1987,soundartist This article at theDawnofAgeMIDI Transcoding Nancarrow with thisissue. See
N I - rolls of paper readto be and interpreted by playerthe piano punched the musical events for his player piano studies into directly Nancarrow Indeed, output. musical resultant the and intentions composer’s the between connection direct very a Nancarrow’srepresent language, scores assembly or C as such computerlanguage low-level a in events musical expressingbyprecision more gain computermaymusician contemporary a as Muchpiano:player the hardwareof the to close was thatmanner a musicin the interfacingbywith [4]), technologies reproduction music other and loudspeaker phonograph, the of rise the (with popularity in diminished which the player piano and other clockwork instruments had during era an in Nancarrowworked Although egance” [3]. unparalleled fusion of excitement“almost visceral and el- structural an as Gann by described been have piano for player works of body whose impact,” “tremendous of poser for automatic instruments. He is today recognized as a com- composer notable most the perhaps is Nancarrow Conlon N (including the recent to extend the original pieces’ spatial and timbral expression. tensions of Nancarrow’s work that utilize the digitized scores concludes with an examination of a number of exemplar ex- didatesfor early into porting domain. digital the The article discussionofwhya side Nancarrow’s works canwere- ideal details of Trimpin’s novel piano roll reader apparatus along - provides technical article This youth.early its in was scores musical of archivization digital when time a at 1980s, the tions of Nancarrow’s work. explora- media new for offers affordances it the and reader chiefly on focus to aimsTrimpin’s article this [2], rollpiano into his relationship with Nancarrow and their collaborations Trimpin’sinsightsexamine excellent provide career artistic that works other While apparatus). percussion mechanical makes use of modified versions of Nancarrow’s experimental ancarr Trimpin’sNancarrow’sin of occurred transcoding works Nancarrow identifiedthe fine-grained control afforded ow ow and Nancarrow Percussion Orchestra T doi:10.1162/LMJ_a_01005 rim p in ©2017 ISAST , which itself. This low-abstraction-layer scoring allows listeners to of physical decay and damage: By the middle of the 1980s, hear directly Nancarrow’s compositional intentions without it was clear to Nancarrow that a system for preserving these the typical layer of musician-applied translation or mediation works was needed. applied to traditionally notated music (a concept explored During the second half of the 1970s, Trimpin focused on by automatic music scholar Arthur W.J.G. Ord-Hume in re- the development of tools that would allow for the transcod- lation to earlier automatophonic music storage media [5]). ing of punched player piano rolls from physical to electronic While this style of direct manipulation of temporal events media. Like those of other early innovators in mechatronic has become common among those using computer music sound sculpture, many of Trimpin’s instruments made use of composition approaches (such as sequencers, computer mu- electromagnetic actuators such as solenoids; these actuators sic programming languages and digital audio workstations), could be controlled by electronic circuits, allowing Trimpin Nancarrow was an early innovator long recognized as a sig- to create computer programs that served as scores for his nificant early forerunner in this field: As early as 1985 Curtis kinetic sound sculptures [8]. By developing devices capa- Roads cites Nancarrow’s works as significant predecessors of ble of reading punched-paper player piano rolls into elec- the rhythmic complexity possible within computer-mediated tronic memory, Trimpin could modify and play back player sonic arts [6]. Similarly, Thom Holmes describes Nancarrow’s piano media on new instruments of his design. One such music as “a conceptual precursor to the idea of programming instrument was Trimpin’s Piano Vorsetzer, an electronically and sequencing in electronic music” [7]. However, unlike a controlled piano player. In essence, Piano Vorsetzer was a programmatically entered electronic score, the laboriously precursor to the popular Yamaha Disklavier electronic player hand-punched piano rolls present a unique challenge: Due pianos, and Trimpin used it as a means both to play back to the relatively obscure device-specific nature of the me- transcoded existing scores and to create new and modified dia, the media was at risk of obsolescence as player pianos compositions for instruments. In this regard, Trimpin’s tech- decreased in abundance. Indeed, these original Studies that nological innovations allowed him to develop and expand were residing in Nancarrow’s Mexico City studio were at risk on the compositional innovations of automatic instrument composers such as Conlon Nancarrow and Ballet Mécanique composer George Antheil. With this foundation in the de- velopment of piano roll scanning and playback technology, Trimpin was, by the late 1980s, well poised to lead in the transcoding, preservation and extended application of Nan- carrow’s media.
The Piano Roll Reader Like many of his sound sculptures and instruments, Trimpin’s piano roll reader (illustrated in Fig. 1) utilizes sur- plus components and found electronics. The main source of components for the roll reader were salvaged surplus opti- cal punched tape readers; these readers were used to read data stored as punched holes on one-inch-wide tape into the memory of computers. Such readers were typically eight bits wide, consisting of a linear array of eight phototransistors positioned below the tape, with accompanying light sources positioned above the tape. As the tape was scrolled past the sensors, one byte at a time could be read into memory for storage and processing. In essence, this system is akin to the means by which player piano scores are read by a player piano, but with the traditional pianos’ pneumatic mecha- nisms being replaced by optoelectronics: The presence of a light brighter than a specified threshold indicates a logical high, much as the presence of air pressure in a player piano indicates that a note event should occur. In the late 1970s, such punched tape computer data storage systems had been largely replaced by denser magnetic storage systems (includ- ing magnetic tape), and Trimpin was able to obtain the op- tical punched tape readers inexpensively as surplus items. By 1980, given the wide availability of such optical punched tape scanners, Trimpin was able to fabricate an 88-bit-wide Fig. 1. The optoelectronic piano roll reader developed by Trimpin and used roll reader whose phototransistors were positioned to allow in the scanning of Conlon Nancarrow’s hand-punched piano rolls. (© Trimpin) player piano rolls to be scanned in real time. Upon scanning,
Murphy and Trimpin, Transcoding Nancarrow at the Dawn of the Age of MIDI 33
Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/LMJ_a_01005 by guest on 01 October 2021 Fig. 2. Nancarrow Percussion Orchestra, consisting of an array of percussion devices originally developed by Conlon Nancarrow and made electromechanical by Trimpin. (© Trimpin)
the data was stored on a cassette tape (replaced in 1984 by punched holes. During the many decades during which he a 3.5" floppy disk) for further modification and playback on had engaged in his hand-punching process, Nancarrow’s mechatronic instruments such as the early versions of the practice had been to cover each mistakenly punched note Piano Vorsetzer piano player. with a small piece of clear cellophane tape, preventing the pneumatic player piano tracker from identifying the incor- rect punch as a note event. While the cellophane tape pre- Transcoding to MIDI vented the transmission of the pneumatic energy, it did not By 1987, Trimpin had expanded his piano roll reader from 88 prevent Trimpin’s optoelectronically based piano roll reader to 96 notes, allowing for the reading of an additional eight from transmitting light through the clear tape and picking accent notes on a piano roll. Further, Trimpin had ported his up the signal on its array of phototransistors. Due to the roll reader hardware to output notes in the then-new Musical large body of work featuring the cellophane tape-based cor- Instrument Digital Interface (MIDI) format, allowing note rections, the manual correction of the errors after scanning pitch, duration and dynamic data to be encoded in a com- was deemed by Trimpin to be restrictively time consuming, pact and portable format. It was at this stage that Trimpin especially considering the event-dense nature of many of approached Conlon Nancarrow, offering to travel to Nan- Nancarrow’s Studies. carrow’s Mexico City studio in order to transcode the exist- To address the false positive events produced by the op- ing Studies into MIDI format. Nancarrow, far from rejecting toelectronics’ interactions with the cellophane tape repairs, the move toward the electronic composition of player piano Trimpin opted to produce a second version of his piano roll studies, embraced the opportunity for both the archiving and reader. This roll reader forewent the phototransduction- future use and extension of his work. based approach, instead utilizing a pneumatic transduction In order to test the quality of the transcoded Studies, approach intended to more closely match the functioning Trimpin brought his Piano Vorsetzer to Nancarrow’s studio. of a traditional player piano’s roll-reading mechanism. This He positioned the Piano Vorsetzer above the keys of Nancar- second version of the piano roll reader consisted of a vacuum row’s piano, allowing the pieces to be tested for accuracy as cleaner–based suction source and a linear array of pressure they were transcoded. After copying a number of example switches. In the absence of a punched hole, the pressure pro- pieces, he played back the resultant MIDI files through the duced by the vacuum cleaner would be blocked by the paper solenoid-equipped MIDI-compatible Piano Vorsetzer. Im- as well as by any cellophane tape–based correction. In the mediately, Nancarrow identified extraneous notes playing presence of a punched hole, however, the air pressure at the alongside the correct ones. Assuming that the problem lay pressure switch would change and would be registered as a within the electronics of the piano roll reader, Trimpin tested MIDI event. With this problem solved, Trimpin was able to the reader by feeding in a known-to-work 88-note test roll; commence the process of transcoding all of Conlon Nancar- the test roll scanned and played back correctly. Curious, row’s hand-punched piano rolls into the MIDI format. Once Nancarrow and Trimpin examined the rolls that had been rendered as electronically stored media, these works were hand-punched by Nancarrow. Trimpin noticed the pres- ready for long-term preservation and extension, as discussed ence of small pieces of clear cellophane tape covering some in the following section.
34 Murphy and Trimpin, Transcoding Nancarrow at the Dawn of the Age of MIDI
Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/LMJ_a_01005 by guest on 01 October 2021 Preservation, Playback and Extension wooden shoes struck with electromechanical actuators [9]; The act of transcoding Nancarrow’s pieces for player piano this interpretation of the Nancarrow studies premiered at the into the MIDI format has created three key avenues through Sheridan Opera House in 1989. Similarly, in 1997 Trimpin which Nancarrow’s work may be explored: the porting of debuted ConlonInPurple, a work featuring a hanging array of the pieces to a format that allows for simplified analysis and five octaves worth of tuned bars and accompanying solenoid- distribution, the playback of the pieces in a traditional man- based percussion mechanisms. ConlonInPurple extends Nan- ner and the extension of the pieces to new instruments, ar- carrow’s piece into the spatial domain, “exploding” the pitched rangements and presentation contexts. This article concludes and rhythmic elements into a room-filling sound sculpture by briefly examining each of these avenues. through which gallery visitors may walk [10]. While MIDI is a relatively low-resolution format by con- More recently, Trimpin realized the Nancarrow Percussion temporary standards, its temporal and pitch resolution is Orchestra. This 2012 showing at the Berkeley Art Museum more than sufficient to serve as a digital storage format for and Pacific Film Archive at the University of California, player piano compositions. The Nancarrow compositions Berkeley, celebrated the centennial of Conlon Nancarrow’s transcoded by Trimpin may therefore now be archived, cop- birth. The orchestra (which featured an array of modified ied and shared. Of particular interest from an archival and percussion instruments originally developed by Nancar- scholarly perspective is the as-yet-unrealized potential to use row, illustrated in Fig. 2) epitomizes Trimpin’s practice of the Nancarrow MIDI scores as the data set for analysis tech- extending and spatially expanding the original scores, play- niques based on the advances made within the field of music ing a variety of Nancarrow’s compositions across an array information retrieval. With the scores in an electronic for- of pianos and percussion devices [11]. The Nancarrow Per- mat, there exists much potential for future work to be done cussion Orchestra, alongside ConlonInPurple and Klompen, utilizing semi-automated techniques to analyze and study the serves as a hybridization of Trimpin’s approach and Nancar- transcoded Nancarrow compositions. row’s composition: After decades of studying Nancarrow’s While the possibility of detailed music information re- compositions, Trimpin has brought his sculptural sound art trieval–based examination of the Nancarrow MIDI transcrip- installation background to bear, fusing the “visceral excite- tions represents an avenue for future study, Trimpin has made ment and structural elegance” of Nancarrow’s scores with use of the MIDI files both in traditional playback contexts in the reactive instruments that spread the sound throughout collaboration with Nancarrow and in new interpretations of a listening space. Indeed, while the act of transcoding Nan- the MIDI files realized through novel instruments. In 1989, carrow’s scores from their original piano rolls into the MIDI Trimpin and Nancarrow first exhibited the transcodedStudies format is a worthwhile endeavor from a scholarly perspec- at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. These studies were played tive (affording much potential digital analysis of the scores), back as they were composed: utilizing mechanically actuated Trimpin’s extension, interpretation and reinstrumentation of pianos. At the same time, Trimpin developed an interpreta- the compositions has exposed many new audiences to Nan- tion of the Studies on Klompen, an array of MIDI-controlled carrow’s groundbreaking works.
References and Notes 9 This is shown in Jim Murphy, Ajay Kapur and Dale Carnegie, “Musi- cal Robotics in a Loudspeaker World: Developments in Alternative 1 Sasha Leitman, “Trimpin: An Interview,” Computer Music Journal Approaches to Localization and Spatialization,” Leonardo Music 35, No. 4, 12–27 (2011). Journal 22 (2012) pp. 41–48. 2 See, for example, preeminent Nancarrow scholar Kyle Gann’s chap- 10 ConlonInPurple: Sound Installation by Trimpin, press release, Suyama ter (“Trimpin, Nancarrow, and the Transfer of Memory”) in Anne Space, Seattle, WA (1 July 1999). Focke, ed., Trimpin: Contraptions for Art and Sound (Seattle: Uni- versity of Washington Press, 2011). 11 Trimpin: Nancarrow Percussion Orchestra / MATRIX 244, press re- lease, University of California, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific 3 Kyle Gann, “Nancarrow, Conlon,” in Grove Music Online, Oxford Film Archive, Berkeley, CA (2012). Music Online (Oxford Univ. Press):
7 Thom Holmes, Electronic and Experimental Music, 2nd Ed. (New Trimpin is a Seattle-based artist whose artwork focuses on York: Routledge, 2002). p. 235. the development of kinetic sound sculptures. Trimpin’s work 8 Trimpin’s early automated installations are discussed in more detail has appeared internationally, and he is a 1997 recipient of a in Steve Peters’ chapter “Archival Investigations” in Focke [2]. MacArthur Fellowship.
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